After nearly a century of independence, the Texas Tech Alumni Association got folded into the university this summer—because what could go wrong when bureaucracy takes over community? The move meant all those affinity-based groups that actually did something for underrepresented students, like Raiders Rojos, suddenly became a legal liability under Texas’s shiny new DEI ban.
Thanks to Senate Bill 17, public universities can’t officially support identity-based programs anymore, which means Raiders Rojos had to spin off as a fully independent nonprofit. They lost access to student lists, funding, and the institutional backing they helped build—but sure, it’s all in the name of “fairness.”
Now the group’s running on alumni donations, scrambling to fund scholarships, and renting office space off-campus just to keep helping Hispanic students navigate college—something the university once celebrated, before the state decided that diversity was too political.
In Texas, “equal opportunity” apparently means everyone gets ignored equally.
