Houston – Imagine a classroom where you can study real-world cyber threats as they happen. While this may sound like something from the future, the future is now at Houston Christian University.
Houston Life’s Melanie Camp went on campus to chat with HCU President Dr. Robert Sloan to learn more. Watch more in the video above.
Only six or seven years ago, Houston Christian University had zero engineering students. Now, it has a few hundred. “We’ve just set an all-time attendance record for the entire student body and had our third-largest freshman class in our history. But the real point of excitement within all those departments and schools has been in engineering,” Dr. Sloan told Houston Life. The University is adapting at speed to meet the needs of Houston and beyond, providing cutting-edge courses in cyber engineering, computer engineering, and electrical engineering. These courses recently achieved ABET Accreditation (https://www.abet.org/accreditation/).
ABET accreditation guarantees that a program at a college or university adheres to the professional quality standards necessary for preparing graduates in that field. As Dr. Sloan said, it is “the gold standard.”
On campus, the University houses a cyber security operations center where students learn from real-world situations. They have access to software that shows real-time, real-world cyber-attacks on giant monitors that span an entire wall. Dr. Sloan said, “It is an amazing real-time demonstration of the kinds of threats that are going on…and it truly shows the kind of present-day learning experience that the students get.”
HCU has attracted so many new engineering students in such a short time because of the standard of education students receive and the opportunities HCU’s scholarships provide. “We had a very generous donor who came along and offered Grace Hopper scholarship,” said Dr. Sloan. A retired Navy Admiral, Grace Hopper was a famous woman in the engineering world. “She invented the phrase, ‘We got to get the bugs out,’” said Dr. Sloan. HCU’s Grace Hopper scholarships offer full tuition scholarships for students who earn a 3.25 or above GPA. “When students have the opportunity to get an engineering degree and to have such tremendous scholarship support, those things go together to make it such an exciting area for us,” said Dr. Sloan.
The future is now at HCU, and student opportunities continue to expand.
“We plan to continue to grow our engineering programs and majors. We have a new master’s in cyber security that we want to develop. That will come along very quickly. A master’s in data sciences, and another one that is very hot these days is artificial intelligence. We don’t have a date for that one, but it’s in the offing. Those are all being developed in 2025,” said Dr. Sloan.
HCU will soon break ground on the Smith Engineering, Science & Nursing Building to accommodate a growing cohort of engineering students. The facility will house advanced laboratories and educational spaces for HCU’s College of Science and Engineering and the Linda Dunham School of Nursing.
Designed by Texas-based Kinsey Architecture, the modern structure will feature specific levels allocated to Engineering, Science, and Nursing studies. It will incorporate leading-edge technology to prepare students for the highly competitive job market in STEM fields.
“This space is going to provide fabulous facilities for the next generation of engineers, scientists, nurses, pre-med students,” said Dr. Sloan.
The future of Houston Christian University stands on a foundation that is a testament to the school’s history.
“This university is grounded on Christian faith. Our founders were very concerned it would be a place not only we have a cutting-edge technological education in the humanities, in the sciences, but also a place where the spirit mattered, where faith matters, where truth matters, and values matter,” explained Dr.Sloan.
Ten stone pillars grace the campus. Dr. Sloan said the pillars were once part of the Galveston County Courthouse, which provided shelter and saved many during the 1900 Storm. Houston Christian University founder Dr. Stewart Morris purchased the pillars. Dr. Sloan said the pillars “…remind us that we are sheltered under the arms of God. We are sheltered and protected, and we have a solid foundation upon which to build.”
Learn more about the engineering degrees at Houston Christian University online at HC.edu/apply or call 281-649-3000.