Texas A&M committee says firing of professor over gender lesson was unjustified

A Texas A&M committee ruled that the university’s decision to fire a professor after a student was kicked out of class for objecting to a children’s literature class on gender identity was unjustified.

A video recorded earlier this year by a student showed her asking Melissa McCoul, a lecturer in the English department, whether teaching gender ideology is legal, pointing to President Donald Trump’s executive orders to remove the subject from higher education.

The internal committee ruled that the university failed to follow proper procedures and failed to prove there were good reasons to fire McCoul. The committee voted unanimously this week that “the summary dismissal of Dr. McCoul was not justified.”

The university said in a statement that interim president Tommy Williams received the committee’s non-binding recommendation and would make a decision after reviewing it.

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The internal committee ruled that the university failed to follow proper procedures and failed to prove that there was just cause to fire the professor. (PA)

McCoul’s attorney, Amanda Reichek, said the dispute will likely end up in court because the university appears intent on continuing to fight and the interim president faces similar political pressure.

“Dr. McCoul claims that A&M’s flimsy reasons for his termination are a pretext for the University’s true motivation: capitulation to Governor Abbott’s demands,” Reichek said in a statement.

Gov. Greg Abbott and other Republicans had called for her firing after watching the video.

“Fire the professor who acted contrary to Texas law,” the governor wrote on X in September.

The video sparked public criticism of university president Mark Welsh, who later resigned, although he did not give a reason and never mentioned the video in his resignation announcement.

Gov. Greg Abbott and other Republicans had called for the professor to be fired after viewing the video. (Mike Kemp/In pictures via Getty Images)

State Rep. Brian Harrison said in a statement to Fox News Digital at the time that “Texas A&M’s liberal president must be fired and all DEI and LGBTQ indoctrination reversed.”

The opening of the video Harrison posted to social media showed a slide titled “Gender Unicorn” that noted different gender identities and expressions.

Students in the class told the Texas Tribune that they were discussing a book called “Jude Saves the World,” which is about a middle school student who comes out as non-binary. Several other books included in the course also address LGBTQ+ issues.

After a back-and-forth over the legality of teaching classes about gender identity, McCoul asked the student to leave the class. Harrison also released other recordings of the student’s meeting with Welsh, which showed the then-university president defending McCoul’s teaching.

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President Donald Trump has signed executive orders aimed at eliminating teaching about gender identity in higher education. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Welsh said that when McCoul was fired, he learned that she had continued to teach content in a children’s literature class “that did not meet any reasonable expectations of the course’s standard curriculum.” He also said the course content did not match the descriptions in the catalog.

“If we allow course content to be taught that is different from what is advertised, we are failing our students. When it comes to our academic offerings, we must keep our word to our students and to the state of Texas,” he said in September, noting that College of Arts and Sciences leaders had approved plans to continue teaching course content that was not consistent with the published course description.

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Earlier this month, the Texas A&M Regents issued a new policy stating that no academic course “shall advocate racial or gender ideology, or topics related to sexual orientation or gender identity” unless approved in advance by the campus president.

Fox News Digital has contacted Texas A&M for comment.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.