A national alliance of universities recognized for their top-tier research and commitment to serving Hispanic students is meeting this week in Arlington at a conference hosted by The University of Texas at Arlington.
UTA is hosting the Alliance of Hispanic Serving Research Universities (HSRU) Summit, which brings together all 21 U.S. universities that are both Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI) and in the top 5% of universities in the country for research. The event, scheduled for March 25-27 at LIVE! By Loews in Arlington, convenes multi-level university leaders to strengthen the HSRU's capacity to work as a collective.
"I'm looking forward to this summit as an opportunity for the top Hispanic-serving research universities in the country to come together and make further progress towards our ambitious goals," said Heather Wilson, president of The University of Texas at El Paso.
The summit will provide opportunities for participants to engage in initiative-focused planning and working sessions, network across institutions and affinity groups, share ideas and promising practices and invigorate collaboration and commitment to their institutions' identities as R1/HSIs. The opening session will include welcoming remarks from Jennifer Cowley, UTA president, and Heather Wilson, UT El Paso president and HSRU chair.
Other speakers and panelists include Cynthia Larive, chancellor of the University of California, Santa Cruz; Howard Gillman, chancellor of the University of California, Irvine; and Michelle Marks, chancellor of the University of Colorado, Denver.
Launched in August 2022, the HSRU's goal by 2030 is to double the number of Hispanic doctoral students enrolled at its member universities and increase the Hispanic professoriate at its universities by 20%.
"The summit is an opportunity to reaffirm UTA's vision to truly serve and support all of our students, faculty, staff and community with intentionality," said Maria Yareli Delgado, senior director of HSI initiatives at UTA.
In addition to Cowley, UTA speakers at the event include:
- Tamara L. Brown, provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, who will join panelists from UT San Antonio, Arizona State University and the University of California, Riverside for a session on college undergraduate experiences and pathways toward graduate enrollment and workforce opportunities.
- Cristina Salinas, associate professor in the Department of History, and her colleagues from Arizona State University, the University of California, Riverside and the University of North Texas. The group will talk about their Andrew W. Mellon Foundation-funded research "Mapping Everyday Mexican/Chicana Political Organizing in the Texas and Arizona Borderlands."
- Joanna Merritt, director of University Analytics, and her colleagues from the University of Arizona, the University of New Mexico and the University of North Texas. They will present findings from a comprehensive study on the data maturity and analytic trends within Hispanic/Latinx data usage at 17 Tier 1 HSI research universities.
