\n Front entrance of Texas Christian University in Fort Worth with TCU sign, trees, and campus buildings in the background | Imabe by Chad Robertson Media\/Shutterstock <\/p>\n
Fall 2026 graduate-course syllabi obtained by The Dallas Express show Texas Christian University placing \u201csettler colonialism,\u201d \u201cstructural violence,\u201d decolonial thinking and group \u201ccomplicity\u201d at the center of two College of Education courses.<\/p>\n
The documents do not present those concepts only as historical subjects for debate. One syllabus describes a land acknowledgment as part of \u201cthe ongoing process of breaking colonial mindsets\u201d and asks how students may perpetuate colonial harm. Another says TCU continues to benefit from the forceful removal of Indigenous people.<\/p>\n
TCU requires all Curriculum Studies students to take \u201cCurriculum History.\u201d<\/p>\n
Course connects evil to settler colonialism<\/p>\n
The three-credit graduate seminar \u201cEvil and Education,\u201d taught by Cathryn van Kessel, opens with a lengthy land acknowledgment stating that \u201cTCU, like all our lives and institutions, exists on Indigenous land.\u201d It recognizes the Wichita and Affiliated Tribes and encourages students to consider their relationship with the land.<\/p>\n
The syllabus says<\/a> educators should teach \u201cthe persistent trauma stemming from settler colonialism\u201d as well as Indigenous \u201crefusals, resistance, and survivance.\u201d It then describes a land acknowledgment as \u201ca small act\u201d that is insufficient by itself.<\/p>\n According to the syllabus, that acknowledgment forms part of \u201cthe ongoing process of breaking colonial mindsets\u201d and uplifting \u201cdecolonial and anticolonial options.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThis course (although it is about evil) is intended to work toward being in good relations with each other and the Land,\u201d the syllabus states. It asks how different conceptions of evil could help students recognize how \u201cany of us can (and do) perpetuate the harms of settler colonialism on this Land and elsewhere.\u201d<\/p>\n The course also addresses \u201cstructural violence.\u201d Van Kessel writes that educators should care for students subjected to such structures as well as students \u201cfrom groups who must come to terms with their complicity in those structures.\u201d<\/p>\n Required course cites removal and reparative accountability<\/p>\n A second fall 2026 course, \u201cCurriculum History,\u201d is taught by Pablo Montes. Its syllabus<\/a> states that the course is required for all Curriculum Studies students. TCU\u2019s graduate catalog<\/a> also lists Curriculum History in the United States among the content requirements for its Curriculum Studies doctoral program.<\/p>\n Montes\u2019 syllabus contains a \u201cLand Protocol, Responsibility, and Accountability\u201d section that goes beyond TCU\u2019s official acknowledgment.<\/p>\n \u201cThe fact remains that TCU benefited\/benefits from the forceful removal\u201d of the Kirikir\u0294i:s people, the syllabus states. The syllabus characterizes TCU\u2019s relationship with the Kirikir\u0294i:s and other Indigenous communities as one marked by \u201cdispossession, forceful removal, and violence.\u201d<\/p>\n The syllabus says Indigenous scholars have criticized acknowledgments that lack \u201cmaterial accountability, reparative considerations, and spiritual importance.\u201d It quotes Theresa Stewart-Ambo and K. Wayne Yang arguing that recognition alone is not a decolonizing act but a \u201cfirst step.\u201d Montes then invites TCU faculty, staff, students and the institution to work toward \u201cbecoming guests on these ancestral territories.\u201d<\/p>\n The course schedule includes a section titled \u201cReclaiming Multicultural Curriculum.\u201d It asks students to consider how curriculum is tied to \u201crace, ethnicity, gender, migration, and class.\u201d Topics include \u201cEugenics, Education, and Race Science,\u201d Native American curricular history, Asian American curricular history, and Latinx and Mexican American curricular history.<\/p>\n Required texts include The White Architects of Black Education, Eugenics and Education in America, and Reclaiming the Multicultural Roots of US Curriculum. Students are also assigned W.E.B. Du Bois\u2019 1935 essay \u201cDoes the Negro Need Separate Schools?\u201d<\/p>\n TCU encourages acknowledgments in syllabi<\/p>\n The course language appears within a broader university initiative. TCU\u2019s guidance<\/a> calls for using its land acknowledgment at major official events and in syllabi, employee orientations, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) activities, and job searches.<\/p>\n TCU says the acknowledgment is \u201cmore than a statement\u201d and seeks through it to foster recognition of how the colonization of Native Americans and their lands shaped TCU\u2019s \u201cpolicies, practices, curricula and activities.\u201d TCU adopted the statement in 2021 after the university\u2019s Native American Advisory Circle developed it and the Chancellor\u2019s Cabinet approved it.<\/p>\n TCU\u2019s current catalog<\/a> describes Curriculum Studies as interdisciplinary and rooted partly in cultural studies and critical theory. It says the field values \u201can ethic of social action that honors diversity.\u201d<\/p>\n TCU maintains LGBTQ+ advocacy programs<\/p>\n Separate from the two courses, TCU continues to operate dedicated LGBTQ+ Resources<\/a> through its Intercultural Center. The program says it seeks to foster a \u201cconnected and affirming environment\u201d and offers workshops for students, faculty, staff, classes and university departments.<\/p>\n The university also operates Qmunity<\/a>, which engages LGBTQIA+ students and allies to identify issues facing those students and \u201cadvocate for solutions\u201d on campus. TCU\u2019s staff directory<\/a> lists an assistant director assigned specifically to LGBTQ+ Resources.<\/p>\n Texas DEI restrictions do not govern TCU<\/p>\n