More Tier 1 universities in Texas!
 

:iagree: I believe that Texas deserves more Tier 1 schools than what it has. California has nine, and Texas has only 3, of course, The University of Texas of Austin, Texas A & M in Bryan/College Station, and Rice University which is a private institution in Houston. I think that the state's brain power is concentrated too much in a few areas. Cities grow based on an educated workforce, and of course, our tax dollars are pumped more so into those areas with Tier 1 schools and with public institutions. Two of the cities in Texas that deserve Tier 1 schools or Tier 1 status for schools that are already there are San Antonio and Dallas. So take heed forumers!:yes:

No.

What about Trinity in SA?

What is Tier One?
 

What is Tier One?

Texas is home to three outstanding Tier One universities: Rice, Texas A&M, and UT Austin. Maintaining the strengths of these institutions relative to the best universities in the nation is vital. But this will not be enough to keep Texas competitive in the face of what has become a global contest for talent, ideas, home-grown advances, and economic development. Texas must develop more top-tier universities, particularly in the major population centers of the state. Texas lags states such as California and New York in this area, and pays the price. read more

University of Texas at Dallas:
http://www.utdallas.edu/president/tier-one/

And like all things in Dallas...the University of Texas at Dallas isn't actually in Dallas!

UTSA and Tier 1
 

UTSA and its bid for Tier 1:

http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/loc...ll_thrive.html

San Antonio Express News:
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/loc...ll_thrive.html
Good jobs follow brainpower. Top Tier universities, such as Boston's Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Austin's University of Texas, create wealth. Alumni from MIT have founded more than 4,000 companies, which employ more than 1.1 million people. In 2006 and 2007, Austin had more venture capital investment than Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston and San Antonio combined.

Compared to other cities in Texas, San Antonio has a shortage of multimillionaires and billionaires. To bridge the gap, UTSA will have to hammer the message: Give locally. Some local philanthropists invest in more glittering brands in Houston and Austin. This needs to change.

Texas... always going for rankings. I assume you are referring to us news & world report undergraduate rankings? Texas universities should just focus on building strong programs to attract a national and international student body... and the rankings they covet so dearly will follow. Texas has many fine schools, but a school like UTSA has a very long road ahead to be ranked highly (is it even ranked as a national university to begin with? I don't think so.).

Also, how are you quantifying "Tier 1", anyway? Ranked in top 50? If so, Texas A&M doesn't make the list. Texas has 2 top tier universities in UT-Austin and Rice University.

Texas is still a relatively new state when it comes to higher education, so it shouldn't be expected to have many long-established, nationally-prominent universities. But it does have a huge population and a lot of $, so one would expect the number of top tier schools to be higher. Still, though larger and older than Florida, Florida still has the same number of top tier universities (University of Florida and University of Miami) as Texas does.

I'm more interested about ongoing talk of education reform. If, and a strong if, schools were forced to focus more on student graduation and retention rates rather than focusing on research then maybe the idea of a tier one university may change. To me it is wonderful to have a university invested in research but not at the expense of the students. There is talk at how much professors are paid to do research when they only teach maybe once or twice a week and if this is fair to students since more tuition money goes to pay these professors rather than student services. To me having the most or being on top does not make a state the best. Sure having more tier one schools is great and it's great that we are aiming for that in the decades to come, however, having the most means nothing unless we can retain those doing research or teaching or donating as alumni. I just hope too much empahsis is not put on having the most tier one universities without a plan to keep the prestige, people and dollars we are trying to attract.

I thought San Antonio was on the list with 8 billionares following Dallas and Houston?

This isn't a rant, just some stats/facts.

Southwestern University in Georgetown is the oldest university in Texas. It was founded in 1840.

Baylor University in Waco was founded in 1845, and is touted as the largest baptist university in the world.

The University of Texas was established in Austin in 1883.

Texas A&M University was established in 1871.

This is true. Red McCombs donated $50 million to UT in 2000. UT in turn renamed the school after him. In 2007, AT&T donated $25 million to the school to help with funding for a new building.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCombs...siness#History

Are UF and U of M really of the same caliber as Rice and UT?

While I am not a UT booster, I recognize they are a great school. I believe better than any school, public or private, in Florida. In addition, to compare Rice to one of them is borderline insanity. In defense of Texas A & M, it is a tier 1 university.

Texas has many excellent universities that do not focus as much on research. Trinity, TCU, Southwestern, U of Dallas, and SMU are a few. You should not assume attending a research university provides you with a better education than a good Masters or Liberal Arts University. It just is not true in many cases.

?

SA is third in number of millionaires and billionaires in Texas behind only Dallas and Houston.

I'm well aware of Texas' universities. It has many fine schools, as I originally said. I currently work in higher education and formerly taught at UT Southwestern and UT HSC-Houston. When I said that it was a relatively new state for higher ed, I meant relative to states that have more of these so-called "top tier" universities. Texas is a much less established state for top-notch higher ed than the older states in the Northeast/Mid Atlantic/Midwest and than a state like California. Texas has just not long served as a national hub for higher education as long, so I wouldn't expect it to. If it had, then that would indicate they've been doing something wrong as to not gain the national recognition. Based on its size alone, one would expect Texas to have more of these "tier 1" (which translates as "ranked in the Top 50") universities, until you realize that the state's schools, though very good, have not served as draws for national and international scholars for as long.

