All year long, all across El Paso County, you’ll find our students, faculty and staff proudly serving as wellness ambassadors at health fairs, clinics and other community events. 

Our four Texas Tech Health El Paso schools embrace their community service mission, promoting the importance of healthy smiles, bodies and minds. At these wellness events, community members typically receive basic health screenings, including diabetes, blood pressure, cholesterol and oral health screenings, as well education on nutrition and healthy lifestyles. Here’s a roundup of some events from the past academic year:

Hunt School of Nursing students joined their colleagues from the University of Texas at El Paso at the H.O.P.E.+ Mobile Clinic and Health Fair at the Rescue Mission of El Paso. The future nursing heroes conducted basic health screenings and offered health education to individuals and families residing at the shelter.

Helping High Schoolers Step Up to STEM

Bringing Hope to the Rescue Mission 

Francis Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences students turned more than $1 million in unused lab equipment at Ysleta Independent School District’s Del Valle High School into a state-of-the-art STEM hub. Students Alejandra Muñoz and Briana Olivares led the effort after learning the equipment had gone untouched due to staffing changes at the high school.

Backed by a U.S. Department of Defense STEM Ambassador grant, they organized the lab, created safety training and launched a mentorship program linking Del Valle students with mentors from Texas Tech Health El Paso’s schools, UTEP’s School of Pharmacy and others.

The lab is making an impact: Students who had never used professional lab equipment before will present original research projects within a year, and the mentorship program will be expanded across Ysleta ISD.

Making Oral Health Accessible to All 

Hunt School of Dental Medicine students and faculty held clinics to bring smiles to some of our most vulnerable residents, including youngsters, older adults, persons with special needs and unhoused persons from the South-Central El Paso neighborhoods surrounding our campus. Many of the events were hosted at the school’s Oral Health Clinic in the Paso del Norte Health Foundation Building. They included “Screen and Clean for Seniors,” “Give Kids a Smile,” and “Hopeful Smiles.”

And thanks to generous community donors who’ve helped equip the clinic with special needs patient suites, the school is leading the way to make compassionate care accessible to all. Events and programs include “Special Olympics Screen and Clean,” “Smiles For All,” for patients with autism and the “Special Care, Healthy Smiles” workshop for health professionals and caregivers of special needs persons. 

Texas Tech Health El Paso Magazine, Fall 2025