TEXAS STATE UNIVERSITY
Editor’s note: This is part two of a two part series on Texas State Mexico.
The Texas State University System Board of Regents recently approved an agreement for Texas State Mexico in Querétaro, Mexico. According to Texas State President Kelly Damphousse, this is a great way to keep the costs of study abroad affordable and bring international students to the Texas campuses, and this deal is just the first of many in various countries around the world. He said the project is funded purely by the investor with no expenses for Texas State.
Previously, Damphousse was the chancellor for Arkansas State University when he was approached by people that wanted to start an American Style University in Querétaro, Mexico.
“They tried a couple of different universities – didn't quite work out. Eventually they came to Arkansas State University and started working on creating a campus down there,” Damphousse said. “The founder of the university spent about $100 million building a campus down there. It's a private university. The campus classes are all taught by Arkansas State University faculty. The students are technically Arkansas State University students. The classes are taught in English. The faculty are all paid by the private investor, and all the buildings were built by him. The partnership with Arkansas State was to offer a set number of degrees down there, and then they would recruit the students. We would provide the curriculum and faculty oversight. And my first year at Arkansas State was the first year that that school opened in the fall of 2017.”
When he came to Texas State, the founder of the university in Querétaro asked if Texas State University would be interested in operating some degrees that Arkansas State wasn't able to offer such as Computer Science, Engineering, Psychology, Biochemistry, Mass Communication and Journalism.
“It works very similarly with Texas State as it does with Arkansas State, in that the Querétaro campus will hire the faculty and… [students would receive Texas State] degrees that we provide oversight [of ],” Damphousse said. “All the classes are taught in English, but it would be a whole new set of degree programs that Arkansas State is not able to offer. So we signed an MOU a few months ago to work on pulling this all together.”
Now that the agreement has been approved by the board of regents, Damphousse said the next steps will be working on a contract and recruiting students.
“We anticipate having students start taking classes from us in fall of 2025. We expect in two or three years, we'll start having graduating students coming to us. We'll be offering mostly degree specific classes, so the years three and four, basically, of a fouryear college degree. So we should have some graduating seniors about two years after we start,” Damphousse said. “We don't know how many students we will have, but we anticipate we'll have a couple 100 students in short order. The students are mostly Mexican nationals, but there are also Japanese students. There are American students who want to go down there and get that experience. It's a beautiful campus in the outskirts of a beautiful city.”
Thilla Sivakumaran, TXST Global vice president, added that the reason for the demand for an American-style university in Querétaro is that the city houses around 1,500 multinational companies, which means the demand for English speaking graduates is high.
Damphousse said Mexico is just the beginning of Texas State’s expansion across the globe.
“We're creating relationships with other countries. In fact, this summer, Thilla [Sivakumaran, vice president for TXST Global at Texas State University,] and I traveled to Italy and to Spain and to Scotland to create similar kinds of programs there,” Damphousse said. “The deal that we're creating at all three of those campuses, is a study abroad hub for our students to go do a study abroad there to make it as inexpensive as possible for our students. But we're also exploring now the opportunity for their students to do two years with them, and then two years with us to get a two-plus-two degree program as well. So Mexico is our first kind of entrée into international locations, but it's not going to be the last one. We also have opportunities in Costa Rica, Australia, New Zealand, London, Japan and South Korea.”
Damphousse said that this is all in an effort to break down the barriers to study abroad, including the amount of hours it takes, the language and the cost.
“Nationally, about 2% of college students get a study abroad experience, and Texas State is actually a little bit lower, less than 2% right now. And we would love to be at least 4 or 5%,” Damphousse said. “What we're doing with these study hubs is having a… Texas State faculty member take a group of students to an international location… Texas State curriculum classes are being taught in English, but the classroom is in Barcelona, or the classroom is in Madrid, or it's in… Scotland, or in Padua, Italy, or in Costa Rica, or wherever.”
Damphousse said another goal is to increase the number of international students at Texas State University.
“When I got here, we had about 500 or 550 international students at Texas State. That's about one in 80 or so. That was two years ago. This fall, we'll have about 1,400 international students,” Damphousse said. “We're doing that by hiring international recruiters but also recruiting internationally and advertising internationally, trying to bring international students to campus. It gives them a great experience, but it's also great for our students to have international students in their classroom and living in the residence halls and eating in the cafeteria and being on their intramural teams. So to give our students a very rich international experience by bringing the world to San Marcos and to Round Rock. We’re also taking San Marcos and Round Rock to the world.”
Learn more about Texas State Mexico at sanmarcosrecord.com/ news/txst-mexico-agreement- approved.
