Immediate aims of East Texas State University at Texarkana were outlined by branch-director Dr. John F. Moss at a meeting attended by about 40 sophomores in the Auditorium Tuesday morning.
The session provided an opportunity for prospective ET-T students to fill out forms surveying interests and needs as well as to ask questions and receive vocational guidance.
Moss urged all “potential customers” who will have 60 or more hours and be classified as a junior next fall to complete forms so that plans for the opening semester can be finalized, as the number of faculty to be hired and the courses offered will be determined by survey data.
Additional survey forms are available in Room 316 of the Administration Building this semester and can be obtained from the ET-T office on the second floor of the Student Center second semester.
Also, East Texas representatives are distributing forms to communities in the Texarkana area and have established contact with various civic clubs from which they may now be obtained.
Response of over 1300 persons to two previous general surveys indicated strong interests in programs of business and education, with the most demand for business courses.
ET-T will initially offer degrees in general business administration and in elementary or secondary education, with courses to be selected from the following fields: general business, art, English, government, history, mathematics, foreign languages, and speech.
“A necessary compromise of needs in terms of legislative funds available means that majors in specific areas of business or in the ‘pure’ sciences will not yet be available because of the inability to provide additional teachers or to build new laboratories which would be required,” Moss said.
However, the possibilities of adding majors in police technology, computer science, and nursing education as well as courses leading to master’s degrees in education and hospital administration to offerings for the second year are now being explored and will be determined when interest data has been compiled.
Moss advised prospective students to work out a tentative degree plan now to prevent taking courses which will not transfer to East Texas later.
Concurrent enrollment on both campuses is possible for juniors lacking one or two lower-level courses, he pointed out.
Total cost per semester for in-state residents will be about $80, including the minimum tuition fee — $50 for all state universities by the Texas Legislature — plus a student service fee of about $20.
Out-of-state residents, including those from Texarkana, Ark., will be charged an additional fee of $600 per semester.
The reciprocal agreement between Arkansas and Texas which nullifies out-of-state tuition for Arkansas residents at Texarkana Community College is not now in effect for ET-T, as it is an upper-level campus of a four-year institution, Moss said.
“We will try to resolve this problem along political lines in a couple of years, but now is not the right time to confront the Legislature with it,” he added.