Students at a community college in Espa§ola, New Mexico, will be able earn a UNM bachelor's or master's degree this fall through a combination of live, televised and Internet classes.
The program is meant to help people become qualified teachers if they cannot or do not want to leave Espa§ola for their education, said Jerry Dominguez, vice president of UNM Extended University.
He said the program will offer a baccalaureate of university studies and a master's degree in elementary education at first. As the program grows, he said, they will explore more degree options.
Dominguez said the program at Northern New Mexico University in Espa§ola is not the first of its kind. It will be the ninth extended university program in New Mexico, joining others such as Taos, Valencia, Los Alamos and Gallup. The entire extended university program has about 6,000 students, and Dominguez said he expects the program in Espa§ola to attract several hundred more.
Tamera Salazar, a teaching major in Espa§ola, said she had not heard of the program but it sounded useful to be able to get her master's without leaving Espa§ola.
"To be able to get my master's, it would be useful since I wouldn't have to leave New Mexico," Salazar said. "That would be helpful for a lot of people around here. There's a lot of people enrolled in this college that want to do teaching, and it would be a really good opportunity for them to be able to stay in Espa§ola and do that."
However, Salazar said the bachelor's degree wouldn't be very useful, since it is a generic university studies degree.
Jose Griego, president of Northern New Mexico University, said both degrees offered are important. He said the bachelor's degree can be used to enter master's degree programs and licensure programs for teaching, even though it is not specialized.
Griego said the program is important for the economic development of Northern New Mexico. He said Highlands University in Las Vegas is the only public university in the state above I-40.
There are 5,000 technicians at Los Alamos National Laboratories that cannot advance in their career because they have associate's degrees, and have to travel to Las Vegas or Albuquerque to get a bachelor's, Griego said.
Dominguez said students in the extended university pay the same tuition as regular UNM students, in addition to all applicable fees. He said he expects the program to be self-supporting through the money received from students.
Dominguez said the courses include traditional classes taught in person by professors, as well as online courses. Some courses taught on the main UNM campus will also be broadcast live to students in Espa§ola, he said.
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"I'm very confident, because we have been working on this for well over a year, planning and getting to where we are today," Dominguez said.
He said the biggest challenge the program faces will be making students aware of it.
"I think initially the major challenge will be making sure the students know where we are, how to get a hold of us and making sure we offer the right services," Dominguez said. "Like with anything, it's just getting the word out."
