It’s difficult to retain students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics fields. Of the students who declared STEM majors at some point from 2003 to 2009, nearly half had switched out of the sciences by 2009.
But the newly formed University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley hopes to keep more students in those and related fields — and on track to graduate on time — by mixing big-data and personalized approaches. This fall the university will start a competency-based biomedical-sciences program through a new system called TEx, or “Total Educational Experience.” The system closely monitors students’ progress in their courses, taking into account outside demands that might hinder their ability to complete coursework.
The pilot project for TEx involves about 170 students pursuing B.S. degrees, who will have a number of advisers and instructors to help them set academic goals and keep on track. Over the course of the term, the students will use the TEx platform on an iPad, provided to them by the program, to submit assignments and complete activities.
But while the program entails plenty of high-tech systems — instructors and advisers can use the TEx platform to track students’ progress, and intervene when necessary — “the total experience is more than just technology,” said Marni Baker Stein, chief innovation officer at the University of Texas system’s Institute for Transformational Learning.
The people behind TEx hope to make finishing a degree easier by allowing students to work through their courses at their own pace. The biomedical-sciences program is designed to take three or four years, but the time can vary depending on the credits students have amassed upon enrollment.
TEx administrators also emphasize the program’s social aspect, which is rare in competency programs. While students complete their assignments online and use the system to track their progress, they are expected to attend their classes in person on the campus and to engage with instructors and other students.
“We want it to be as highly interactive as possible, highly social, highly collaborative,” said Steve Mintz, a professor of history at the system’s flagship campus, in Austin, and director of the Institute for Transformational Learning.
The hybrid approach, he hopes, will lead to greater success rates.
“We’re trying to move aggressively to radically increase the number of college graduates, especially in the high-demand fields that are going to define the economy in the 21st century,” he added.
In their first fall term, most students in the program will take courses in biomedical science, chemistry, and writing. They’ll submit activities and do coursework online, but will go to the campus each week with other students for their classes and to meet with instructors. The TEx system will notify advisers, instructors, and the faculty members who lead the courses if a student is falling behind and not meeting their goals.
If it works, Ms. Stein said, the university system intends to start 10 other programs — in business, computer science, criminal justice, engineering, and nursing, among others — by 2017, across seven UT campuses. The hope is that, by 2022, the programs will enroll more than 25,000 students.
Correction (6/19/2015, 1:55 p.m.): This article originally misstated what “TEx” means. It stands for “Total Educational Experience,” not “Total Education Experience.” The article has been updated to reflect this correction.