University of Central Arkansas officials held a dedication Wednesday for the new residential college designed to prepare students for careers in technology and science.
The STEM Residential College also fits into the governor’s call to help improve science, math and technology education in the state by building a community of young scholars.
The residential college provides students a learning and living environment in the areas of math, science, computer science, technology and secondary math/science education. The residential college, located in Arkansas Hall, opened its doors in August. Currently, more than 200 freshmen are enrolled in the program.
The concept of a residential college is something relatively new to Arkansas, but others are beginning to follow in UCA’s footsteps, said Gov. Mike Beebe, who served as the keynote speaker.
For more on the dedication of the new STEM Residential College, visit UCA’s YouTube page.
“It is a concept that more and more schools are adopting and obviously the success of this wonderful building will be a predicate to whether or not other people will decide to emulate,” Beebe said. “… UCA for a long time has been the leader in certain areas of health care particularly in regards to physical therapy. Now, you have taken it to a totally different level.”
Tomorrow’s economy is changing to the point where there is a greater demand for people with these disciplines, Beebe said. However, the state is lagging behind when it comes to the number of bachelor degrees per capita. Less than 19 percent of adults over 25 have baccalaureate degrees.
“We do a pretty good job at sending kids to college, but we don’t do a very good job at getting them a degree,” he said. “This is going to change that. This kind of setting is going to change that. This kind of attitude is going to change that. … This is not an overnight process, but it is a goal worth pursuing and one that we must achieve.”
The STEM Residential College is consistent with the governor’s initiatives to build a base of educated workers for a science and technology economy, said Dr. Steve Runge, Dean of College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics.
“Our objective here is to help elevate the level of STEM education in Arkansas and make it more engaging such that more students will see a career in a STEM field as a possibility and something that they could really do,” he said.
Officials hope to increase the university’s retention and graduation rates for students majoring in the STEM disciplines. Other residential colleges at UCA have consistently increased freshman to sophomore year retention by 12% and graduation rates by 10% relative to students who are not participating in a residential college.
“We plan to leverage the establishment of the STEM Residential College into a powerful recruiting tool to bring undergraduate students interested in the sciences, technology and mathematics fields into our outstanding programs at UCA,” Runge said.
University officials are incorporating a significant service learning component into the STEM Residential College program. Students will be involved in community-based projects that will help them learn about and appreciate the applications of science and mathematics to solving real-world problems, Runge said. Also, the college will be partnering with area K-12 schools in teaching STEM lessons with their teachers.
“We hope that this exciting environment that values and celebrates science and math learning will encourage more of our high achieving students to pursue careers in K-12 STEM education,” Runge said. “This will in-turn renew the cycle of increasing the quality of STEM education in our schools, with more students wanting more.”
