Read the full transcript of UT President Davis and Board Chairman Kevin Eltife

The Daily Texan sat down with UT President Jim Davis and Kevin Eltife, the UT System Board of Regents Chairman, shortly after the Thursday board meeting where Davis announced changes to UT’s core curriculum. This marks the Texan’s second exclusive interview with Davis, after the Texan spoke to him in April. Davis and Eltife discussed the principles and discussion that guided the UT Austin Core Curriculum Task Force in their report released on the same day.

The Daily Texan: Well, it’s nice for both of you to be here. We thank you very much for agreeing to this interview. Big news today. For the first time in 20 years, the core curriculum at UT is going to change. You guys just announced that today. … I know this has been a big priority for you (President Davis) since you (came) here to UT. As you came here and sat down with the faculty, we’ve heard a lot of themes come up from this new curriculum. We’ve heard the simplification of classes, standardization, but also a response to the changing times. The last time the core curriculum was reviewed, the iPhone didn’t exist. I wasn’t alive. Can you talk to me a little bit about which of those three things — simplification, standardization or the changing times? Which one of those was really your north star — your real drivers for this?

Jim Davis: That is really good insight. All three are the three legs of the stool. All three: simple, so that students can navigate a core and be successful; balanced and full that way, so they have a really deep understanding, but also responsive to the change. So this AI class would be an example of “how can we better deliver the knowledge you need to have when you go off to your first jobs after you finish your time at UT and be ready for the modern workplace?”

DT: I see. Now we have seen very slightly on the picture that you had shown us a couple of course title names. Are we supposed to take those as new proposed courses, or is it going to be similar to the last core curriculum, where there were a set of areas that certain courses could become eligible for?

JD: Again, really good insight. So you’ll see U.S. history today has 27 classes that qualify. That’s going to shrink. So it’s more the required ones will be those broad classes you may have experienced that Professor Brands teaches, and the other classes become electives available to study to get a deeper understanding of a topic in history. So you should expect that there (are) classes you’ve seen, but fewer options. Some are brand new. So Western Civilization is not a class we teach today, and how to build that so you have enough sections so students have access to classes. There’ll be a little bit of variability in those, but it’s intended to come around the whole idea of a baseline of Western civilization, and then invite you to now go explore something different. (I’ll) put them together for you. Great ideas of humanities, things that all you’ll be able to figure out all the things that all humans believe, no matter what continent you’re from, what era you’re from, things we all value about fairness, justice, love, beauty. Then you go into Western Civilization and look at the things that have come (from) that Western tradition that are slightly different or include more things like liberty, equality, property. Then you go into the U.S., and you get settled around those inalienable rights: life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, and government that is designed to preserve those rights. So you’ll see a sequence of ideas that get you grounded about who are we, and who are we in the world we live in today. So then you can go be informed about what you want us to be as citizens of the democracy.

DT: Obviously, with all of these courses being offered to students, I’m sure you guys have thought about the capacity constraints of professors you have in core classes. So I’ve read in the press release there’s a question about hiring new professors. There’s some about respecializing professors who have done other courses into these new core curriculum courses, can you talk to me a little bit about that effort, (and) what that looks like over the next few months? 

JD: Well, that was the purpose of coming out to the board today, to give this status report about the direction. Now we have work to do to then say, how do we build that into this timeline? We know that we want to offer electives. We know we want to offer core curriculum, and people who are teaching electives may have a class they’re teaching, and they may not be able to teach the new one. So we know that there’s going to be a need for more faculty to meet demand, particularly if we want to go into smaller classes, you know, in-person classes, things that require a human professor to be there for that student. That’s going to require some hiring. I think you can anticipate that we will be filling gaps that way, but we also are going to rely on the faculty that we have today that are in that core curriculum.

DT: So we’re in like a timeline-building phase, or is the timeline built out?

JD: Well, the timeline is, I think, aspirationally set. It is my intent that I am able to bring (this) back to this Board of Regents before the year is over a more concrete idea because we have work to do. It’s my intent that by the fall of ‘28, we can really make this full. Now, it may still require some time after that to fine-tune it. As you grow over time, maybe the class sizes start to decline over a couple more years, but the classes will be available. And I also know that this is a complicated project. It’s fall of ‘26 right now. That’s still two years away, so I anticipate we’ll adjust as we need to and make sure that we are delivering a quality outcome, not just a fast outcome.

