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This coming fall, the McAllen and Edinburg school districts, in collaboration with UTRGV, are set to open new collegiate schools marking a milestone for the university’s footprint in Hidalgo County.
Signing a memorandum of understanding in 2022, the university and school districts split the cost of the construction of the new campuses with UTRGV offering free professors and classes for the students.
“We are thrilled to see the Edinburg Collegiate High and the McAllen Collegiate Academy come to fruition,” UTRGV President Guy Bailey said. “These projects are a powerful reminder of the incredible outcomes that can be achieved when we collaborate with local school districts for the benefit of our students.
“These unique collegiate highs will not only provide exceptional educational opportunities for our students but will also serve as a model for future dual enrollment partnerships. Together, we are paving the way for innovative educational pathways that will shape the future of our community.”
The collegiate high schools are geared to focus on education, engineering, computer science and health professions. Students will get two years of UTRGV classes taught by university professors at no cost.
With both collegiate high schools being modeled almost exactly to the UTRGV-Harlingen CISD Collegiate High School in terms of layouts on both stories of the building, Edinburg’s campus is larger at 66,661 square feet compared to McAllen’s at 65,000 square feet.
UTRGV-McAllen ISD Collegiate Academy cost a total of around $23.4 million.
UTRGV-Edinbrug CISD Collegiate High School cost a total of about $29.6 million.
Receiving another tour of the UTRGV-Edinburg CISD Collegiate High School on Monday, district Superintendent Mario Salinas touted the state-of-the-art facility.
With the construction of the campus complete, cleaning up and installing all of the furniture and plants around campus are the only things left to do.
“The construction of the building is pretty much done,” Salinas said. “Furniture will be installed in the next month.”
The facility has a total of 35 classrooms, 18 on the first floor and 17 on the second. It also features offices for university and district staff, three labs designated for physics classes, another three labs for biology and chemistry, one manufacturing lab, one computer lab and an auditorium that can seat about 170 people.
He said the first floor of classrooms will mostly consist of high school classes with the second floor for UTRGV college classes.
Students that play sports will have their home high schools to participate in extracurricular activities.
“We didn’t want to take that away from them,” Salinas said. “We happen to think that participation in the fine arts or in UIL is very important to the development of the student.”
Anticipating to have about 500 students when fall rolls around, he said the school is built to have a capacity of 700 to 800 students.
“This is high school number five for us,” Salinas said. “It has a mascot, the lynx. This high school, the children are here all day.”
With the collegiate program starting two years ago, students this last year were in portables. He said the students and parents are excited for the move.
“I think it’s a huge benefit to the students and it’s a big feather in our cap,” Salinas said. “ It’s such a beautiful facility for such a beautiful purpose … you probably have more poverty in the Valley than any other area in the whole United States of America.
“I think this is part of the solution. The majority of our students here come from poor families. They have parents and siblings that have never gone to college and they’ll be the first.”
McAllen ISD on the other hand is operating their collegiate academy in a different way.
McAllen ISD gave The Monitor a tour in April and since then, the campus construction has been completed with furniture being installed in the next two months.
UTRGV-McAllen ISD Collegiate Academy Director Elizabeth Gonzalez said the difference between the campus and the other collegiate high schools is how it operates.
She said students attending the academy are still part of the one of the district’s comprehensive high schools and based on their schedule and extracurricular activities, either take classes in the morning or afternoon and come to campus on days based on their classes at the academy.
“It’s beyond exciting,” Gonzalez said. “This is something that educators only dream about. Starting your own campus, getting to be a part of it, literally from the ground up. I’m excited for the opportunities that students will have.”
The campus has a total of 26 classrooms, including four labs for chemistry, biology, physics and engineering. It also features office spaces for UTRGV and McAllen ISD staff, conference rooms and an auditorium.
Gonzalez said the district expects around 300 students, from freshman to juniors to attend in the fall.
The facility has a capacity of around 500 students.
McAllen ISD Superintendent René Gutiérrez said the district will have about approximately 15 teachers at the academy along with support staff and the professors provided by the university.
“It’s great that we have another campus available and for our students where they’re going to have another option,” Gutiérrez said. “This campus is going to provide another opportunity for kids to consider and to enroll and to be part of the UTRGV experience.”
He added with McAllen ISD being an open enrollment district, students from surrounding areas are welcomed to visit the campus when it is open and enroll.
“This campus has the best location in the area because it’s located where all the medical complexes and facilities are going to be built around there,” Gutiérrez said.
UTRGV Vice President for University Marketing and Communications Patrick Gonzales said the university will offer 22 courses at the Edinburg collegiate campus and 14 at the McAllen collegiate academy.
