(Todd A. Smith)
Attending college often changes the perspective of those who choose to go.
Not only do colleges challenge students in the classroom, but they also challenge students outside of the classroom by exposing people to different views on race, politics and religion.
However, as colleges throughout Texas try to acquiesce to President Donald Trump’s war on diversity, they are ensuring that their students are not prepared for success in a country that is becoming more diverse by the year and a planet that seems to get hotter by the day.
Samantha Ketterer of the Houston Chronicle reported, “The Texas A&M University System Board of Regents cut more than 250 courses from the core curriculum across 11 universities on Thursday, deciding they do not follow new state standards of being ‘foundational and fundamental.’
“Among the deletions were various courses about women and gender; climate and the environment; as well as Black and Latino history, literature and culture. Courses removed from the core can still be taken as electives, or even required in certain degree programs. Still, the change could lead to fewer people taking the classes.”
And unfortunately, that might lead to fewer discussions on those topics, which could result in less understanding, unity and change.
While conservatives might say that those deleted core courses eliminate bloated student schedules and financial burdens, what it really is about is maintaining the status quo when it comes to race, gender and science, even to the detriment of the world’s future.
As a child, I developed a passion for Black history.
My father made me get a library card and periodically check out books.
I would have to tell my father what I learned after reading those books.
My passion for social justice and ending racism began because of those trips to the Everett Collier Library in northwest Houston.
I often would have discussions with my classmates, Black and White, in between or before classes.
Many Black and White students learned from the information that I shared with them, and hopefully that led to less racism and more unity.
I can vividly remember a White classmate thinking that the Black Panther Party was the Black equivalent of the Ku Klux Klan until a conversation with me and our ninth-grade history teacher Mr. head corrected her assumption.
It was probably a similar conversation that led my ninth grade algebra teacher Mr. Lorber to introduce me to a book entitled The Chosen by Chaim Potok.
Mr. Lorber was Jewish.
And he had heard me talk about the plight of my ancestors.
But he wanted to share with me what his ancestors endured during the Holocaust and beyond.
Years later, may sister’s passion for the Holocaust exposed me to more stories about the Jewish plight.
That commonality that people face due to oppression made me an advocate fighting against any form of discrimination and bigotry.
But without those lessons being taught, whether a part of the curriculum or extracurricular, who knows what my mind state would be right now.
I might be a person who only cares about Black people.
I might not care about the oppression that the people of Ukraine face at the hands of Russia.
I might not care about the discrimination that Muslims are facing at the hands of so-called Christians because I might only care about Christians because we share the same faith.
I might not care about police brutality faced by White and Hispanic Americans because I might only be knowledgeable about the police brutality that my people endure.
That self-centeredness or selfishness is one of the reasons why America has so much hatred going around.
We have an us against them mentality, which makes us our own worst enemy because many of us cannot see a fellow American, or brother or sister, if they look or believe differently than we do.
Those courses on race and gender allow students to be exposed to things that could change their lives for the better.
But instead, many will not learn those lessons because they will not be forced to visit that proverbial library that my father made me visit to educate myself beyond what the school administrators saw as important.
And that is such a shame because many White students who choose to attend a school like Texas A&M might not have been exposed to too many people from different races and cultures, unless they came from an urban area like Dallas, Houston or San Antonio.
Many will come with prejudices towards others because of who raised them and the lack of diversity where they were raised.
And seeing that Texas A&M is not very diverse, besides their athletics program, the students will probably graduate with many of the same prejudices because they were not required to take classes that might have expanded their horizons.
Additionally, the fact that Texas A&M is not requiring courses on climate change is just stupid because science cannot be debated like racism can.
Nevertheless, conservatives must realize that they can restrict courses and ban books, but they cannot ban people from attaining knowledge.
They cannot ban conversations in the dorms.
They cannot ban conversations on road trips.
They cannot ban conversations at fraternity houses.
And they cannot ban discussions on social media, even though social media companies try to limit intelligent conversations on their platforms in favor of ignorance via their algorithms.
Therefore, they can never stop the truth, even though they are trying to make it harder for the truth to come to the light.
- Movie Review: ‘731’ Another Film That is a Warning - September 26, 2025