DT: Yes. So my question is on the hiring of the faculty. Traditionally, this has been done by deans and faculty from within the college. With this new need, and the need to fill the gaps from having much more centralized core curriculum and having more students in (this) smaller selection of courses, is the president’s office and the provost’s office going to take a more active role in the hiring of new faculty in this case? I wouldn’t say streamline, but to meet this new 2028 fall deadline?

JD: Our last hire in the history department took one full year from identifying the person that everyone wanted to getting that person here. We have to go faster. Does not mean we want to change the quality of who we’re picking, or that we have the right people at the table to make sure we’re getting the right mix. But the pace of that kind of process is the pace of the old days. We’ll have to think about how to increase that process to go faster, but never sacrifice the quality of that.

DT: On the topic of the new core curriculum and the input from faculty that you had mentioned, you also mentioned some student input as well. In attendance today were the newly elected student government (alliance). So I was wondering, to what extent and what kind of discussions did you have with students, with the student leaders in this case from SG or the Senate? Could you walk me through?

JD: You bet. So (UTSG President) Kiera (Dixon) and (UTSG Vice President) Jaden (Watt) were not on board yet, but I’ve talked to them about this. But they weren’t interviewed by the task force because they weren’t there yet. But the prior student government leadership was at the table. They brought perspectives from other students to that group to hear that input. I haven’t mapped out the hundreds of conversations that the faculty had. I don’t really know all the answers to how many people, but I know student government was for sure at the table.

DT: So it was mainly the task force that was having these conversations with the students?

JD: Yeah, the task force ran their own process, and we asked them to go figure out, but I gave them a deadline, so let’s move quick. So they reached out to students, they reached out to (faculty) in various departments, talked to people they knew, they talked to leaders in other universities who do something like this to say “What’s working for you, how do you improve it?” So they did a really deep, what I would call due diligence, about what would both be a good outcome, but also what’s an achievable outcome at a scale of a flagship public university with 44,000 undergraduate students. That’s one thing that makes this different. Doing this at a very small private liberal arts college is one thing. Doing it at the flagship for the scale of the state of Texas, that’s a mouthful. 

DT: Yeah, something different. Mr. Chairman, I’m interested a little bit: what was the Board of Regents’ role in these changes? Was it, because I know the regents have wanted something similar to this for a long time, that was said in the meeting, was this more of a top-down approach from the regents, or was this more bottom-up, faculty-driven?

Kevin Eltife: It’s a very good question. We have asked — actually, the legislature has asked us all, all public universities in the state of Texas, to review their core curriculum. Rightfully so. When you look, we hadn’t made a change in 20 years. I mean, think of everything that’s changed in the last 20 years. I mean, y’all weren’t born then, but I mean I didn’t even have an iPhone. I mean, we didn’t have cell phones when I was there. So much has changed. It’s just common sense that you would review the core curriculum. So the board has wanted this done on all our campuses, quite frankly. Our request of our new president when Jim took office was, and we actually asked previous administrations — they didn’t get anywhere. Our request was: this has to be a priority. I mean, the legislature wants us to do it. This board wants it to happen. It’s outdated. It’s common sense. And think about this, guys. If you narrow the core and you focus on the courses that end up being in the core, and it’s a smaller group, think of the quality that you will get, consistency across the entire campus. It’s a no-brainer, and you still have your electives. So all the people that say, “Oh well, you know, they’re trying to do this to get away, get rid of courses.” It’s not true. Go take it as an elective. You want to take it so bad, whatever it is, go take it. I took the history of rock ‘n’ roll when I was at UT Austin. So I mean, you can take whatever you want, but the core is going to be the core. So we applaud President Davis and the advisory council and the students and faculty employees that were involved because I think you’ll see this be a model for the country. I mean, it’s what’s going on. It’s the talk everywhere that higher education has to get back to basics. I mean, you have to if you’re going to keep it affordable, and you know it’s a huge step in the right direction. We couldn’t be more thankful for President Davis’s leadership.

