Texas Tech University

History

The Texas Tech University Center in Sevilla began as a vision by Dr. Donald Haragan, President of Texas Tech University, and Dr. Allan Kuethe, Horn Professor of History and frequent visitor to Sevilla for research. In November 2000, Dr. Haragan appointed Dr. G. Douglas Inglis as Director of The Texas Tech University Center in Sevilla. The first cohort of students began their studies in Sevilla in January 2001 in offices and classrooms of the Universidad Pablo de Olavide.

For the first couple of years, relatively small semester groups came to Sevilla. Then in 2004 with the first summer programs, yearly enrollment surpassed 100 students. The Center outgrew its space at the host university and relocated to a downtown building in 2005. One of the program's hallmarks that continues to attract students today is the ability for students to fulfill their language requirement of up to 12 hours in just one semester. Numbers continued to grow, especially the number and variety of summer offerings, and in 2006 building space was doubled to accommodate more students and programs.

In 2018, Dr. Inglis and Lubbock Coordinator Donna Wright retired, and long-time Assistant Director Dr. Sara Pink became Resident Director, Dr. Jonathan Deen became Assistant Director and Lanna Sheldon became the new Lubbock Coordinator. That same year, part of The Center was remodeled to create two studios for Architecture semester programs.

Today The Center hosts on average 400 students during the course of the year. Semester programs include Spanish, Architecture, Engineering and Pre-Health, and summer programming regularly includes Spanish, Engineering, Music, Math, Agriculture, Sociology, English, Honors and more. What started out as a vision for global education of a few entrepreneurial professors and administrators has evolved into an integral part of Texas Tech University's global vision.