The University of North Texas recently refused to fund a journalism professor’s participation in an upcoming academic conference, stating that its focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion conflicts with state law.
Tracy Everbach is the professor, and she plans to attend the Association of Education in Journalism and Mass Communication’s conference in August anyway, KTEN 10 News reports. She will be giving a presentation about a student project on “common media tropes around Indigenous Americans,” according to the report.
Recently, Everbach said the public university denied her request to cover her expenses to the event due to a 2023 state ban on funding DEI programs. She said she was surprised by the denial because she has been attending the conference for decades.