DT: You know, we actually have a History of College Football course alum to our left, over there. 

KE: Wow, I would have taken that if I had it. 

DT: I guess the next question would be: You guys have presented this to the Board of Regents. It’s public now. The core curriculum is going to change. You know, big pressure situation. Hopefully, that’s over. What are the next steps for you and this committee?

JD: So today, it is release the report. Faculty, students, our employees and staff, parents, citizens of Texas, go read it. You have ideas. You have comments. Let us know. We are going to keep working on building the best answer, but there’s always more work to get done to get it right. So we’re going to run this now through (the) rest of our faculty and our process to build out a plan, knowing that we want to execute. It’s not a plan that’s going … we’re not going to talk about it for five years and then decide if we’re going to do something. We’re going to execute promptly, and that’s the part I think matters within the University. In higher education, oftentimes people say if they said something, they feel like they’ve done something. They make a statement. Ah, problem solved. We have to do something with this. We have to deliver an actual outcome, and so that deadline is what creates the real crucible that causes us to come together and make choices and then deliver classes.

DT: What do you see the result of this being? We’ve talked a little bit about what your intentions were going into this, but now you’ve seen this process play out a little bit. Would you want this to just be good for the University, something new for students, or is this something you want to see adopted, say across the UT System? Say across other universities around the country.

JD:  I get that question more often than you think. I was a student at UT Austin. Chairman Eltife was a student at UT Austin. I’m the first student to become president in 100 years. The last guy built the tower. My focus is on making UT Austin the best version of the flagship public university of Texas, and if others want to do their own version of that, I’m happy for that. But I’m not trying to cause anyone to do anything else. I’m not sure their problems are like our problems, or their strengths are like our strengths. So what I do know, what I know to the heart of it is UT Austin, and we are going to make that curriculum really special for the students we have.

DT: What are your thoughts, Chairman Eltife? Is this something that could be adopted system-wide?

KE: Well, system-wide, yes. I mean, obviously, we only govern the UT institutions. So yes, I mean, we’ve asked all our institutions to review their core curriculum. Like I said, it’s just common sense. It’s time. It’s needed. So we will ask all our institutions to do it. Flagship is leading the way, and I think they’ll see, I think after today they’ll have a model they can follow. As far as past our institutions, I can’t speak for anybody else, but I’ll be willing to bet you lunch that you’re going to see this expand across other public universities in the state of Texas and across the country. I mean, y’all read all the stuff. Higher (education) is under attack for not being able to deliver affordable, accessible education, and to do that, you’ve got to get the basics right, and that’s what we’re trying to do. Just get back to basics. Let’s make sure you have the tools you need when you leave our institution, and that’s what this is all about. And I think this will be a model across the country, but obviously I don’t speak for them. But look at our enrollment at all our UT institutions. I mean, every institution in the UT system this year is seeing record enrollment, and a lot of that’s because of the changes we’re making.

DT: You bring up an interesting point. These changes do exist in the context of a lot of controversy over higher education. Would you characterize this as more driven as a response to those controversies, or as an attempt to get better?

KE: No, I wouldn’t say it’s a reaction to any controversies. I’m just saying, some of the arguments, (and) I get frustrated as chairman of the board of the UT System that people, they always want to take apart the problems of higher education, and 99% of it is incredible what we’re doing. You ask any of our communities that have a (university), you go to Tyler and ask if they want to get rid of UT Tyler. Go anywhere and ask any community if they want to lose their university. The answer is no. But we have to do a better job of making sure people understand what we’re delivering and the quality of the product. I think this goes a long way for that. I think this helps give people confidence that when you come to the University of Texas at Austin, you’re going to deliver a great product that is actually going to benefit the students when they leave and enter the workforce. I like to promote higher education. I was in the Texas Senate. I mean, I promoted all of higher education. I didn’t pitch just for UT. I pitched for Tech and Houston, because I think every student in the state of Texas, no matter where they go, what football team they’re for, is important to us. It’s critical that we take care of y’all, and that everyone can get a public education at one of our public universities. I think it’s critical. We can’t just ignore the criticism about higher education across the country. You can’t just bury your head in the sand. So we’re going to show that we’re worth every dollar that is spent when you send your student to UT Austin.

