Higher Ed Commish Discusses Where Texas is Heading
I was able to watch the Texas House commitee on Higher Education today. Higher Education as I have noted will be a big issue in 2007 as it relates to the state of Texas moving forward with dealing with the population growth in our state.
In 2000, to prepare to fix higher education, the state of Texas came out with the 'Closing the Gap' initiative which covers many issues from helping low-income families to improving the research dollars coming into Texas to getting students from first-generation families into college.
Raymund A. Paredes, the Commissioner of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board was the featured speaker. Paredes said that Texas has a long way to go to reach parity with the rest of the states in the country in terms of percentage of students enrolled. Paredes said that the good news since Closing the Gaps came about in 2000 that there has been a 162,000 increase of students since. However, he did note that growth has become stagnant in the last year. The most shocking of which is slow growth in south Texas, where the population is booming, mostly with Hispanics.
The three fastest growing regions noted by Paredes are the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, Houston/Galveston and South Texas. He stated the Higher Education Coordinating Board will be focusing on these three areas to attract college students with 85% of the growth in the next few years in higher education coming from these areas. Of note, Sam Houston State, which draws heavily from the Houston/Galveston area had the largest increase in an enrollment this past year.
Paredes feels the most crucial issue towards getting more individuals in higher education is the growth and stability of community colleges and technical colleges. The goal is getting the transfer-rates from these institutions to four-year institutions higher. Many schools are signing agreements with these two-year institutions, with once more, Sam Houston State being the trendsetter.
As we look towards preparing students for college, a great deal must be done at the high school level. Paredes states that colleges must participate in high school college-preparation courses in order to get students away from taking developmental classes during their years in college. The biggest step that Paredes sees is bringing the high school exit standards to that level of "college ready standards", an initiative which has been granted an executive order from the Governor with backing of the head of the Senate Education commitee, Sen. Florence Shapiro (R-Plano).
One of the questions asked to Paredes was about the amount of high schools credits and perhaps the state needs to require more credits of the high school students to prepare them better for college. Paredes said that the state needs to make for four years of math, English, science and social studies as well as stress that ability of students to comprehend a second language, so that our state can compete in our global community.
This was insight that shows that Texas has a great deal of different issues in making sure schools are uniformed and strong across the board so students are at equal footing upon entering their institution of higher education. Paredes feels that the access issue for higher education comes from this and not taking care of the "low hanging fruit" by giving them more financial aid.
In 2000, to prepare to fix higher education, the state of Texas came out with the 'Closing the Gap' initiative which covers many issues from helping low-income families to improving the research dollars coming into Texas to getting students from first-generation families into college.
Raymund A. Paredes, the Commissioner of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board was the featured speaker. Paredes said that Texas has a long way to go to reach parity with the rest of the states in the country in terms of percentage of students enrolled. Paredes said that the good news since Closing the Gaps came about in 2000 that there has been a 162,000 increase of students since. However, he did note that growth has become stagnant in the last year. The most shocking of which is slow growth in south Texas, where the population is booming, mostly with Hispanics.
The three fastest growing regions noted by Paredes are the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, Houston/Galveston and South Texas. He stated the Higher Education Coordinating Board will be focusing on these three areas to attract college students with 85% of the growth in the next few years in higher education coming from these areas. Of note, Sam Houston State, which draws heavily from the Houston/Galveston area had the largest increase in an enrollment this past year.
Paredes feels the most crucial issue towards getting more individuals in higher education is the growth and stability of community colleges and technical colleges. The goal is getting the transfer-rates from these institutions to four-year institutions higher. Many schools are signing agreements with these two-year institutions, with once more, Sam Houston State being the trendsetter.
As we look towards preparing students for college, a great deal must be done at the high school level. Paredes states that colleges must participate in high school college-preparation courses in order to get students away from taking developmental classes during their years in college. The biggest step that Paredes sees is bringing the high school exit standards to that level of "college ready standards", an initiative which has been granted an executive order from the Governor with backing of the head of the Senate Education commitee, Sen. Florence Shapiro (R-Plano).
One of the questions asked to Paredes was about the amount of high schools credits and perhaps the state needs to require more credits of the high school students to prepare them better for college. Paredes said that the state needs to make for four years of math, English, science and social studies as well as stress that ability of students to comprehend a second language, so that our state can compete in our global community.
This was insight that shows that Texas has a great deal of different issues in making sure schools are uniformed and strong across the board so students are at equal footing upon entering their institution of higher education. Paredes feels that the access issue for higher education comes from this and not taking care of the "low hanging fruit" by giving them more financial aid.
posted by Jason Plotkin | 5:05 PM
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