In response to questions about why A&M discontinued the medical care, a university spokesperson said its growing student population and the resulting strain on the A.P. Beutel Health Center require officials to continuously review the services they offer and how they use the center’s resources. The spokesperson noted that the university has invested more in mental health care following a national rise in college students seeking it out.
Transgender and queer students are skeptical of that explanation and believe the university acted in response to pressure from conservative groups. They say the move shows the university is not willing to support them equally.
“It just seems that they don’t take the same level of care to address concerns of the queer community as they would other communities,” Klatt said.
Students saw the move as part of a political environment that has become increasingly hostile against LGBTQ+ people in Texas. And it comes as the state’s public universities face top-down pressure to appease Republican leaders — or risk incurring their wrath during next year’s legislative session.
Don’t you just love that “small government?” FFS, y’all. Please vote like people’s futures depend upon it.
If you choose to fight the good fight and stay in Texas (or just need in-state tuition), UT in Austin is definitely the easier choice out of the two big public flagships. You can usually count on their admin to do the bare minimum to keep the worst of the statewide officeholders off their back, and the institution generally wants to be seen as keeping up with the best of the academic establishment in the country. A&M is almost custom-made to culturally go the other way, right down to a fixation on tradition and militarized conformity (without actually sending a huge number of students into the military anymore), and a culture of grievance and reflexively trying to differentiate themselves from UT.
The actual faculty and staff probably only skews slightly right of the average university, but the students (including their shitty parents, hell maybe it’s mostly the parents), the alumni, and especially the donor class pressure A&M in ways that you don’t usually see in public higher education.