Zayas: We plan to make UTRGV an authentically bilingual, bicultural and bi-literate institution

Good evening and welcome to all of you and our distinguished guests tonight. 

It’s really an honor to be here tonight but it is also an honor to serve as provost of UTRGV. I don’t think there could be a better place for this event to be held than UTRGV. 

Indeed we are a Hispanic Serving Institution with a mission not unlike that of the White House Initiative on Advancing Education; Equity, Excellence, and Economic Opportunities for Hispanics has. We partner with local schools to inspire and prepare students in elementary, middle school and high school for college. Many of those children will be, as many of our students are now, the first in their family to go to college. We serve a population of students that is overwhelmingly Hispanic, and the challenge is not to serve and educate them, but to help them grow as individuals, as members of their communities. 

Moreover, we pursue very lofty goals while highlighting others. So we are an Hispanic Serving Institution and we’re going to be the leading one. But we are also highlighting another part of our vision, part of our identity: to become an authentically bilingual, bicultural and bi-literate institution. Our students, faculty and staff can learn and teach in both Spanish and English. Being a B3 institution, as we fondly refer to it, gives our students an advantage they might not achieve elsewhere. Yes, there are many schools producing engineers but how many are Hispanic engineers and bilingual, bicultural and bi-literate? That is an advantage but that cannot be taken away. 

I want to tell you a little something, too. There was a recent study or a report issued about UTRGV and another university in the Valley, or at least in South Texas. And it has to do with, what is it about these schools that make them so effective in promoting economic mobility for our low income students? And the study asked a simple question, or at least the report has a simple question. How are these institutions doing it, what is it about UTRGV and what choices are they making? 

There are five takeaways from the report that I’d like to summarize for you. 

First, we are a mission-focused institution where the mission is widely embraced by everyone, faculty, staff, administration, and students. We are focused on the challenges facing low-income, first generation students and how we can help them meet those challenges. Everyone believes that our core purpose is to help the region develop and become a better place for our citizens. 

Second takeaway. The pursuit of our mission is reinforced by a deep sense of accountability to the families of our region. Many of our faculty and staff are themselves alumni, and many have origins right here in the communities in the Rio Grande Valley. The deep connection between us and the surrounding communities creates a sense of accountability unlike any other. We’re accountable to our families, not to some bureacracy or process. It’s really for the communities we serve. That is an important part of our mission. 

Third takeaway. We don’t accept any of the assumptions that most of most other higher education institutions make. We turn things upside down. We do that intentionally. We are not competing with other universities for a shrinking pool of students or worrying about a population that is not interested in education. We know that communities here in the Rio Grande Valley still value higher ed and will have their children pursue it. 

Rather, we see tens of thousands of young people who are not choosing college and we pursue them to attend. We make it possible for them to attend. We don’t view potential students as sources of money, although that would be great, I am sure. But rather, we build our financial and operational models based on the success of our students.

The fourth takeaway is that we place enormous value on the perspective of our frontline staff who directly interact with our students. Who better to learn from than the people who sit day in day out, advisors and financial counselors, and professors and departmental staff, who sit in front of our students and know and hear from students what’s going on. And we listen to them, and from the President on down we are all listening to them. These are the people who have the most insight into our students and we listen to them. 

The final takeaway is that we are nimble. Our agility and our nimbleness come from the focus on this mission. So when we face a challenge, we simply build consensus and find a way to deal with it. That’s what allows us to be so successful with our students. We’re not perfect by any means. But we deliver to our students by focusing on them and their family. And I say that proudly and unabashedly. And thank you very much. 

Editor’s Note: The above remarks were given by UT-Rio Grande Valley Provost and Senior Vice President Luis Zayas at a dinner hosted by the UTRGV College of Engineering and Computer Science. The event was part of the college’s 2024 Engineering Week celebrations. Zayas mentioned the White House Initiative on Advancing Education; Equity, Excellence, and Economic Opportunities for Hispanics in his remarks because the keynote speaker at the dinner was Melody Gonzales, its executive director. The dinner was held at the UTRGV Ballroom on the Edinburg campus.

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