The University of Texas System Board of Regents has dedicated $100 million to creating a "permanent home" for the School of Civic Leadership. The 101-year-old Biological Laboratories building at UT Austin will be renovated by 2028 to house the civic school, which itself contains the regents-created and conservative donor-conceived Civitas Institute.

Justin Dyer serves both as founding director at the Civitas Institute, created in 2022, and as interim dean at the School of Civic Leadership, approved in 2023 and temporarily lodged in the Littlefield House. Once the civics school has taken up residence, some programs in the College of Natural Sciences and the Jackson School of Geosciences will "move to more modernized lab facilities elsewhere on campus," says a press release from the university.

According to the release, the school's purpose is "to equip the next generation of leaders with the philosophical, economic and historical understanding needed to preserve constitutional democracy." It promises "free speech and free inquiry," including viewpoints from "across disciplines and perspectives."

According to the Texas Tribune, the formation of this school in 2023 nullified the need for a vote to turn the Civitas Institute into a school, instead adopting it into a new structure.

"The decision by the board came before Texas lawmakers could vote on a bill by Sen. Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe, intended to turn the Civitas Institute into a college," the Tribune article explains. "The board’s creation of the new college makes that legislation unnecessary."

The center was originally called the Liberty Institute. At the time, Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick endorsed the institute in strong language on Twitter: "I will not stand by and let looney Marxist UT professors poison the minds of young students with Critical Race Theory. We banned it in publicly funded K-12 and we will ban it in publicly funded higher ed. That’s why we created the Liberty Institute at UT."

Dyer has written eight books that largely cover the constitution and constitutional law. His most recent, with former Visiting Fellow with the Civitas Institute at UT Austin Kody Cooper, is The Classical and Christian Origins of American Politics: Political Theology, Natural Law, and the American Founding.

“The elected leaders of our state, as well as the Board of Regents of The University of Texas System, have long seen a need for programs in higher education that prepare future leaders to safeguard freedom,” said Board of Regents Chairman Kevin Eltife in the 2025 release. “We have needed a place where civic education is focused on the foundational principles of our constitutional democracy. The School of Civic Leadership at UT Austin is that place, and today we are giving it a permanent home.”

The release states that this fall, the first 100 freshmen will join the new Civics Honors major, which targets career paths such as law, business and entrepreneurship, public service, national security, and health professions. Faculty will be involved from similar existing UT programs, but the school's goal is to hire "20 dedicated tenured or tenure-track faculty members by Fall 2026."

“This is a bold investment that empowers the School of Civic Leadership to fulfill its mission to prepare leaders committed to the principles of freedom, self-government and civic responsibility,” said Dyer. “We are profoundly grateful for the board’s commitment to our mission and its investment in the future of our country.”