SEPTEMBER 8, 2020 — UTSA today announced the Academic Success District initiative to promote collaborative learning environments for students and faculty. Through the initiative, the university will relocate several key offices that support the academic experience to paseo-level spaces to enhance their visibility and navigability.
“Providing exemplary working and learning environments that enhance collaboration, education and creative activity are critical to our destinations to be a model for student success and an exemplar for strategic growth and innovative excellence,” said Kimberly Andrews Espy, provost and senior vice president for academic affairs. “Just as we conduct campus master planning to guide our physical growth in alignment with our long-term institutional goals, strategically allocating space on campus allows us to realize more immediate gains toward those goals.”
The Academic Success District initiative builds upon the recent completion of the Student Success Center. The new modular building brings together undergraduate advising services on Main Campus that previously were dispersed across multiple locations in five buildings.
“With the completion of the Student Success Center and resultant release of space in several core buildings, we have a prime opportunity to move—and in some cases, co-locate—a number of academic support areas to more prominent spaces and also to create more synergistic environments for our students, faculty and staff,” said Joshua Gerken, senior director of space management.
“We are a university of more than 34,000 students and some 4,000 faculty and staff; space is a central resource of the university and one of our most limited ones. So it is critical that we identify and capitalize on opportunities to fully and effectively utilize our space in a manner that supports our institutional objectives for student success and faculty excellence.”
A key component of the Academic Success District will be creating front door environments for the division of Academic Innovation and academic support programs of the Tomás Rivera Center on the second floor of the Multidisciplinary Studies Building in spaces previously occupied by Student Placement Advising and the Registrar’s Office.
“The division of Academic Innovation supports UTSA faculty and students by championing innovative and transformational practices that enhance their academic experience at UTSA,” said Melissa Vito, vice provost for academic innovation. “With this storefront space in the MS, we are bringing together our Digital Learning, Teaching and Learning, and Learning Technologies specialists and creating open and collaborative working and training spaces for our faculty and students. Our vision is this will be a community space that invites both faculty and students to work with our team to innovate and improve teaching and learning at UTSA.”
Similarly, the new home for the Tomás Rivera Center’s academic support services will feature open and collaborative learning spaces with flexible furniture to accommodate group learning sessions, study halls, tutoring and learning assistance workshops. Small offices on the perimeter will be used for one-on-one tutoring sessions.
“The new space will be a supportive environment where students can master skills needed to be successful lifelong learners,” said Tammy Wyatt, vice provost for student success. “The Student Success Center was an important step in our efforts to create hubs where our students can access essential resources; with the Academic Success District, we’re talking it several steps further.”
Also as part of the initiative, the TRC’s Supplemental Instruction will move from the fourth to the second floor of the John Peace Library.
⇒ Learn more about the Academic Success District initiative.
With limited in-person classes for fall 2020 and many staff and faculty continuing to work remotely, the launch of the Academic Success District initiative is timed to cause minimal disruption to academic life. Many of the relocations already are underway, and Gerken expects the moves to be completed with the offices capable of being fully operational in their new spaces by May 2021.
Other components of the Academic Success District initiative:
The Academic Success District also encompasses student-focused offices in the Graduate Studies and Research Building: Honors College, Writing Core Program and ROTC programs.
UTSA Today is produced by University Communications and Marketing, the official news source of The University of Texas at San Antonio. Send your feedback to news@utsa.edu. Keep up-to-date on UTSA news by visiting UTSA Today. Connect with UTSA online at Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Instagram.
Join UTSA Libraries and Museums to learn more about the publishing discounts available for UTSA researchers. Current agreements include Elsevier, Cambridge University Press, Wiley, and more. Bring your questions and feedback for the library as we continue to pursue partnerships with publishers to reduce costs for our researchers.
Virtual Event (Zoom)M. Bayani Cadenas from UT Austin will present a research lecture on "Hydrobiogeochemistry of terrestrial-aquatic interfaces from pore to continental scales."
Loeffler Room (BSB 3.03.02), UTSA Main CampusHave questions about making your OER accessible on UTSA Pressbooks? The OER Team and the Digital Accessibility are ready to answer them! Bring your questions about OER and accessibility and receive guidance from our two teams.
Virtual (Zoom)Perfect for faculty and grad students who are ready to take their research to the next level, this workshop will guide you through the basics of the I-Corps program. Learn how I-Corps can teach you entrepreneurial skills to translate your research to commercialization, how you can get funding to discover customers for your technology, and how I-Corps can help you find the value proposition that will get your technology to sell. Lunch is included.
TBDLearn how to maximize the benefits of ORCID, how it can help you save time, and how to set up automatic updates to keep your ORCID record current.
Virtual Event (Zoom)In this hands-on workshop, participants will learn to setup an EndNote library, save references and PDFs, and automatically create and edit a bibliography. Attendees are encouraged, but not required, to have EndNote already installed on a personal computer.
Virtual Event (Zoom)Pressbooks Basic workshop attendees will be able to: create a new book, clone an existing book, remix chapters from a variety of different Creative Commons licensed books, add media and other content to a book, export a book in a wide range of formats.
Virtual (Zoom)The University of Texas at San Antonio is dedicated to the advancement of knowledge through research and discovery, teaching and learning, community engagement and public service. As an institution of access and excellence, UTSA embraces multicultural traditions and serves as a center for intellectual and creative resources as well as a catalyst for socioeconomic development and the commercialization of intellectual property - for Texas, the nation and the world.
To be a premier public research university, providing access to educational excellence and preparing citizen leaders for the global environment.
We encourage an environment of dialogue and discovery, where integrity, excellence, inclusiveness, respect, collaboration and innovation are fostered.
UTSA is a proud Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) as designated by the U.S. Department of Education .
The University of Texas at San Antonio, a Hispanic Serving Institution situated in a global city that has been a crossroads of peoples and cultures for centuries, values diversity and inclusion in all aspects of university life. As an institution expressly founded to advance the education of Mexican Americans and other underserved communities, our university is committed to promoting access for all. UTSA, a premier public research university, fosters academic excellence through a community of dialogue, discovery and innovation that embraces the uniqueness of each voice.