This article originally appeared in the February 2016 print edition.
By Kassandra Garza
As a local born and raised in Laredo, TX. I have seen that Laredo has been growing in a very fast pace. Many small businesses booming from left to right and many apartments being built all over the city. Since the city is growing with the population it is also important that our society has a higher education school. Texas A&M international University offers an economic solution to help combat expensive education.
Most people living in our city are middle class and cannot afford to go to Yale or Harvard unless you’re really intelligent or receive grants/scholarships. Laredo has been known to have a low education rate post high school and TAMIU offers a way for local youth to find their way into higher education. Our university offers a lower tuition compared to other universities from our nation. This city and state has improved TAMIU by expanding the school so that everyone has a better and equal opportunity in higher education just like everyone else in the United States. With this in mind, current students and alumnis have the opportunity to give back to the society. Giving back to our society can range from finding a local career or having any type of business after graduation. This helps Laredo grow in a positive manner and also opens up a lot of doors for the undergraduate and graduate students from our local university.
As a booming city Laredo has opened so many doors for recent graduates from TAMIU. Many graduates dream of moving away after graduation and pursuing a career somewhere out of town. A recent friend of mine just graduated from TAMIU with a criminal justice degree. During his senior year at TAMIU he was offered an internship with Child Protective Services. Once he got his bachelors he was offered a full time job with CPS. That shows that even though Laredo is still growing our society has many opportunities to offer TAMIU students for future careers once we finish with our degrees.
Even though our city is still small but growing I have heard many of our local people talk about how boring Laredo is and there is nothing fun or exciting things to do. As a current undergrad at TAMIU I have heard of many activities that our school has offered through the semesters. TAMIU wants us to participate with the “Dustdevil” community and most on campus activities are also open to the public. So Laredo isn’t boring. We just need to pay more attention to announcements from the school website or the campus paper to see what community activities are coming up in the future.
