UTPB RECEIVES PRELIMINARY APPROVAL FOR ENGINEERING

The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board has given UT Permian Basin preliminary authority to develop plans for a new engineering program. The program would include chemical engineering, mechanical engineering and petroleum engineering.  

“This is a great day for a great university,” UTPB President David Watts said. “These programs will help us address the energy needs of West Texas and our nation.”

Watts said the decision to pursue engineering was community driven.

“In 2004, we went on listening tours throughout the Permian Basin. The men and women who attended those town hall meetings said they wanted the university to increase its focus on the energy industry.”

After the tours, the university brought in consultants to study the feasibility of an engineering program. As part of their work, the consultants talked to local Basin businesses and professional engineering societies and studied regional economic conditions.

“After their research, the consultants recommended chemical, mechanical and petroleum engineering because they were the programs we would be able to deliver at the highest level of quality,” Watts said.

UTPB has been granted preliminary authority defined as “permission from the State of Texas to propose new degree programs in a given disciplinary area at a given level of instruction.” (THECB Regulations 5.23)   Now the university will be working on a full new program proposal that will detail faculty needs, curriculum and facility needs.
 
Vice President and Provost William Fannin said he expected proposal development to last several months. The final proposal must be submitted and reviewed by the University of Texas System administration. If the proposal is approved, it will then be forwarded to the Coordinating Board for review.  “If these proposals are approved the absolute earliest, we would start these new classes in 2009 or 2010,” Fannin estimated.

Until the new programs are approved implemented students can enroll in the existing pre-engineering transfer programs with UT El Paso and UT Austin.  UT El Paso permits UTPB students to transfer into its upper division engineering program if they complete, with a grade of C or better in all courses, UTPB’s lower division engineering program.  The articulation with UT Austin is only in the field of mechanical engineering and requires students to meet a minimum grade point average for transfer.