HESTEC just the beginning – UTRGV will continue to push STEM

By Daniel Flores

The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley’s Edinburg campus shifts its focus to all-things STEM as the 14th annual Hispanic Engineering, Science and Technology week (HESTEC) began Sunday night with the Congressional Dinner at the Edinburg Conference Center at Renaissance.

Since 2002, the office of U.S. Rep. Rubén Hinojosa, D-McAllen, has hosted HESTEC in collaboration with UTRGV legacy institution, the University of Texas–Pan American. This year’s is the first iteration of the festival with UTRGV at the helm after the consolidation of UT System’s pair of Valley universities.

“My wife and I feel like the father and mother of a young lady who is just turning 14 years, and next year she’ll be celebrating a quinceañera,” Hinojosa said. “We’re building up, over these last 14 years, to what is now is a new, much bigger HESTEC than we created.”

Thousands of Valley students, teachers and parents will visit UTRGV for the annual educational event.

Hinojosa attributed HESTEC’s future growth to the merging of Edinburg and Brownsville’s schools and UTRGV’s commitment to the entire region of a million-and-a-half people.

“What we want to do is build on all of the good of the last 13 years, and add to that,” said Veronica Gonzalez, UTRGV vice president of governmental and community relations. “It’s expanding.”

For the first time, South Texas College, Texas State Technical College and Texas Southmost College are going to be a part of the program, Gonzalez said.

“We’re partnering with them because we know that not all students chose to go to a four-year university, and we want them to know about options that are available to them,” Gonzalez said.

STEM fields are growing, according Gonzalez, and young people of the Valley should be aware of the job opportunities.

“It’s the wave of the future, and the reality is that it’s moving faster than many can even learn,” Gonzalez said. “We’re seeing the university moving to a lot more online because of that.”

UTRGV President Guy Bailey said HESTEC is about bringing a growing population to fields that have the largest number of jobs in the future.

“If you think about this, most of the careers in the future — especially the high-paying jobs — are going to be in STEM fields. Most of our population growth is among Latinos,” Bailey said. “You want to marry the growth in the population and the growth in the careers.”

U.S. Rep. Filemon Vela, D-Brownsville, has seen an improvement in terms of promoting STEM jobs over the last decade, he said.

“I think when you consider where the Rio Grande Valley was 10 years ago and where we are today, we’re making significant advances in terms of pushing toward with the availability of more STEM careers,” Vela said.

Vela predicted the emergence of more local STEM occupations in the space industry, spurred by SpaceX, and in the healthcare field, with the blooming of the UTRGV School of Medicine.

“They are going to allow the university to provide tremendous opportunities for students who, in the past, had to leave the Valley to pursue those types of careers, who are going to be able to do that at home now,” Vela said.

UTRGV’s Bailey doesn’t just see HESTEC expanding in size. The event will be branching out beyond the Edinburg campus and encompassing more fields of study in the future, the president said.

“We’ve had a great past. In the future, we’d love to include both ends of the Valley and we’d love to include the arts, too,“ Bailey said, referring to the Brownsville’s campus Rio Grande Science and Arts Festival (RiSA), which focuses on STEAM by adding art. “This is a big event now, but we think it will be even larger in the future when it embraces the entire Valley.”

He envisions incorporating more of the university and Valley’s assets, like the collaboration with SpaceX, STARGATE and the Coast Studies Laboratory.

“Think about the science of our coast. We have one of the great ecological treasures in the United States on our coast,” Bailey said.

Bailey sees the mission of UTRGV to push the growth of science, and events like HESTEC will showcase the fields of study.

“Science is at the heart of everything,” Bailey said, adding there will be a continued emphasis in exploring academic programs incorporating STEM. “One of the things we’ll do in the future is expand our allied-health programs dramatically. We’re going to add a number of other programs —things like physical therapy — that we think will really be of great value to the Valley, but will also provide great opportunity to the students. … Almost all of them will be STEM related.

“It’s a big deal now, but in five years, we think it will be even bigger and more impressive.”

HESTEC just the beginning – UTRGV will continue to push STEM