TAMU joins the ranks of Emerging Hispanic Serving Institutions

Exciting news about some significant progress in growing the impact of Texas A&M in serving the broader Hispanic/Latino community was reported today by President Loftin.

He reports in his regular 3/7 update that : 

* Building upon our land-grant mission, Texas A&M was recently recognized as one of the nation's 'top 25 colleges and universities serving Hispanics' by Poder Hispanic magazine: http://tx.ag/9gl4ej. 

A visit to the linked Poder Hispanic page shows that the University as a whole has 16.1% Hispanic undergraduate enrollment (1,031 bachelor's degrees, 17th in the nation), over the threshold of 15% required to be classified as an "Emerging Hispanic Serving" institution for the first time.  Once we grow to 25% Hispanic enrollment, we will join the ranks of fully-fledged Hispanic Serving Institutions or HSIs.  

This milestone is also reflected in the College of Geosciences, and we also far outperform our national peers in serving this community.  

-Texas A&M Geosciences BS graduates in 2010-11 were 14% Hispanic
-BS graduates nationally are ~3.5 % Hispanic in geosciences 

Additionally, we were recognized by the American Institute of Physics in 2010 as a top producer
of geoscience BS degrees for Hispanic students (1 of 13 schools in the nation, including UT Austin, UTEP and UTSA) based on 2005-2008 graduation rates.  Our recent increase in graduation rates for Hispanic students will only enhance this reputation in coming years.

Good news, but a call to keep working hard at making an inclusive and welcoming College for all of our students.

Eric

Texas A&M Geosciences goes to New York!

Hello from Aggieland!

I am happy to report that the College established a big public presence in the Exhibits Hall of the Association of American Geographers annual meeting in New York City from February 25-27.  Our Department of Geography as well as other allied departments in the College enjoyed significant publicity as many of the roughly 7000 registrants strolled through.

Over 60 prospective graduate students from a huge array of institutions around the country and the world took information and requested follow up contacts.  Faculty, staff and graduate students from the College took part in the booth staffing efforts, and created a very welcoming public presence for A&M Geosciences.

We'll see the AAG again next year, April 2013 in Los Angeles, CA!

Eric