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Welcome to the graduate programs of the University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez Campus (UPRM)… an institution that will celebrate its 100th Anniversary in 2011. Graduate education at UPRM is important to Puerto Rico, Latin America and the Caribbean… is essential to UPRM’s mission. Graduates with a PhD or a Master play a vital and increasing role in the social, industrial and commercial life of our communities and in our universities. Although graduate education makes important contributions to the education and research missions of universities, its overriding purpose must be the education of graduate students. At the end of the second semester of the academic year 2004-2005 we received our reaccredidation by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education. In the preparatory process for the reaccredidation UPRM renewed its commitment to support and foster graduate education. Our University is dedicated to implement the following recommendations of the 1998 Association of American Universities Committee on Graduate Education to strengthen graduate education at UPRM. |
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| • "Recruitment and admissions: Admissions decisions should be made with the goal of maintaining and improving the quality of programs. Universities should encourage enrollment of exceptional foreign students while continuing efforts to develop the U.S. domestic talent pool. • Financial support: All admitted students should be given accurate information about the costs they will incur and realistic assessments of future prospects for financial support. Financial support should be designed to assist students in their progress to a degree; financial support through work that draws students away from their graduate programs should be avoided. • Graduate curriculum: The graduate curriculum should balance breadth and depth with the need to minimize time-to-degree. • Faculty mentoring: Faculty mentors should confer with students frequently to assess students' progress, and should provide the department with periodic assessments on progress to the degree. • Data for institutional policymaking, program evaluation, and student advising: Institutions should maintain data on completion rates, time-to-degree, and placement to the first professional employment, as well as conduct exit surveys for all Ph.D. recipients • Program evaluation: Institutions should evaluate the quality of and justification for their doctoral programs through self-study, on-site evaluation by external reviewers, or both. Institutions should terminate programs that cannot maintain the infrastructure and student financial support necessary for acceptable program quality. Institutions should not begin new programs absent a regional or national need and sustainable support. • Policy implementation and maintenance: Institutions should ask departments to provide descriptions of their goals and expectations for their graduate programs, and should periodically compare these against departmental program performance data”. As we initiate academic year 2005-2006, we welcome all those who have accepted the challenge to initiate graduate studies at the University of Puerto Rico at Mayaguez. We restate our pledge to support you in facilitating an academic environment that strengthens the concept of “university as a priceless way of life”. Welcome! Jorge Iván Vélez Arocho Chancellor |
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