Tylerite Named to State Advisory Committee

AUSTIN – The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board has appointed a Tyler educator as a member of the Political Science Field of Study Advisory Committee. He is Tyler Junior College’s Department Chair of Government and Economics Geoffrey Willbanks. The committee is composed of 24 voting members, 12 from public community colleges and 12 from public universities. They come from a representative sample of institutions of varying sizes, peer groups, and regions of the state. The is charged with identifying the block of courses that students may transfer to a general academic teaching institution.

Willbanks is a longtime resident of Tyler and graduated from Robert E. Lee High School. He holds an associate degree from TJC, bachelor’s and master’s degrees from UT Tyler, and has completed his Ph.D. coursework at the University of Houston. He has been department chair at TJC for the past 13 years and is a past president of the TJC Faculty Senate. He was the first director of the Carnegie History Center, a joint project of the City of Tyler, Historic Tyler and the Smith County Historical Society.