Plans for a new teacher-training center were announced Monday in the Board of Regents Meeting Room after Texas Tech was named one of only five universities to receive $1 million in competitive grants.
The funds will go toward the creation of a Texas Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics center, better known as a T-STEM, to develop instructional materials in select fields, according to a press release.
Dean Fontenot, who is slated to direct the new T-STEM center along with John Chandler, said the center will provide teachers with new resources they can integrate into their lesson plans in order to offer students a strong base of curriculum in the fields of math, science, technology and engineering.
In effect, the center will help high school students better prepare for college, especially those planning on studying engineering, she said. Today, only 35 percent of students who come into college intending to study engineering actually end up graduating with a degree in this field.
"By 2010, almost 90 percent of engineers will be from foreign countries," Fontenot said.
The T-STEM center will thus be aimed at broadening the educational backgrounds of students so they may find success in the courses involved with receiving an engineering degree.
T-STEM is $71 initiative created to improve the instruction of both science and mathematic in secondary schools across the Lone Star State, according to a press release. Among the various partners involved in the effort is the Office of the Governor as well as the Texas Education Agency.
"The initial project was something started by the TEA," Fontenot said. "What the TEA is doing is trying to get more students prepared to go to college."
She said both in-service and pre-service teachers alike from throughout the state will be able to come to Lubbock and take advantage of the facility.
"Anything like this always helps the Lubbock community," Fontenot said.
For more information, visit the Web site www.tstem.ttu.edu.
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