UT Advocacy Group Vies For Equity

The University of Texas Advocacy Organization is hosting a statewide conference to focus on the lack of benefits for non-married faculty and staff. Administrators say that the absence of such benefits hurts the university's competitiveness.

"There is a lack of equity between people who get benefits and people who don't. It's a compensation problem," said Dana Cloud, an associate professor of communication studies.

"It's also a human rights kind of issue as well, a basic equality civil rights issue that some people are not afforded the same benefits as others. And this has a tremendous impact on people's families," she said.

The mail goal of the conference is to create and build advocacy groups in hopes of securing domestic partner benefits to all campuses within the University of Texas System.