El Paso County is projected to have nearly 9,000 fewer pre-K-12 students by 2030, but Southwest University is betting the region still needs more teachers with special training.
The private, for-profit university plans to launch a new College of Education in August, arguing that persistent demand for bilingual and special education teachers outweighs broader enrollment declines.
Jeremy Burciaga, the university’s vice president since 2021, said the college will enroll any eligible student, but its target audience is the non-traditional students in their 30s and 40s, parents who have helped their children with their homework, and adults who have had a career and want something different.
He knows that there will be interested people who may think they are too old to return to school, but his message to them is to not give up on their dream.
“We want to step in and say, there’s people that are going to be your age, that understand what you’re going through, and they comprehend the information that you have to deal with, as a parent, as a guardian … and we’re also going to be there to show you how to become a teacher,” Burciaga said.
The new program comes as public school districts countywide – and across Texas – are facing deep financial struggles that have led to reductions in force across the board through layoffs, unfilled vacancies and resignation and retirement incentives. The El Paso Independent School District Board of Trustees laid off 55 employees last week, the vast majority teachers, while layoffs are imminent in Ysleta ISD next year. Socorro ISD last year implemented staffing reductions. District leaders have said special education and bilingual teachers remain an area of need, though most are looking to first hire from within their own teacher pools.
The plan
Burciaga said Southwest University officials began to consider creating a College of Education in 2023 after conversations with Workforce Solutions Borderplex representatives who said the region needed more teachers with special training. The university’s’s research included conversations with administrators from area school districts and the Texas Education Agency.
A team led by James Ramos, the university’s academic dean, has stood up an advisory committee made up of pre-K-16 educators and administrators, business leaders and community members to help guide the program.
The college initially will offer bachelor’s degrees in Education Elementary (EC-6) and in Education Middle Grades (4-8). Both will have strong health sciences components and will follow TEA guidelines.
The college will offer morning and evening classes. While the six-week courses will be in-person, there will be some online elements. The college expects to add hybrid or online instruction as the program grows.
Susana “Susy” Arzate, the college’s program development and strategic development coordinator, said the curriculum will include the basics about lesson plans, classroom management, and parental engagement. Students also will learn about the support they can access to fend off first-year burnout.
The university does not have extended winter, spring or summer breaks so students should earn their degrees in three-and-one-half years, and that includes clinical training. The college has affiliation agreements with the Anthony, El Paso, Socorro and Ysleta independent school districts.
“I like to share with (students) that we’re traditionally nontraditional, but in a sense, it’s a traditional education,” Burciaga said.
The roll-out
The college initially planned a May 2026 launch, but decided to wait for August to align with the traditional academic year. As of early April, about 30 people had expressed interest in the program, but none had enrolled, Burciaga said. As enrollment was ongoing, Ramos said he could not provide any prospective education students for an interview.
Burciaga said he expected to start with 25 to 30 students and three to five faculty and staff, and grow from there. Within five years, he projects education enrollment to be at 70-100 students, and about 200 students in 10 years.
The administrator said the college would build its faculty from applicants who meet the criteria and come from the school districts. They would have master’s degrees and experience in their teaching fields. Salaries would be competitive with other teacher preparation programs. According to Indeed, an international employment search engine, a higher education lecturer in a teacher preparation program in El Paso should earn from $50,000 to $65,000.
For-profit institutions entered the market in 2001 and by 2020 more than 50% of newly certified teachers got their training at for-profit institutions, which are generally more expensive and often offer quicker paths to graduation.
Burciaga estimated that the tuition and fees would be about $50,000 for the degree plan. There will be scholarship opportunities through community partners, such as the city of El Paso and the Ysleta del Sur Pueblo, and school districts that have “Grow-Your-Own” teacher initiatives.
A similar four-year degree at UTEP would cost about $37,000.
Collaboration
The Anthony and Ysleta superintendents, who have seniority among the partner districts, said they look forward to working with the new College of Education, its student teachers and graduates.
