Celebrating Alamo Colleges District as San Antonio's Pillar of Education

THE ALAMO COLLEGES DISTRICT TRICENTENNIAL EVENT HOSTED AT ST. PHILIP'S COLLEGE

St. Philip’s College was the host location for the Alamo Colleges District Tricentennial event, a San Antonio Tricentennial Celebration partner event---Sept. 12 in the 600-seat Watson Fine Arts Center at 1801 Martin Luther King Drive, site of the San Antonio Eastside Tricentennial Celebration hosted by college President Dr. Adena Williams Loston earlier this civic celebratory year.

The Alamo Colleges District -- Northeast Lakeview College, Northwest Vista College, Palo Alto College, St. Philip’s College and San Antonio College – has been proud to join other higher education institutions and the San Antonio community in celebrating the city’s Tricentennial in 2018. Held in the 25-year-old Watson Fine Arts Center that has hosted many events of historic interest in the city since 1993 and is as old as today’s average SPC student, the Alamo Colleges District Tricentennial event highlighted the history of the colleges and their contributions to the city, while showcasing the journeys of students, faculty, the city, partners worldwide and the Alamo Colleges District institutions themselves. Visuals that piqued the interest of students bustling from class to class included a tall pink installation of helium-filled balloons linked to depict the observance’s 300 logo.

Alamo Colleges District member institutions have partnered in and been directly responsible for projects that depict the diversity of San Antonians following the six pillars of the Tricentennial: religion, military, history and education, arts and culture, world heritage and community service. The Sept. 12 project featured portraits of the knowledge building culture in San Antonio at the community college level of postsecondary education that is not only the gateway to corporate workforce education and transfer to the baccalaureate and graduate levels of academia. The institutions are the gateways to global competitiveness and the dreams of many. Most of the guests present already knew that one original primary mission of community colleges in America was to serve the workforce education needs of servicemembers transitioning back to civilian life during the Truman administration in the final months of World War II. Some of the district’s legacy member institutions that include St. Philip’s College and San Antonio College predate the Truman administration. Today, community colleges educate half of America’s college students. Many are the recipients of or applicants for some of the nation’s highest awards for performance excellence. Some have operations and partners worldwide. Alamo Colleges District has it all, and more. 

In addition to highlighting the role that community colleges have played in every pillar of the city’s 300 years of development as institutions of higher learning, guests heard from current corporate leaders at Alamo Colleges District. They also heard in-depth from a statesman, a student and an esteemed former San Antonio College president, along with a current faculty member at St. Philip's College. Professor Allen Lee Hamilton, St. Philip’s College's professor of Texas and American History, focused attention on focus on Community Colleges in San Antonio Past and Present.

Hamilton is also a local community leader in his capacity as the college's faculty member representing higher education on the City Tricentennial Committee's Intra-University Tricentennial Committee. The college is an educational partner in the yearlong San Antonio Tricentennial Celebration calendar of events, activities and innovative initiatives that honor that historic milestone. Find details on the Sept. 12 event at the SA300 Community Colleges in San Antonio (Past and Present) web page, and keep an eye out for additional Tricentennial events to be announced online at the college web page ngskmc-eis.net/spc in coming weeks.