Welcome to the UTB/TSC Learning Community

If you are looking for an academic experience in which:

• You interact more closely with professors and classmates,
• You learn, study, and grow as part of a small, intentional community within UTB/TSC,
• Your courses are pre-selected and integrated across disciplines and relate to a common theme,
• You give back to the greater Rio Grande Valley through service learning projects,

Then an intentional, theme-based UTB/TSC Learning Community is the place for you!

Fall 2007 / Spring 2008 Learning Community theme is Health and Healing Along the Border. Students who complete the on-line application by: “ongoing”, have an opportunity to become part of an exciting, new community on the UTB/TSC campus.

What is a Learning Community?
Learning Communities are designed primarily for freshmen students and provide the chance to learn material in the classroom and outside the classroom through extracurricular activities such as field trips, service learning projects, movies, sharing healthy meals, and discussion sessions. These learning opportunities are integrated to enhance critical thinking, information-literacy, and writing skills.

Why the “Health and Healing Along the Border” theme?
The Rio Grande Valley has staggering rates of obesity, diabetes, and heart disease coupled with a significant shortage of health care and health insurance. To address these health disparities in our border communities, more attention must be paid to health promotion and disease prevention in culturally sensitive ways. Learning how to improve health and healing—both traditional and nontraditional—prepares you for a long, healthy academic career and life.

What courses will I take?
All Learning Community members enroll in specific courses set aside just for community members. These courses are part of UTB/TSC required core curriculum and include, for Fall 2007, the following: United States History to 1877, Concepts of Fitness, Physical Conditioning, Composition I, and Applied Communication. For Spring 2008 the courses are United States History since 1877,  Introduction to Psychology, Outdoor Adventure, and Composition II. Classes meet in the afternoons, Monday through Friday, beginning at noon. The community has an hour also set aside for you to hear guest speakers, work on projects, and hang out with new friends!