Consolidated majors’ last students speak on academic changes – The Daily Texan

Heather Wood grew up reading Percy Jackson, watching anime and listening to K-pop in the small panhandle town of Shamrock, Texas, home to less than 2,000 people.

“I wasn’t exposed to anything related to women’s and gender studies,” Wood said. “(Before) I went to college, I had these beliefs, but I didn’t have any way to learn about them.”

Wood started at UT in 2023, the same year the department of women’s, gender and sexuality studies was elevated from a center to a department. The program was consolidated before she made it to her senior year.

As the last students with these majors prepare for registration in November, the department of women’s, gender and sexuality studies not only lost its department status, but none of its classes will count toward the core curriculum starting spring 2027.

Wood will be allowed to complete her degree, but new students can no longer enroll in the program.

University President Jim Davis announced in February the creation of the department of social and cultural analysis, which consolidated four departments of ethnic and gender studies: American studies; Mexican American and Latina/o studies; women’s, gender and sexuality studies; and African and African diaspora studies. The University said it wanted to reduce the number of degree programs with “narrow” subject matter.

In August, a committee of social and cultural analysis faculty submitted a proposal to the provost’s office recommending the elimination of the race, indigeneity and migration major and the LGBTQ+ studies minor.

The proposal also suggested the creation of a new interdisciplinary major — social and cultural analysis. The new major would exclude American studies and urban studies, which would remain majors on their own.

Department faculty wrote in the proposal that they still believed every major — excluding race, indigeneity and migration — should remain as an independent offering. The chair of the department wrote to faculty in September that the provost’s office rejected their request to retain majors.

The University then began a review to determine which courses would retain core credit status under the new core curriculum President Davis announced the prior month. Internal documents show that no course offered under women’s and gender studies retained its eligibility, while other fields of study in the department received a mix of rejections and approvals.

The sweeping effects of academic changes in the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis are still ongoing, though some students have already felt their impact.

Alfredo Campos, a Mexican American and Latina/o studies and government sophomore from the Rio Grande Valley, entered UT pursuing computer science, but later changed his major. Campos joined Students for a Democratic Society’s campaign against President Donald Trump’s 2025 offer of federal funding to the University in exchange for certain requirements from the Trump Administration. The University never agreed to the deal.

“That was really my first time hearing about Latino studies or the ethnic studies majors,” Campos said. “I kept hearing some of the members (of SDS) talk about classes they had, talk about professors, how they’re really good, how they were interesting.”

Last November, Campos heard professors suggesting the consolidation of ethnic and gender studies departments was coming. He would later add the Latina/o Studies major to support the program.

“At that time the quick tactic on everyone’s mind to defend it was to try to enroll in as (many) classes as possible,” Campos said.

Senior Kaitlin Boyce Johnson decided to major in anthropology and African and African diaspora studies to feel more connected to her culture. Boyce Johnson was born in Memphis, Tennessee, and moved to Texas at 13.

“I was isolated from my Black culture that I was used to, being back home in Memphis,” Boyce Johnson said.

Boyce Johnson heard rumors that her department would be consolidated at a protest in fall 2025. She said she thinks that putting multiple fields of study under one title will diminish student interest in the programs.

“What does ‘social and cultural analysis’ mean?” Boyce Johnson said. “I feel like there won’t be that much attention grab or interest.”

Junior Cesar Corralejo came to UT from a border town as a business major and later added Mexican American and Latina/o studies after taking a one-off class in the department. In spring 2026, Corralejo said he was sitting in his finance class when he got the email from Davis that the Mexican American and Latina/o studies major would be consolidated.

Corralejo said he dislikes what he describes as unfair targeting of ethnic and gender studies programs by academic changes, and is upset his major will not be offered to students moving forward.

“It feels like if our chairs and professors don’t have much power, ultimately what power do students really have?” Corralejo said. “(It feels) like we’re more viewed as a product rather than someone with power.”