University of Texas at El Paso xpect the new School of Nursing and College of Health Sciences

An unprecedented building boom at the University of Texas at El Paso is dovetailing into what educators hope will result in better-quality education for about 2,500 students pursuing degrees in health sciences or nursing.

The university will break ground this fall on a $60 million, 135,000-square-foot building designed for nursing and health sciences students, with state-of-the-art laboratories and classrooms geared to health education.

Construction of the new nursing and health sciences building will begin in November and will be finished in about 30 months.

UTEP officials expect the new School of Nursing and College of Health Sciences building to be a draw for prospective health-care educators, who in recent years have become harder to attract as the pool of nursing and health sciences professors dwindles.

A growing proportion of nurse educators and health sciences professors are at, or approaching, retirement age. At the same time, colleges are trying to educate more people in those fields as the baby boomer generation begins to require more health care.

The new building’s central location on campus should benefit students as well. Nursing and health sciences serves about 2,200 undergraduate and 300 graduate students.

Degree programs include nursing, occupational and physical therapy, clinical laboratory science and speech language pathology.

Health sciences center students take many of their classes at the Health Sciences Building, which is nearly a mile from the main campus, at 1101 N. Campbell.

Professors describe this as a liability to instructors and students alike.

Students at the university described a new health sciences and nursing building, which will be right on UTEP’s main campus, as key to creating a more well-rounded campus life for people now alienated from other students.

“A lot of students can’t access any of the programs the university offers as readily,” said Angel Pineda, a senior nursing student at UTEP who is in a paraprofessional internship on campus but has to take his classes at the Health Sciences Building off campus.

Robert Anders, dean of the UTEP School of Nursing, said that because health sciences and nursing students have been taking classes at off campus, they haven’t been able to participate as easily in the breadth of student services and activities the campus offers.

“What this building will provide us is access for over 2,000 of our students with campus services,” said Kathleen Curtis, dean of the College of Health Sciences. “Over 2,000 of our students are undergraduates who will benefit greatly from being on campus.”

Curtis said the new facilities will also translate into better quality education and research into broad areas of health care, which could have a distinctive benefit for residents of border communities.

Research in immunology, vaccine development and infectious disease studies could become more robust as more accomplished faculty and students come to the university.

While the aim of the new building for nursing and health sciences isn’t geared necessarily to teaching more students, Anders said, the new building will make for a better, higher-quality learning environment.

Nursing students will be able to use tools such as a simulation lab with computerized mannequins to learn how to assess and prepare treatment for common diseases.

The new building also will include equipment for contemporary exercise science research,and a patient suite that will allow students to make diagnoses of actors feigning a certain disease or problem. Classrooms and bench labs all will be new, modern and situated in a centralized area on campus.

What’s more, by establishing a single locale for health science and nursing students, a more collegial, collaborative environment will emerge as students and teachers can engage in research nearer to one another in a modern setting, Anders said.

When the new building goes into use on the southwest corner of campus, students and faculty also can more easily work closely with biology, bioengineering and other sciences for a greater “synergy” that will foster research efforts, Anders said.

“The needs of education in the 21st century are so much different now,” Anders said. “This will allow us to have a centralized location.”

Darren Meritz may be reached at dmeritz@elpasotimes.com; 546-6127.