COLLEGE STATION, Texas (KBTX) – Texas A&M University says it is canceling six courses after reviewing over 5,400 course syllabi to ensure they meet Texas A&M System policies on curriculum.
In November 2025, the Texas A&M Board of Regents approved a policy requiring campus presidents to sign off on courses that could be seen as “advocating race and gender ideology or topics related to sexual orientation or gender identity.”
That policy was later revised in December when Regents voted to ban most discussions of these topics in introductory or core curriculum classes. Exceptions could be made if administrators determined the material serves a “necessary educational purpose.”
Some Texas A&M faculty, students and alumni have voiced concerns about these policies, saying these restrictions would curb meaningful conversations in the classroom and border on censorship.
Joan Wolf, an associate professor at A&M, described the moment she found out the course she helped build from scratch in 2005 is being wound down.
“It was almost like looking at somebody who’s been on a respirator for a really long time, and then they finally go, and you feel the grief at that time,” Wolf said.
She’s not the only one upset with recent changes. Sociology major Angelina Garcia said shes disapointed that a course she chose to take is now being discontinued.
“It’s targeting women and queer people as a whole, which is again perfectly in line with the agenda that is being pushed, not only in the state and this country as a whole,” Garcia said. “It also is just, it makes my heart hurt because these are truly just people that are trying to explain the systems that were set up in place by these things within our society.”
Provost Alan Sams did not list which courses were canceled, but said they did not “comply with A&M System policy.” A total of 48 courses were granted exceptions.
“Exceptions were granted primarily in graduate-level clinical programs, such as Psychological and Brain Sciences, and courses in the Naresh K. Vashisht College of Medicine, where these topics are academically relevant and necessary to prepare clinical professionals,” Sams said.
Sams also said the university is ending the Women’s and Gender Studies program to comply with system policies.
“Additionally, as part of the broader implementation of the recently updated System policy, we made the difficult decision to begin winding down the Women’s and Gender Studies (WGST) academic programs, including the BA, BS, Graduate Certificate and the Minor,” Sams said in an announcement posted to the university’s website on Friday.
Copyright 2026 KBTX. All rights reserved.