DT: And your thoughts, President Davis?

JD: I agree. I think the word I would use is renewal, as opposed to other ways you might look at it. My background is in history, so I can’t help myself looking at things through a historical lens. It was 150 years ago that the people of Texas, that the Constitution, decided we will have a university of the first class for the promotion of literature, arts and sciences. That’s what the Constitution says after that word “first class.” This is our most basic mission, so we are renewing that commitment to 150 years of why — why we have a public university in the first place.

DT: Texas Senate Bill 37 went into effect last September, and it requires a yearly review of the curriculum, around January. I guess with this core curriculum, which you laid out, how will this inform or affect (future mandatory reviews) going forward as it is still in its early phases of this core curriculum?

JD: I would say there’s kind of four parts you need to have a good core. You need to have a vision. I think we have stated the vision today. You need to have discipline to say these classes go in. You have to have this (discipline) to say these classes don’t. So being able to say no, and then go every five years, every time that we need to look at it to make sure it hasn’t drifted. You might look at it from a background (of a) physicist (like) entropy. If the system (has) entropy, it’ll degrade over time. That’s the nature of how things move in time, how do we make sure we come back around again? Say, “oh, let’s tighten the belt if we need to, or expand it if it’s the better answer, or things have changed and you have something, that new device in your hand that’s not even an iPhone.” We have to teach about that too.

DT: On the topics you laid out on the image in the slides, one that was included was (artificial intelligence). Recently, the University announced, over the summer, that it was expanding its access to free AI tools, including Claude, ChatGPT, Microsoft and other sorts of AI. But I guess my question to you is: Now that students have this access from the University, and you, or the task force, is proposing AI taught in the core curriculum, is this something (similar to) how should students be using AI, like responsible use, and how it’s effective in education, or more (of) what is AI?

JD: It’s all those things. “What is AI? What is it good for? What are the dangers? How to use it wisely?” That is to give you a grounding and a tool, so when you go take your next job you are ready for that company that may be using AI. So it’s also a practical skill.

KE: How not to use it to write for papers.

 DT: I know you are making sure that these courses in the core curriculum do not get too narrow. How are you balancing that with the idea that they could get too broad?

JD: I look at this as “Think about a pyramid. What’s your base level to invite you into a common understanding? What is your major you’re picking so you have this more specialized area, and then what electives do you want to add to that to fill it out?” So it gives you a lot of choices about how you want to fill out the rest of that pyramid. But you will leave with a broad education and a specialized education because of the core and your major. What I would imagine is you will take a class. I mean it’s one semester of the Great Ideas (course), right? That’s not going to give you every great idea that’s been thought about. There’s a minor available in the Jefferson Center. If that caught your attention, you like it, you might take the minor. New major that starts in that field. (If) you want to take a second major, you might take it. But if you never even knew it existed, you might not even know the door was there. So that’s the idea: to frankly build curiosity, breadth and curiosity about what you want to leave knowing when you graduate. 

DT: On a similar topic, the University also recently announced (24) new programs, including six majors and a bunch of minors and certificates. A big focus … was also the materials science new major, which is part of two colleges, where it’s working with the (School of) Engineering and the College of Natural Sciences. Is that a big focus with this curriculum, blending ideas from maybe two colleges? 

JD: You’ve nailed it, so Great Ideas (in) Science. (We) don’t just take chemistry and biology and then ask you to figure out “what does science mean?” Go through an idea that says “What is matter? What is life? What is human? What is (the) universe? Earth? Central Texas? What is energy, force, time, math? What do those things mean in this finely tuned universe that just happens to work?” But you change the speed of light a little bit, you change the force of gravity just a little bit, the place collapses or expands. Getting a breadth about, “oh, that’s how this thing works.” Now you go into your biology class and you understand a little bit more about DNA, and as opposed to, “I know how to use calculus, I know that red algae and brown algae are different.” … This fills in the gap (of) why.

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