"Costly and unsustainable:" After spending $75 million, a troubled UT System technology institute

[TexasTowelie]

by Neena Satija, The Texas Tribune and Reveal and Shannon Najmabadi, The Texas Tribune


"Costly and unsustainable:" After spending $75 million, a troubled UT System technology institute shuts its doors

After spending $75 million and struggling to create a signature product, the University of Texas System's Institute for Transformational Learning closed its doors last week. The decision follows a recent investigation by The Texas Tribune and Reveal that raised questions about the system's spending.

The institute was created in 2012 under former Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa and the UT System Board of Regents. It was envisioned as a kind of startup technology company that would create digital learning tools like a platform for health education, online courses available to people around the world and an iPad app that would let students access course materials.

The idea, said UT System spokeswoman Karen Adler, was to make "a UT education more accessible and more affordable."

But the institute, which employed more than 50 people in the last academic year, had to scale back or abandon most of its original ambitions. In the last five years, it's only generated about $1 million in revenue.

Read more: https://www.texastribune.org/2018/02/07/ut-system-shuts-down-major-endowment-funded-initiative/