According to what is considered to be the standard for ranking undergraduate education programs, US News & World Report, yes they are of the same caliber. University of Florida, University of Miami, Rice University, and University of Texas are all ranked in the Top 50 colleges in the USA. (By the way, UT and UF tie in these rankings, just to let you know since you think UT is "better"). Bottom line is, they are all great schools with tremendous offerings in many disciplines. Is one particular school "better" than another? Maybe so, maybe not. That's not what the point of the conversation is anyway. As for Texas A&M, I think it is a great school, but it does not rank in "tier 1" in this system. It comes in at 61.

As for your last paragraph, I completely agree.

No definition for a Tier One School?
 

Definition of a Tier 1 University

Contributor:
By Malik Sharrieff, eHow Contributing Writer

Nailing down one definition of a Tier 1 university is difficult. Though commonalities exist, it is hard to get the many different ranking organizations to justify the differing methodologies that lead to their determinations of which school qualifies as Tier 1.

Identification:

As of September, 2009, a concise statutory definition of a Tier 1 University does not exist. There are many organizations that rank institutions of higher education and all have slightly differing definitions. Two of the most prominent of these organizations are the Center for Measuring University Performance (the Center) and the U.S. News and World Report (U.S. News). While these two organizations have differing methodologies of evaluation, they are the two most widely respected institutions within this field.

Details:

According to research done by the Texas Senate Research Center (see reference 1), each year the Center publishes a report identifying the top research institutions of higher learning in the U.S. Criteria consists of:

• Total research expenditures,
• Federal research expenditures,
• Endowment assets,
• Annual giving,
• National Academy members,
• Faculty awards,
• Doctorates awarded,
• Post-doctoral appointees, and
• Median students' SAT and ACT test scores

U.S. News also issues an annual ranking using a weighted scale incorporating the following criteria:

• Peer assessments,
• Retention (graduation rate and freshman retention rate),
• Faculty resources,
• Student Selectivity,
• Financial resources,
• Graduation rate performances (predicted versus actual graduation rate), and
• Alumni giving rate
• Significance

Universities with Tier 1 status receive higher amounts of research funding, consequently attracting a larger number of students pursuing careers in research and development fields. Major corporations see these institutions as resources, providing highly skilled staff that can establish a competitive edge in the marketplace. These corporations are often willing to relocate to geographic areas with a higher concentration of Tier 1 universities like New York and California. The net effect is greater economic growth within these geographic regions.

Benefits:

Tier 1 universities generally spend $100 to $150 million dollars in research each year. These funds are generated through donations and state and federal matching funds grants. This translates to a sizable inflow of cash for communities surrounding Tier 1 institutions. The relocation of research oriented corporations also spurs job growth in these areas. Therefore, many states will energetically pursue Tier 1 status for their universities to obtain the associated benefits.

Considerations:

Because of the lack of consensus regarding the definition of and methodology in identifying a Tier 1 university, many complexities exist regarding the issue. For example, U.S. News actually ranks schools through the fourth tier level. The one commonality across all ranking systems is the idea that the term "Tier 1" suggests annual research spending at or above $100 million.
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Candidate for governor says it himself!
 

Today the candidate for governor, Mr. Bill White, says it himself, "San Antonio is one of the top 10 cities in the United States, so it deserves a Tier One University":yes:

If anything, it sure gets him some votes.

Let's go UH! Houston could use two tier 1 universities.

Go Tigers
 

Trinity University buys $500,000 scientific instrument


San Antonio Business Journal


Trinity University is installing a new high-dollar nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer on campus that will help students and faculty to conduct the same caliber of scientific research as some of the larger schools in the country.

A nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer is used to learn how molecules function and relate to each other.

Trinity records show that the $498,000 500 megahertz spectrometer is now one of the most expensive pieces of scientific equipment ever bought by the university. The National Science Foundation contributed the money for the equipment using funds from the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act of 2009.

Only five other primarily undergraduate schools in the country have received federal funding for similar equipment. The majority of schools with this caliber of equipment typically limit access to graduate and post-doctoral research associates. At Trinity, first-year students will use the spectrometer in their undergraduate research projects.

The equipment will be used by undergraduate students and faculty in the chemistry, geosciences and biology departments. Trinity will also make the equipment available to officials with other universities.

The new spectrometer replaces one bought by Trinity back in 1996, at the time with funding from the National Science Foundation and the Dreyfus Foundation. The new equipment is being installed during a three-week period in April and May.

The National Science Foundation also recently awarded Trinity $200,000 to buy two additional spectrometers. One is known as an inductively coupled plasma-optical emission spectrometer, while the other uses X-ray fluorescence techniques. Chemistry professor Michelle Bushey says the two latter instruments will be in place by the fall semester.

UTSA gets "Helinita"!
 

UTSA today announced in the San Antonio Express News that it has purchased and successfully tested the world's most advanced electron scanning microscope on the face of the globe endearingly named, "Helenita", by the staff of the UTSA physics and astronomy departments. It was obtained with the assistance of the Robert J. Kleberg, Jr. and Helen C. Kleberg Foundation. The microscope was named after Helen Kleberg the heiress of the vast King Ranch. The multimillion dollar device helps scientists at UTSA to hone in on atomic particles that are impossible to see with the unaided eye. It will play a role in helping to find better ways to fight cancer and to develop faster computers. World reknown researcher Dr. Miguel Yacamen who heads the astronomy and physics departments at UTSA says the unique microscope has generated better pictures than he has anticipated.

This is just another step in UTSA's quest for Tier 1 status. It will be a stepping stone that the school needs in order to attract more advanced students not just from Texas, but from around the world.:yes:

source: www.mysa.com (San Antonio Express News)