Texas Tech University Facilities

Texas Tech University Resume

 The emphasis on research excellence makes Texas Tech University (TTU) an excellent place for scholars and graduate students to conduct their research on addiction and recovery.  In 2016, TTU earned the Carnegie Foundation classification as a R1: Doctoral University with Highest Research Activity, a distinction gained after the university grew its total research expenditures by 25% in just five years to more than $158M in FY2015, further growing to $166M in 2016. Competitive ideas and innovative thinking contributed to the growth in total external awards to TTU, with federal research awards up 12% in 2015, and another 7% in 2016, achieved at a time when federal funding in general has been flat or declining.  TTU also has earned a Community Engagement Classification from Carnegie, recognizing collaboration between institutions of higher education and their larger communities for the mutually beneficial exchange of knowledge and resources in a context of partnership and reciprocity.  TTU was counted among the inaugural class of institutions so-designated in 2006 among a group of only 63 universities, and was recently reconfirmed in 2015.  In 2014, the Association of Public and Land Grant Universities designated TTU as one of only 44 institutions recognized as an Innovation & Economic Prosperity University, in honor of its commitment to knowledge and development for the benefit of society. Entrepreneurship marks the institutional character of Texas Tech, which became part of the Texas I-Corps node in 2015 to foster commercialization of technology previously supported by NSF-funded research. Texas Tech gross licensing revenue has grown from $438,000 in 2013 to $676,000 in 2016.  In 2012, Texas Tech received designation as a National Research University (NRU) from the State of Texas. Texas Tech is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. 

 The facilities and other resources available to scholars and graduate students at Texas Tech University are more than adequate to successfully conduct studies on addiction and recovery.  Located in Lubbock, Texas, TTU's campus physical facilities include a total of 7,449,218 square feet in 188 buildings making it one of the largest in the country, covering over 1,800 acres.  Faculty, researchers and graduate students have dedicated office space or cubicles at the College of Human Sciences, Weeks Hall Addiction and Neuroscience Lab, or the 2nd floor of the Center for Collegiate Recovery Center. Work areas include ample desk space, locked storage cabinets, telephone, and computers with access to secured data storage, word processing, and statistical analysis tools such as SPSS and Mplus.  The College of Human Sciences also provides access to Qualtrics (a web-based survey tool), which will be the main data gathering platform for the proposed study.  The Department of Community, Family, and Addiction Sciences, home of the Center for Addiction Recovery Research, also has conference rooms with teleconferencing capabilities, which can be used for virtual meetings between study sites.  Faculty, researchers, and graduate students also have access to two libraries, one that is dedicated to the health professions (TTU Health Sciences Center Libraries) and a general library that caters to a broad discipline.  A wide selection of books and scholarly journals, including digital copies, relevant to addiction and recovery research are available, as well as several bibliographic databases which include, but not limited to, EBSCOhost databases, PsychINFO, JSTOR, and MEDLINE.  Materials not available in within the TTU library system can be acquired using the ILLiad Inter library loan mechanism. 

 Faculty and Students

TTU supports interdisciplinary collaborations across departments, to which scholars and graduate students have access to more than 1,700 academic faculty across 66 academic departments.  The Office of the Vice President for Research also holds a monthly Faculty Research Club, a social setting intended to stimulate interdisciplinary research collaborations and promote informal discussions about research. 

As for the student body, TTU is composed of 37,010 students currently enrolled.  The diversity of the student body has also broadened in terms of underrepresented students. Texas Tech has recently met the Hispanic student population threshold for designation as a Hispanic Serving Institution. As of September 25, 2017, the 20th Class Day of the Fall 2017 semester, Texas Tech University reported to the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) an enrollment of undergraduate full-time equivalent (FTE) students that is 27.8% Hispanic students, totaling 8,515 Hispanic students. With this benchmark reached, TTU is one of the few R1 High Research Activity Universities that will also be designated as a Hispanic Serving Institution, joining only 14 other universities across the country.

 Other Institutional Support

Research and administrative support are available to scholars and graduate students through the Office of Research Services (ORS) and the Office of the Vice President for Research (OVPR).  The OVPR and the ORS maintains a website and provides workshops that provide information regarding proposal development, grant application and management, funding opportunities, program officer assistance, and new faculty research orientation.  Numerous seed grant opportunities are also available, as well as post-award assistance.  To assure adherence to responsible conduct in research and research ethics, offices and committees such as the Institutional Review Board (IRB) and the Human Research Protection Program are available to researchers and graduate students.