TAMIU Faculty, Staff Assembly Friday

As the Fall Semester readies to unfold Monday, Texas A&M International University faculty and staff will initiate the new academic year with Assembly 2008, beginning Friday, Aug. 22 at 8:15 a.m. and continuing through 11:45 in Western Hemispheric Trade Center room 111.

Traditionally, Assembly provides a snapshot of the year to date, focuses on the year to come and offers special presentations relevant to the University’s mission, service and research.

This year, the University will welcome three special guest presenters.

Dr. J. Herman Blake, vice president of Scholars for Educational Excellence and Diversity Inc. and Inaugural Humanities Scholar in Residence at the Medical University of South Carolina, will present “Achieving Student Success Together.” Dr. Blake’s presentation is anchored on the principle that diversity and academic excellence are intertwined and enhance each other.

Also joining the Assembly will be Dr. Russell Lowery-Hart, associate vice president for academic affairs at West Texas A&M University in Canyon, Texas, and Eva Harder, a WT student.

Dr. Lowery-Hart directs WT’s Readership WT Ambassadors, a common readership program initiated in 2005 as part of the University's Quality Enhancement Plan theme, "Engaging the First-Year Student." Harder, originally from Seminole, Texas, is a first-generation college student and one of 20 University freshmen selected in 2007 to take an all-expenses paid trip to central Europe to study the Holocaust based on essay contest submissions and reading the program’s selection, Night by Elie Wiesel. This Fall, TAMIU launches its common reading program.

The Assembly also serves to introduce new faculty and administrators to the University community. This year, 25 new faculty members join the University. Classes begin Monday with late registration underway through Friday, Aug. 29.

For additional information, contact the TAMIU Office of Public Relations, Marketing and Information Services, at 326.2180, visit offices in the Sue and Radcliffe Killam Library, room 268, e-mail prmis@tamiu.edu or click on tamiu.edu

Journalists who need additional information or help with media requests and interviews should contact the Office of Public Relations, Marketing and Information Services at prmis@tamiu.edu