LeTourneau University is a private Christian school in Longview, Texas.
The school offers numerous undergraduate degrees, most of which are Engineering, Aeronautics and Computer Science focused. The Liberal Arts, Business and Educational departments are slowly helping to round-out the overwhelmingly techie (and male) student population. The school also offers extensive business and management graduate classes in Houston, Dallas, Tyler and Longview.
Most of its 1,500 students live on campus, as the school requires all freshmen and sophomores to live in dormitories or on-campus apartments. The campus is in the "south side" (south of U.S. Highway 80, which divides the city in half) of Longview; it is often called an oasis among low-income housing. The mostly Caucasian students are in stark contrast to their predominately African-American and Hispanic neighbors.
The school's mascot is a yellow jacket and the colors are yellow and blue. Religious chapel attendance is mandatory, and held three times weekly. The school competes in the American Southwest Conference.
Short 5-10 minute devotions are held before each class by the professor or a student. The campus is completely networked, with 100-mbit connections available nearly everywhere; convenient for an extremely tech-savvy (and demanding) student body.
Soccer, football, volleyball and basketball intramurals are highly valued. Somewhat unique to LeTourneau is floor pride. Every floor in the dorms has its own student-created name, logo, and t-shirt. Floors often have rivalries and freshman "orientation" to build floor unity.
LeTourneau boasts many student-led foundations and a very active student senate. Student senate has a large amount of money allocated to it each year to fund spring break missions, campus activities, and other projects as deemed by the representative body. The YellowJacket Activities Council creates as many diversions as possible. Concerts, midnight festivals, movies, paintball, valentine parties and other activities help keep the students from going completely mad.
The school emphasizes integrating Protestant Christian faith with higher education. |
