In February, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) approved TTUHSC’s application to expand the School of Pharmacy’s Graduate Program in Pharmaceutical Sciences to the Abilene campus.

Sanjay Srivastava, Ph.D., professor and chair for TTUHSC’s Department of Immunotherapeutics and Biotechnology (DIB), said the approval means earning a biomedical sciences-based Ph.D. in Abilene is possible for the first time.

“Abilene has three undergraduate universities and Cisco College, but we lose bright minds every year to other cities,” Srivastava said. “Now we hope to retain the best and talented students within Abilene, and this also will be an effort to give something back to the Abilene community who have been very supportive to TTUHSC, the DIB and the School of Pharmacy.”

Srivastava said the university began working on the application in early 2018. It was submitted to the THECB late last summer after receiving approval from School of Pharmacy Dean Quentin Smith, Ph.D., Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences Dean Brandt Schneider, Ph.D., TTUHSC President Tedd Mitchell, M.D., and the Texas Tech University System Board of Regents. The program is expected to officially open in August with six to 10 students.

“Two students moved with me to Abilene from Amarillo and I want to recruit at least six new students,” Srivastava said. “We hope to grow this program and bring new dimensions to research and scholarly activities in Abilene.”