Building up structures and strength

Since its founding in 2014, the UTRGV School of Medicine has expanded across the Rio Grande Valley, educating and helping several individuals throughout its growth. 

The school’s most recent development, the Team Building Learning Center (TBLC), will be completed in March 2020. It is located on the east side of the School of Medicine and library on the Edinburg campus.

Marta Salinas-Hovar, associate vice president for Facilities Planning & Operations, said the TBLC is somewhat like an expansion to the medical school’s existing building, at about 25,000 gross square feet overall.

Salinas-Hovar said the building will consist of 45 faculty and staff offices, 20 open cubicle work areas, eight Team Based Learning rooms (TBL), two medical student study rooms and one large lecture classroom capable of seating 90 students. 

The first floor of the building will contain a large space dedicated to “team-based learning.” Surrounding this large area will be several problem-based learning rooms (PBL rooms), where students can focus on different case studies and solve problems as a team. It will also contain a “grab-and-go” café and lounging area.

The second floor will have student study spaces, faculty offices, support and meeting spaces. 

Michael Patriarca executive vice dean of the School of Medicine said the TBL rooms would have “audio visuals hooked up to each table” and is a flexible space so students can “cut it down or make it a large room” for a variety of uses. 

He said the classrooms in the building would be set up solely for medical and the College of Health Affairs students but encourages all students to come see the lounge areas and grab-and-go café. 

“Especially as we look to grow further on down the road, I think it’ll give us more space for students to focus and study [and] collaborate with their classmates and just encourage an environment for learning and growth in line with our growing enrollment and our curriculum,” Patriarca said.

The total project cost of the Team Building Learning Center is $13.7 million, primarily funded with the School of Medicine’s Permanent University Fund (PUF) allotment.

Salinas-Hovar said the UT System dedicated $100 million for the creation of the School of Medicine in allotments of $10 million every year for 10 years. 

“So … this project is being funded with some of that allotment,” she said. 

The construction for another future project, the Institute of Neurosciences Building, will begin in Harlingen once the TBLC is completed in March 2020.

Salinas-Hovar said the institute would be about 29,900 gross square feet and cost $30 million.

Patriarca said this project was also primarily funded by PUF, and said the Valley Baptist Legacy Foundation had made a $15 million gift to the medical school in order to support the start-up in infrastructure needed to begin the Institute of Neurosciences.  

“The South Texas Medical Foundation, which was a [nonprofit] set up in Harlingen, was kind enough to donate 35 acres for the medical school for growth and the first building we have going up there is the Institute of Neurosciences,” he said. 

Patriarca said the building was meant to be an interdisciplinary building, the first floor designed for patient care as well as a pharmacy and the second floor for clinical research. 

“This land … was meant to be where the brick and mortar, where the actual research was going to be happening, so that was really the thought process for it, and in addition to that, across the neurosciences, the Valley is severely underserved in research and patient care,” Patriarca said. “So, psychiatry and neurology remain among the top underrepresented specialties. We really need to make an impact on providing that [type of] patient care and research.” 

He said aside from providing patient care and research, the School of Medicine also wants to begin a neurology residency to build upon the current psychiatry residency in Harlingen. 

Patriarca said the School of Medicine is trying to grow the number of trainees across the health sciences in an attempt to “make a dent” on the shortage of health-care providers in the Valley. 

“The Team Based Learning Center [at Edinburg] and the Institute of Neurosciences at Harlingen are both going to contribute to, again, the clinical research and education mission that was a promise with the genesis of the school,” Patriarca said. “So, we remain really excited about it and we hope the Valley and UTRGV, as a whole, is excited about it, too.” 

Salinas-Hovar said the contractor for both projects will be the same company that worked on the Science Building and the Interdisciplinary Engineering and Academic Building, Vaughn Construction. 

Both projects also have the same architect, Muñoz & Co., a company based in San Antonio.  

“We’re excited about the growth that we’re seeing with the School of Medicine, and we’re looking forward to implementing new projects for them, which will help them a great deal with their overall strategic plan to grow the school across the Valley,” she said

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