HONORS COLLEGE COMMUNIQUE: January 2021
Hello from the Honors College! In partnership with Academic Advising, we are sending a monthly
Honors College Communique on the Advising listserv, in which we will send short updates about:
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Honors opportunities open to all students
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A student highlight from your advising areas
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Additional opportunities for students you may want to pass along
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Contacts within Honors for more information
Honors Opportunities for All Students: Citymester – Summer 2021
UTSA’s Citymester program is an exciting 9 SCH combination of internship, service learning, and coursework on San Antonio’s civic landscape. In Summer 2021, up to 30 students will be virtually immersed
in our vibrant city with scholarships up to $3,000. Details are attached and you can read a 2019 Sombrilla story on Citymester
here.
Note, while the Honors College manages the Citymester program,
students do not need to be Honors students to participate. Students only need to be current degree-seeking UTSA undergraduates with a GPA of 3.25 or higher.
The most common question is, will the Citymester courses count toward my degree? It depends on the degree, but often, the internship course
can all under the major’s internship course (if present) and the service learning course and San Antonio seminar can count toward free electives in certain majors. The Citymester program manager, Ms. Elisa Perkins Cuellar (citymester@utsa.edu)
works with each student and their advisor to determine the best path. Please share widely with students. Questions? Contact
citymester@utsa.edu.
Current students can also join the Honors College!
Do you know a current UTSA student with a 3.5 GPA or above (under 45 cumulative hours) that might be interested in joining the Honors College? Benefits of joining the
Honors
College include small interdisciplinary courses and a tight-knit community across all UTSA colleges, Honors-specific scholarships, access funds to pursue experiential
learning opportunities, and professional coaching. Students eligible to join the Honors College (3.5 higher GPA and less than 45 cumulative hours) will be notified in May once grades are posted.
Student Highlight: Meet Samuel Mosquera Florez, College of Engineering
Samuel is a Biology major in the NIH/Federally-funded UTSA ESTEEMED (Enhancing Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math Educational Diversity) Program. He does research involving dental stem cells
for regenerative Endodontics, and in the future his goal is to obtain a Ph.D. in Biochemistry. Samuel is one of 16 UTSA students who were named United Nations Association Millennium Fellows in Spring of 2020 (more details on this opportunity below). Samuel
proposed a service project called the East Flower Garden Coral Foundation, which is dedicated to preserving endemic coral species of Texas either in their natural habitat, marine exhibits, or in the commercial setting. His goal is to partner with local reef
stores, universities, and aquariums to develop at least 15 land-based nurseries to care for coral until it is safe to return them to their natural habitats. While in-person work has been impacted by the pandemic, Samuel is partnering with a non-profit, Hydrous,
to introduce virtual reality reef dives and 3D models of coral to K-12 classrooms in San Antonio to promote conservation.
Additional Opportunities for All Students: Millennium Fellowship
The Millennium Fellowship is a semester-long leadership development program, in which students develop service projects that address United Nations sustainability goals. Students from all UTSA colleges,
from freshman to junior year, can apply each spring for the fellowship. While there is no monetary award from the fellowship, students engage in a curriculum that helps them develop their projects as well as gain the exposure of a robust, worldwide networked
community of fellows. You can read more about the fellowship and UTSA’s class of 2020
here. For application support,
students can contact Andrew.chapman2@utsa.edu.
Our best regards,
Drew Chapman, Director of Nationally Competitive Awards,
andrew.chapman2@utsa.edu
Jill Fleuriet, Honors College Acting Dean,
jill.fleuriet@utsa.edu
Andrew Chapman, Ph.D.
Director,
Office of NationallyCompetitive Awards
The University of Texas at San Antonio
Honors College