Update on UTSA and UT Health San Antonio merger

Editor's Note: This message was sent via email from President Taylor Eighmy, Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs Heather Shipley and Interim Vice President for Business Affairs Mary Hernandez to all faculty, staff and students.

AUGUST 23, 2024 — As you learned yesterday, we’re beginning a bold journey toward integration with UT Health San Antonio as we join forces to build a world-class university. Our community deserves a comprehensive institution of this caliber—one that advances discovery, innovation, academic excellence and opportunities for faculty, staff and students. Together, we can deliver it.   

While we’re greatly excited about the bright future ahead, we also recognize that many of you may be wondering what this integration means for our UTSA community and culture. We want to assure you that our university’s mission, vision and values will remain at the forefront of our shared work.

We also want to reiterate that the UT System Board of Regents’ plan for integration is driven by a vision for growth and excellence. Collectively, we will create greater capacities for academic programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels, recruit and retain even more top-tier faculty and staff, develop innovative services and programs, and elevate transdisciplinary research.   

For students, the integration will enhance learning experiences, provide a wider variety of campus programming, and create stronger connections between degree programs and evolving industry needs. Undergraduate students can expect increased access to enriched program offerings, including expanded or newly introduced areas in nursing, public health, medical technologies and programs at the intersection of medicine with STEM disciplines as well as data science and AI. Graduate students will experience expanded applied science and health care programs, including significant growth at the Ph.D. level and integrated master's and Ph.D./M.D. programs.

Faculty and staff can look forward to elevated services, strengthened partnerships and new opportunities across the board. This alignment will immediately and immensely scale our current endeavors to achieve our three strategic destinations. We also expect to significantly grow our research enterprise, particularly at the transdisciplinary intersection of STEM disciplines, humanities, and the basic and applied health sciences. We anticipate this union will foster even more collaboration through teaching research and support service activities while multiplying technological advancements, enhancing fundraising appeal and elevating UTSA to a new level of national peers.

We have a bright future ahead, but we cannot get there without your partnership, collaboration and contributions. Each one of you will play a key role in building this world-class university, and our collective talents will ensure the successful integration of our two great universities.

As we dive into this important work ahead, we will communicate regularly about next steps and various avenues for having your voices heard. While we work to develop a website to capture ideas and feedback, we encourage you to visit UT System’s integration landing page for the latest details. We look forward to sharing more as we move through this exciting process.