UTA president: Our new campus in west Fort Worth is a critical investment in our region | Opinion
As a Tarrant County native and president of the University of Texas at Arlington, I know that, with more than 40,000 students, we’re the second-largest university in the UT System, The Wall Street Journal’s No. 1 public university in North Texas, and ranked among the top 4% of all research universities nationwide because of our location in the heart of our thriving Metroplex.
Our region is growing fast and growing to the west. And as our region grows, UTA will as well.
On Monday, we announced plans for UTA West, a new campus that will bring all the benefits of our top-tier research university and the nation’s best public university system to west Fort Worth within the eastern edge of Parker County.
Advantageously positioned at the intersection of I-30 and I-20 at the western gateway to Fort Worth, the new campus is located just 14 miles from downtown. It sits atop more than 50 acres of rolling hills dotted with wildflowers and live oaks, with a small lake that inspired us to plan a waterfront park. If you’re lucky and visit at the right time, you can sometimes see a sea of bluebonnets.
Location is critical in higher education. A little-known fact about top-tier public universities like UT Arlington: The majority of students come from communities within 18 miles of campus. It’s why even though UTA, the University of Texas at Dallas and the University of North Texas aren’t that far away from one another, we serve more than 120,000 students among the three of us.
The area around UTA West has the potential to add 1 million new residents. This isn’t a matter of “If you build it, they will come.” They’re already there, and more are coming. UTA West will be there to serve them.
With new employers eyeing Walsh and Veale Ranch as future homes, this part of our region has the economic need for a top-tier research university. Having a high-quality UTA education in close proximity will be a key contributing factor for companies deciding to call Fort Worth home.
UTA West will prioritize areas of study, such as our top-ranked engineering programs, that ensure students are prepared for the career opportunities that await. And as the region grows, UTA West will grow alongside it, bringing key academic programs that support economic progress.
For decades now, my university’s impact on our region has been both mighty and mutually beneficial. You send us your students, and we send you back well-educated, workforce-ready Maverick graduates who sustain and transform our local economy, making it the envy of the nation. With more than 270,000 living alumni, UTA graduates can be found in just about every company, non-profit and government agency in Fort Worth.
The top employers of UTA alumni read like a blue-chip list of Fort Worth-area companies: American Airlines, BNSF Railway, Lockheed Martin. We’re Bell Textron’s largest supplier of talent nationwide.
We’re also the largest producer of baccalaureate-educated nurses in Texas and boast the largest public college of nursing in the United States. If you walk into any Fort Worth-area doctor’s office, hospital or health care system —from Texas Health Resources to JPS Health Network to Baylor Scott & White Health — odds are you are being cared for by a UTA nurse or nurse practitioner.
We’ve long prioritized our relationship with Fort Worth, and our westward expansion is just our latest investment as a key education partner for the region. Since 1986, we’ve maintained a thriving research-and-development think tank at Riverbend Business Park in east Fort Worth called the University of Texas at Arlington Research Institute. Our researchers there create next-generation technologies, such as medical devices and advanced drones, and our Texas Manufacturing Assistance Center helps local companies become more competitive.
We also renovated and revitalized a downtown Fort Worth railroad depot beginning in 2007, converting it from a train station to a training ground for workers in the city’s urban core. Earlier this year, 29 city of Fort Worth employees graduated from our Master of Public Administration program, which we tailored to meet the city’s needs. In response to the needs of downtown engineering firms, we added two new graduate programs in engineering management and software engineering.
With UTA West, our focus remains the same: to make our world-class education accessible where and when our students need it. For our thriving region, UTA West will meet today’s needs and tomorrow’s as well.
This story was originally published August 5, 2024 at 2:10 PM.