Graduate Education Task Forces
HSC has witnessed tremendous growth in its research enterprise, and graduate education plays a critical role in educating future scientists while propelling research initiatives forward.
It is essential to align graduate programs with existing and emerging research strengths. Graduate education deepens students’ knowledge and skills, preparing them for higher level roles in their chosen fields, addressing workforce demands, and cultivating the next generation of real-world leaders and innovators.
HSC has formed two task force committees to explore opportunities to enhance our graduate education programs with the foremost goal to strengthen our graduate education experience for our students.

Report: Graduate Education

Report: Synergizing Research and Graduate Education

Task Force on Graduate Education & Research Charge

Task Force on Student Mental and Behavioral Health
Task Force on Graduate Education
The Task Force on Graduate Education is charged with assessing the current graduate governance structure and providing recommendations to build efficiency, maintain high quality and provide suggestions for areas of standardization or centralization of key services across all programs.
- Co-chair: Dr. Tom Cunningham, Tom.Cunningham@unthsc.edu
- Co-chair: Dr. Melissa Lewis, Melissa.Lewis@unthsc.edu
Task Force on Synergizing Research and Graduate Education
The Task Force on Synergizing Research and Graduate Education is charged to evaluate the HSC research strengths and envision opportunities to foster stronger connections between graduate students and our research enterprise.
- Co-chair: Dr. Robert McClain, Robert.McClain@unthsc.edu
- Co-chair: Dr. Rebecca Cunningham, Rebecca.Cunningham@unthsc.edu
Graduate Education Task Force Campus Feedback
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Task Force on Graduate Education & Research Charge
They will be focusing on a variety of tasks, that will include:
- Essential features or characteristics of a Graduate College
- Prioritized research degrees best aligned with HSC research strengths
- Organizational framework within a Graduate College to house research degrees
- Integrated Graduate College-level student and faculty services
- Unified Graduate Council (or similarly named body) composition and responsibilities
Student Mental & Behavioral Health Task Force
This task force is charged with providing input, ideas and potential solutions to addressing our student’s needs. Some areas of focus for review include:
- Cost of living for students (i.e. Ph.D. stipends that currently don’t cover all costs)
- Student Emergency Fund
- Counselor accessibility/availability, especially for crisis situations
- Current telehealth mental health services
- Core needs for mental health support
Background
HSC’s Academic Council recognized, in its June 2022 report, the need for HSC to manage and facilitate non-professional graduate and especially doctorate programs to build efficiency, maintain high quality, and provide standardization of services across all programs.
The task forces are charged to continue this work by providing recommendations to the following questions:
- What broad responsibilities should be charged to a centralized HSC unit?
- How should a unified, graduate governance structure be organized?
- Are there graduate policies, procedures, or standards that should be HSC-wide?
- What metrics should be used to monitor the performance of a centralized HSC unit?
The two task forces that has been working this summer will join to form the new Task Force on Graduate Education and Research, which will be chaired by Dr. Tom Cunningham.
This committee, which features experts from across HSC’s six schools, will build off the reports of the previous two task forces.
Timeline and Communication
- June 22, 2023 – Task Forces Launched
- July 31, 2023 – Task Force Open Forum
- August 11, 2023 – Feedback from faculty was collected and shared at HSC’s August Faculty Senate meeting
- Aug. 21, 2023 – Reports submitted for review
- Sept. 8, 2023 – Feedback period ends
- Nov. 22, 2023 – Date for submission
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