UHCL offers classes in Alvin, Pearland
University salutes community partner
Attendance soars at statewide exhibition
Fusion of instruction and technology yields recognition
bell hooks

UHCL offers classes in Alvin, Pearland
In summer 2004, UHCL began offering undergraduate and graduate classes at Alvin Community College’s Pearland College Center as the result of of a higher education partnership agreement between UHCL and ACC.

“The combination of a community college and an upper-level university provides a cost-effective approach to providing degree opportunities at the associate’s, bachelor’s and master’s levels for area residents,” says UHCL President William A. Staples.

UHCL will also start offering upper-level classes at ACC in Alvin beginning in fall 2004. The university continues its collaboration with ACC in offering programs and courses at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

ACC ranks in the top three area community colleges in the number of undergraduate students who transfer to UHCL.

University salutes community partner
President William A. Staples recognized Houston Endowment Inc. with a UHCL Community Partnership Award at the 2004 Report to the Community breakfast.

UHCL concluded Discovering Opportunities, a fundraising initiative bolstered by a $1.5 million challenge grant from Houston Endowment during which donations designated for endowments were matched dollar-for-dollar for a total gift value of $3 million.

The initiative enhanced 50 existing endowments and contributed to the creation of 47 new ones. It also marked the second matching challenge grant from Houston Endowment Inc., but the first one of this magnitude.

In 1997, Houston Endowment issued a three-year matching challenge grant of $500,000 that was satisfied within 15 months. The 1997 grant resulted in the creation of 35 new scholarship endowments. The two challenge grants combined brought UHCL’s total endowment from $3.6 million in 1997 to $7.7 million in 2003.

Attendance soars at statewide exhibition
Texas high school students, teachers and parents came to UHCL in April 2004 in record numbers to attend the statewide Visual Art Scholastic Event, sponsored by the Texas Art Education Association.

Of the 1,200 visitors that came to UHCL, more than 900 of them were students. Previous statewide exhibitions held at UHCL drew fewer than 700 attendees.

VASE allows Texas high school art students to display their artistic work in a variety of media such as drawing, painting and sculpture, as well as attend workshops and submit their work for competition. UHCL art faculty assisted with judging student art. To learn more about VASE, visit www.vase.taea.org.

Fusion of instruction and technology yields recognition
Microsoft Corp. tapped the School of Education as a Microsoft Model Professional Development Site because of the school’s integration of technology within its undergraduate and graduate education courses as well as a variety of professional specializations.

“Microsoft is pleased to support the ongoing efforts of UHCL’s School of Education and its work in enabling students, teachers and lifelong learners to realize their potential,” says Greg Butler, manager of Educator & Student Development at Microsoft.

“Investing in developing technology skills and the way those skills can be applied to learning sets this organization apart as an educational leader in its community.”

All instruction delivered by SOE is supported by the curriculum and projects written as a result of the Preparing Tomorrow’s Teachers for Technology (PT3) three-year $1 million grant given to the school by the U.S. Department of Education in June 2000.

“We appreciate Microsoft’s acknowledgment of the School of Education as a Model Professional Development Site,” says SOE Dean Dennis Spuck.

“This followed the successful PT3 site visit by representatives of five universities who wanted to learn about our PT3 grant project and exchange ideas about our instructional technology programs here at UHCL.”

Microsoft’s Model Professional Development program features organizations, schools, colleges and universities that support highly effective programs that improve the way educators use technology.
To read Microsoft’s online profile of SOE and PT3 program, visit http://www.microsoft.com/education/default. asp?ID=MPDHouston.

HOOKED: bell hooks (right), author of more than 20 books on feminism and the roles of black women, was the distinguished guest lecturer for Women’s Studies Week. Her book signing and lecture on “Ending Domination: Race, Class, Gender” packed the Bayou Theater and ended the weeklong events, which included several film presentations, lectures and panel discussions on women’s issues. Women’s Studies Week was developed by a group of UHCL women’s studies faculty members to explore the diversity of women’s experiences and roles within the constructions of gender. Pictured with hooks is Needha Boutte-Queen (left), assistant professor of social work.