COLLEGE STATION, Texas — An internal investigation released on Thursday found numerous high-level Texas A&M University System officials, including the former president of the university, the chancellor of the university system, and members of the board of regents, were involved in discussions on how to handle professor Kathleen McElroy's job offer.
"The correspondence reveals quite clearly that President Banks was a vehicle for political influence. That influence came from outside sources, was channeled through the regents, and then through her," Texas A&M Journalism Professor Nathan Crick said. "That process has in effect corrupted a normal process that is done out in the open."
Details in the report contradict former University President Katherine Banks' claims that she was unaware of any changes made by the school to weaken its offer to Dr. McElroy after individuals within the university system and outside it criticized her hiring.
In fact, the review found that she was one of the people that pushed for the changes to be made to the terms that McElroy would later reject, which eventually led to Banks' resignation.
"Sadly I think things can get worse," Crick said. As much as people care about this university and love it, as long as those influences are out there that are trying to dictate what this university can be according to a very rigid ideology, then this university will never become the great university that it deserves to be."
Professor Crick warns that this is just the latest example of much larger issues in the U.S.
He pointed to how politicians in Florida, Virginia, and even Texas are turning places of secondary and higher education into the battlegrounds of culture wars.
"People across the nation should not see this as a Texas A&M story," Crick said. "Texas A&M is a bellwether for political influence across the nation, as people seek to impose ideological straitjackets upon academic institutions, and we should all see that as a threat."
Also on KAGS: