UT System cancels big Houston expansion

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Originally Posted by Vicman

UNT first opened in 1890 and Texas Women's first opened in 1901. Denton eventually became a part of DFW but I'm not sure it was thought of as such at the time. The same in likelihood happened to Prairie View.

Let's compare by total student population (I'll just get the numbers off of Wikipedia) - includes both undergrads and grads

Houston area:
* University of Houston - 42,704
** Sugar Land is a separate campus of UH
* University of Houston-Downtown - 14,262
* University of Houston-Clear Lake (Pasadena and Houston) - 8,628
* University of Texas Medical Branch (no undergrad) - 3,169 total, 2,826 full time
* Prairie View A&M (Prairie View) - 8,762
* Texas Southern University - 9,646
* University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (Houston) - 4,811 (no undergrads)
* Texas A&M University at Galveston is a branch of Texas A&M - 2,324

DFW area:
* University of Texas-Dallas (Richardson) - 26,793
* University of North Texas (Denton) - 37,979
* University of North Texas at Dallas - 3,030 (it just recently got undergrad programs so expect this to increase)
* Texas Woman's University (Denton) - 12,416 for Denton campus only (it has 1,446 in Dallas and 1,273 in Houston)
* University of Texas-Arlington (Arlington) - 39,714
* Texas A&M Commerce (Commerce) - 12,302

You're missing UT-Southwestern Medical school in Dallas if you are including medical schools.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by Texas Ag 93

Does anyone have an opinion on what, if any, impact the top 10% rule has had on UH? My own personal belief is that the increased requirements for admission to UT and A&M have had a positive trickle down effect on schools like UH, Texas State and possibly even Texas Tech etc. There are now some very good candidates from competitive HS that don't meet that 10% bar, but are in the top 20% or 25%, for example. I think a lot more of them are considering UH, as opposed to just going out of state.

Anyone agree (or disagree), and if so, why?

Absolutely its positive. I know lots of people with kids who would have gotten into UT or A&M 25-30 years ago that consider UH and TT (as well as a lot of out of state public schools).

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Originally Posted by Houston parent

There is plenty around this tract, and it consists mainly of warehouses and old apartments (to be fair, there are a couple newer apartment complexes nearby as well). I've actually driven through this parcel in the past. You don't need to get in the car to know I'm right - just check it out on Google Earth. This is a short distance southwest of the Astrodome - an area not exactly known for beautiful scenery or low crime. I can only guess that they thought the new campus might help spur some gentrification.


I'm not a UT or UH booster, BTW. My remarks are from a commercial real estate perspective. This tract is going to be a hard one to sell, and they stand a good chance of either losing money, waiting a long time for a buyer, or both.

The Texas Medical Center is rapidly growing that way. That area has excellent potential. There just isn't much available land between 610 and Hermann Park. Institutions own most of the vacant land.

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Originally Posted by KerrTown

Honestly the UT System is too late in the game. For too long, the state has neglected higher education in Greater Houston and the University stepped up to fill the need and is ascending into Ivy League status. Sadly, quality higher education in Texas necessitated leaving the big city (or the small town in West Texas) and serving time in provincial Austin or College Station for 4 years.

UH has done a good job in building a world-class university and state university system around the metropolitan area over the past half-century while UT (and to a lesser extent, A&M) neglected Houston. All I can see are the good 'ol boys from UT-Austin (and A&M-College Station) trying to loot the assets of UH and the system because it's encroaching on the turf of UT/A&M superiority (and Tech, UNT, et al. is not far behind UH).

If the Houston area had to secede from Texas and write up a Declaration of Independence, the treatment by the Lege (and the Austin-based cabal of UT and A&M alumni elitists) of UH and the system would definitely be one of the grievances!

No, that's a UH centric perspective, not Houston. The Houston metro area had 2 of the states 4 medical schools for many years (more have opened, especially in the last 15 years).

[Spade]

Originally Posted by DabOnEm

Oh I see. They're trying to rebrand it to get back in those whiny kids...I mean UH alumni graces . Hope it gets built.

UT wants to establish a presence in the nation's 5th largest metro area. Leaders in Houston see this could be an economic boon for the metro. Sounds like a win-win.