Xavier De La Torre, Ysleta ISD superintendent since 2014, said he was open to any program that would bring additional value to his district. YISD employs almost 2,400 teachers at 61 campuses. Until recently, the district hired about 60 teachers annually from traditional and online higher education institutions in Texas and beyond, as well as candidates who completed alternative teacher certification programs.
“Our reputation as one of the best districts in the region and (No. 26) in the state of Texas for the best places to teach attracts more teachers than we can accommodate,” De La Torre told El Paso Matters in April.
The Anthony district is among the smallest in Region 19 with about 52 teachers in three schools. It does not host many student teachers, and averages about one teacher vacancy per year.
“I think (a new teacher preparation program) is a good thing because the more candidates we have, … there’s a better likelihood that we’ll get a quality applicant for our students,” said Oscar Troncoso, leader of the Anthony district since 2019. “That’s the way I look at it. A little competition doesn’t hurt.”
Troncoso, an educator in the region for almost 40 years, said that the most successful teachers in the region understand how to work with a large percentage of students who struggle academically, have behavior issues or socio-economic challenges.
The Anthony leader said that in his district, about 62% of his students are at-risk, and 22% are second-language learners. At-risk students have a higher than average chance of failing to meet academic milestones and dropping out of school due to social, academic or environmental issues.
Burciaga said that the university has an agreement with the state and its accrediting body that 70% of its graduates will have a job in their field of study. That body is the Accrediting Bureau of Health Education Schools, which is recognized by the U.S. Department of Education. It has certified the university through 2029.
Concerns
David DeMatthews, the W.K. Kellogg Endowed Professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy at the University of Texas at Austin, is leery of for-profit teacher education programs throughout Texas. That’s because they often hire faculty who lack robust credentials, do not have strong clinical partnerships, and graduate students without the skills to teach effectively, he said
“Every kid deserves a great teacher,” DeMatthews said. “I think every Texan would agree with that. When you see a program open up and you don’t have any insight into any of those things, I think that’s really concerning.”
DeMatthews, who served as an assistant professor in the University of Texas at El Paso’s Department of Educational Leadership and Foundations from 2013 to 2018, includes educator preparation among his research specialties.
He said his investigations into for-profit programs have found its graduates struggle academically, fail certification exams at high rates, and do not stay in the profession long.
DeMatthews said Texas is in a crisis due to a teacher shortage and the proliferation of uncertified teachers being hired across the state. During the 2024-25 academic year, school districts across the state hired 42,103 uncertified teachers or about 12% of the teaching workforce. Among new teacher hires, 52% lacked credentials.
Statistics in “Should States Reduce Teacher Licensing Requirements? Evidence from the Rise of For-Profit Training Programs in Texas,” a paper published in September 2025 by the National Bureau of Economic Research, shows that the demand for teachers remains high regardless of quality.
“Passing the teacher certification exam should not even be the bar,” DeMatthews said. “There’s a lot of research on high-quality teacher preparation that I would say the leaders in our state have not prioritized.”
Burciaga said that general aspersions aimed at for-profit institutions should not reflect on Southwest University’s College of Education, which has not launched yet.
“We’re not part of that stat,” he said.
Clifton Tanabe, dean of the University of Texas at El Paso’s College of Education, did not respond to questions about the launch of the Southwest University’s new teacher preparation program, and about the trend in the number of future teachers his college graduates.
Past, present and future
SU opened in June 1999 as Southwest Career College. It was an academic option for people who wanted to learn English or earn a General Educational Development certificate. Within three years, it began to offer vocational courses. The college collaborated with business partners and continued to add programs throughout the decade.
In April 2009, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board authorized the college to award associate degrees in applied science. The same year, the institution changed its name to Southwest University of El Paso and began to offer bachelor’s degrees three years later.
Burciaga said critics had doubted the quality of the university’s nursing program when it started 11 years ago, but their graduates have proven themselves to be day-one ready. He expects the same from its education graduates.
“We are going to push them to their boundaries,” he said.
The post Southwest University to launch teacher preparation program amid El Paso schools’ enrollment decline appeared first on El Paso Matters.
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