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TTU System, TTUHSC El Paso Celebrate Opening of Hunt School of Nursing

The new 34,000-square-foot facility includes a high-tech simulation lab, state-of-the-art classrooms and collaborative learning spaces for students and faculty 

February 4, 2015 | Contact Doug Hensley

Ribbon CuttingChancellor Robert L. Duncan, from right, cuts the ribbons with Gayle Hunt, namesake of the nursing school, husband Woody Hunt and Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso leadership. 

Scissors in hand, officials, friends and supporters of the Texas Tech University System opened the new building for the Gayle Greve Hunt School of Nursing in El Paso during a ribbon cutting ceremony on February 3, 2015.

The nursing school's new location is on the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso campus, standing on the corner of 201 N. Concepcion Street and Alberta Avenue directly across from the Medical Education Building of the Paul L. Foster School of Medicine.

“The Texas Tech University System is excited about the Gayle Greve Hunt School of Nursing and its future,” Chancellor Robert Duncan said.  “We have an outstanding health-related institution in El Paso, and we have an incredible opportunity to impact health care by training first-class nursing students in a first-class facility.”

The state-of-the-art, 34,000-square-foot facility includes a high-tech environment for faculty and students. The building also is home to a 12,000-square-foot simulation lab, four classrooms and multiple collaborative learning spaces.

The Gayle Greve Hunt School of Nursing offers an accelerated Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) Program as well as a new RN to BSN program.

Responding to a serve nursing shortage in the greater El Paso region, the Gayle Greve Hunt School of Nursing admitted its first class of BSN students in 2011. The school now has approximately 90 students and 10 faculty members, and Founding Dean Jeanne Novotny, Ph.D., R.N., FAAN, says those numbers are expected to grow.

“We are dedicated to expanding the quality and size of the faculty, launching new degree programs and positioning the school as a leader in academic nursing,” Novotny said. “We will expand student enrollment by opening access to a world-class nursing education for a diverse, highly competitive student body that will focus on the health care needs of the borderland.”

A $14.5 million project, the Gayle Greve Hunt School of Nursing was established through a generous donation from the Hunt Family Foundation in 2010. The school was named in honor of Gayle Hunt, the wife of El Paso businessman and philanthropist Woody Hunt.

"Thank the Hunt family for their generosity and congratulate, Dr. Lange, Dr. Novotny as well as the entire team for their vision and passion that made today possible," Duncan said.


We have an incredible opportunity to impact health care by training first-class nursing students in a
first-class facility.

Chancellor Robert L. Duncan, Texas Tech University System


The construction of the Gayle Greve Hunt School of Nursing building also was made possible through funding from the Medical Center of the Americas Foundation. The area where the building is located is intended to enable the redevelopment of a non-contiguous subset of approximately 440 acres of land included in the Medical Center of the Americas master plan.

The Gayle Greve Hunt School of Nursing is accredited by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education, an autonomous accrediting agency that contributes to the public’s health by assessing and identifying programs that engage in effective educational practices.

Administrators anticipate the school will grow to 300 students in five years to counteract the long-term nursing shortage in the medically underserved El Paso region.

The Gayle Greve Hunt School of Nursing is one of three schools at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso. The other schools are the Paul L. Foster School of Medicine and a regional Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences

About the Texas Tech University System 
The Texas Tech University System is one of the top public university systems in the nation, consisting of four component institutions —Texas Tech UniversityTexas Tech University Health Sciences CenterAngelo State University and Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso—and operating at 12 academic sites and centers.  Headquartered in Lubbock, Texas, the Texas Tech University System has an annual operating budget of $1.7 billion and approximately 17,000 employees focused on advancing higher education, health care, research and outreach around the globe.

In 2014, the Texas Tech University System endowment exceeded $1 billion, total research expenditures were approximately $200 million and total enrollment approached 47,000 students. Whether it’s contributing billions of dollars annually in economic impact or being the only system in Texas to house an academic institution, law school and medical school at the same location, the Texas Tech University System continues to prove that anything is possible.