I hope you have had a productive and enjoyable week.  Mine has been busy, to put it mildly.  In addition to the two-day Board of Regents meeting – which I will summarize in an upcoming Chancellor’s Message – I had the good fortune to spend time with some very special educators.

Wednesday night, I got to rub elbows with some of the UT System’s world-class educators at the Regents Outstanding Teaching Awards (ROTA) dinner.  Hailing from every one of the UT System institutions, this year’s 79 award recipients were vetted rigorously by their peers, by students, and by the UT presidents before advancing to competition at the System level.  They were then evaluated by a review panel on a range of activities and criteria, including classroom expertise, curricula quality, innovative course development and student learning outcomes.

ROTA is the most prestigious teaching prize in the UT System.

ROTA is the most prestigious teaching prize in the UT System, and in addition to prestige, the winners each receive $25,000 cash.  Having distributed more than $15 million to outstanding teachers since 2009, this is among the largest teaching awards programs in the country – underscoring the importance the UT System places on great teaching, and the reality that rewarding great teachers is less an act of generosity than a wise investment in our state’s future.  

The second group of educators I met with this week – who, like our faculty, will have a profound impact on the future of Texas – were the men and women of Harlingen Consolidated Independent School District.  Earlier today, I made a quick trip south to attend the convocation which kicks off the local school year, and I can tell you the teachers, coaches, administrators, bus drivers, crossing guards, and everyone else associated with HCISD are fired up and ready to go.

I was in the right place at the right time to make a difference.

One of my top priorities as Chancellor is to make sure we are reaching out to the K-12 community wherever and whenever possible.  Because at the end of the day, we are all part of the same team, with the same goal: a smarter, stronger, healthier Texas.  And the only way we are going to reach our common goal is by working together.

As I told the folks at Harlingen, I have been the beneficiary of some good timing in my life.  In my military career, I was in the right place at the right time to make a difference.  And now that I have embarked on a second career as an educator, I hope and believe that fate has placed me, once again, in a time and place in which I can have a positive impact on the world.  

Being around so many great teachers this week reminded me that, more than any other profession I know, educators are always in the right place at the right time.  For a teacher, a coach, a counselor, or an administrator, the opportunities to make a positive impact on someone’s life abound! 

The educators I met this week are making the most of their opportunities, and I hope you are too.

Have a great week.  I’ll write again soon.