Texas Border Business
AUSTIN –More than 400 faculty, administrators, staff and students from the University of Texas Brownsville and the University of Texas Pan American have been working diligently for several months help chart a course for the UT System to bring both campuses together as one university – UT Rio Grande Valley.
On Thursday, UT System Chancellor Francisco G. Cigarroa, M.D. will welcome members of those working groups– some of whom will present their recommendations – to the UT Rio Grande Valley Spring Symposium. Committees have been structured under three broad themes: academic programs, academic administration and operations administration.
Discussion topics Thursday will include student engagement and experiential learning; sponsored research, grants and contracts; enrollment management; and business processes.
Guest speakers, including Charles Rutheiser, senior associate for the Center for Community and Economic Opportunity at the Annie E. Casey Foundation, and John Lin, principal at McKinsey & Company, will also lead talks on topics such as the process of transformation and designing an anchor institution.
“It is hard to believe that what was still a vision a year ago is now 15 months from being a reality,” Chancellor Cigarroa said. “As wonderful as that is, there is much work to be done to welcome the students to UTRGV in August 2015, and I see this symposium as a launch pad for getting the job accomplished.”
The UTRGV Spring Symposium will be held at Casa De Palmas Renaissance McAllen Hotel, 101 N. Main Street, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Thursday April24, 2014.
Space is limited. Media interested in attending should contact the UT System Office of Public Affairs at (512) 499-4363.
About The University of Texas System
Educating students, providing care for patients, conducting groundbreaking research and serving the needs of Texans and the nation for more than 130 years, The University of Texas System is one of the largest public university systems in the United States, with nine academic universities, six health institutions and a fall 2013 enrollment of more than 213,000. The UT System confers more than one-third of the state’s undergraduate degrees, educates two-thirds of the state’s health care professionals annually and accounts for almost 70 percent of all research funds awarded to public universities in Texas. The UT System has an annual operating budget of $14.6 billion (FY 2014) including $3 billion in sponsored programs funded by federal, state, local and private sources. With about 90,000 employees, the UT System is one of the largest employers in the state.
