Having worked alongside so many dedicated members of this university for the past 30 years, I've seen firsthand the remarkable impact Texas A&M has on students, communities and our state. I am honored by the trust and confidence of the Board of Regents and Chancellor [Glenn] Hegar, and if given the opportunity, I look forward to building on the incredible work already underway and leading Texas A&M into its next chapter.
For its 40th year, the popular culture and technology festival in Austin embarked on its experimental era. Amid renovations to the Austin Convention Center, which won't reopen until 2029, the festival chose to spill it all outward into downtown Austin. The temporary closure of the center led to what the festival's organizers dubbed the Congress Avenue Block Party-a long stretch of city blocks that shut down traffic to become occupied by various activations.
In 2023, Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed Senate Bill 17 into law, banning diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives at public institutions across the state. In the years since, the University of Texas at Austin has been steadily remaking itself in the image demanded by conservative legislators across town.
In reality, the Lone Star State is vast-and incredibly diverse-spanning more than 250,000 square miles of major cities, small towns, beach getaways, country roads, and border communities. For travelers arriving in Texas, one thing quickly becomes clear: the Lone Star State isn't just one destination-it's many.
WAC play features the Tarleton State Texans (13-13, 4-9 WAC) at home against the Southern Utah Thunderbirds (9-17, 5-8 WAC) on Thursday, February 19, 2026 at 8 p.m. ET. In its most recent game, Tarleton State topped Abilene Christian on Monday, 65-62 in OT. Kade Douglas scored a team-high 24 points (and contributed one assist and three rebounds). Southern Utah was victorious in its previous game versus UT Arlington, 78-73, on Saturday. Elijah Duval starred with 20 points, plus two boards and three assists.
Chris Hall is an ecommerce entrepreneur turned media operator. His new "Ecomm Cowboy" show broadcasts live Monday through Friday on X and YouTube. The mission, he says, is twofold: deliver daily news to sellers and offer companionship to those working alone. Chris first appeared on the podcast in 2023 as the marketing head of a D2C brand. In this our latest conversation, he addresses his goals for Ecomm Cowboy, production challenges, and, yes, the power of AI tools for one-person brands.
On a chilly day before Christmas, Teresa Rivas helped a tween boy pick out a new winter coat. "Get the bigger one, the one with the waterproof layer, mijo," she said, before helping him pull it onto his string-bean frame. Rivas provides guidance counseling at Owen Goodnight Middle School in San Marcos, Texas. She talks with students about their goals and helps if they're struggling in class. She's also a trained navigator placed there by a nonprofit called Communities in Schools.
"At this time, no changes to faculty or staff positions, reporting structures, or job responsibilities are planned," Mario Torres, dean of UTSA's College of Education and Human Development, wrote in an email, according to the Express-News. He described the change as "an exciting opportunity" that would lead to a "more prosperous future" for the academic programs. He said a task force composed of faculty, students and staff would help shape the new department.
Over the past several years, Texas has moved from griping about "woke campuses" to fundamentally restructuring the governance, curriculum, and tenure protections of its public universities. The cumulative effect is not reform. It's consolidation of power. And the target is the traditional independence of higher education. TL:DR - send your kids to Texas public universities, and it's like having the Texas legislature teach your kids.
This is a striking decision at a moment when public confidence in higher education is eroding. It is also puzzling because rigorous research and evaluation have demonstrated, over and over, the value of the work of centers for teaching and learning, including positive impacts on student learning outcomes, institutional effectiveness and faculty development.
The mock funeral was a protest against the university administration's plan to overhaul the college by consolidating its departments into four thematic schools including one devoted to human narratives and creative expressions, encompassing what was previously taught in the English, classics, languages and Latino Studies departments, among others. Fears over the future of the humanities aren't limited to New Jersey's second-largest public university.
"We're bringing together two really significant and very diverse institutions, and it's a big-scale operation, so we'll be able to look at a lot of things across a lot of different environments," said Mindy Tarlow, senior fellow and professor at NYU's Marron Institute of Urban Management, where the lab will initially be housed.