Texas A & M University Kingsville

Texas A&M University-Kingsville, a Hispanic-serving public university and state institution within the Texas A&M University System, operates as a federal grant recipient delivering applied research, field operations, and educational programs across agricultural sciences, wildlife management, citrus pathology, STEM workforce development, and environmental sustainability. The institution holds 453 prime federal awards (91% of its portfolio) spanning grants, cooperative agreements, and contracts, with a smaller subcontract footprint (9% of awards, 45 sub-awards).

The university's customer concentration reflects USDA dominance. The Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service anchors the portfolio with 120 awards, though combined potential value is modest at $40 thousand; the Department of the Interior Fish and Wildlife Service Region 2 drives the highest potential value at $14 million across 11 awards. Federal education agencies—the Department of Education Office of Postsecondary Education (59 awards) and the National Science Foundation (29 awards)—fund significant STEM student support and graduate training capacity. NASA Shared Services Center, the National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA, two separate customer lines in the portfolio), and the Department of Defense fund research grants in earth observation modeling, agricultural communications, engineering materials, and nuclear systems. Combined potential value across all 498 awards is $17.4 million; however, dollars obligated against those awards total $310.3 million, indicating substantial prior-year invoicing on awards that carry modest ceiling values.

Texas A&M Kingsville's capability footprint centers on research execution and operational field services. The institution operates the Texas Citrus Clean Plant Certification Program—a state-mandated facility that delivers pathogen-free certified citrus budwood to the Texas industry through intensive diagnostic testing, shoot-tip grafting, and quarantine protocols. The program supplies germplasm for over 250,000 certified citrus nursery stock annually across multiple APHIS cooperative agreements. A $12.2 million DOI Fish and Wildlife Service contract awarded July 2023 funds South Texas endangered ocelot protection and recovery services through September 2027, spanning captive breeding, conditioning, quarantine, field research, habitat management, and monthly reporting; in FY2024, this contract invoiced $2.2 million across 5.6 FTEs at a government-paid hourly rate of $188.08. A $1.75 million DOI purchase order (July 2023–September 2027) supports ecological impact assessment on large mammals affected by border barrier construction in South Texas, covering four years of field research on transboundary movements and population densities of black bears and mountain lions across nine counties; FY2024 invoicing was $379 thousand across 2.3 FTEs at $78.11 per hour. The institution also operates the Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute's Alkek Ungulate Research Facility (ACURF), which breeds and conditions cervid research models for chronic wasting disease (CWD) investigation, supporting a $2.4 million USDA cooperative agreement (August 2023–July 2025).

Research capability spans citrus pest and disease surveillance, water resource management modeling, and energy systems. Multiple APHIS cooperative agreements fund citrus greening (Huanglongbing) mitigation research, including evaluation of beneficial microbes, mating disruption pheromones, alternative bait chemistries, and Asian citrus psyllid biological control methods. NSF and USDA support hydrologic and wildfire impacts modeling, with a $699 thousand NASA grant (April 2022–April 2024) funding HYDROFLAME—an earth observation-integrated hydrologic modeling framework for post-wildfire water resource management. NSF Engineering and STEM Education awards fund a $5 million CREATE-AI Water center (Phase II CREST, September 2026–August 2031) for AI-driven agricultural water sustainability research and workforce development; a $600 thousand RET Site grant for data-driven renewable energy research across middle and high school teachers; and a $999.7 thousand DHS Cyber Intelligence program establishing intensive accelerated training, an online certificate program, and a cyber intelligence research lab for underrepresented students.

Educational grant work targets workforce pipeline and student support. The Department of Education Office of Postsecondary Education funds TRIO Student Support Services programs ($360 thousand regular and $272 thousand STEM tracks in FY2025–2026), Upward Bound initiatives (multiple awards across rural and traditional tracks, FY2022–2027), a Ronald E. McNair Scholars Program, and an Educational Opportunity Centers program. NSF supports a National Research Traineeship (NRT) in transdisciplinary research for coastal air and water resources (78 MS and PhD students, July 2023–July 2028) and Research Experiences for Teachers (RET) sites integrating data-driven renewable energy and resilient energy systems across disciplines. USDA NIFA awards fund the Research and Education in Agricultural Communications Training (REACT) program ($558 thousand, four years through August 2030), the Capacity Building for Non-Land Grant Colleges program ($300 thousand for wildlife and ecology training, August 2026–July 2029), and collaborative workforce projects targeting Hispanic agricultural students across three institutions.

Recent grant activity shows mixed trajectory. Awards per year declined from 43 in 2022 to 13 in 2026 (year-to-date partial year), with 2023–2024 averaging 37–39 awards annually. A 24-month recompete cliff carries $14.7 million in combined potential value across 35 awards—a significant portion of the institution's active portfolio at risk of renewal competition. The institution competes predominantly full-and-open; no federal set-aside categories apply to government entities.

SCI-reportable invoiced revenue totals $2.6 million in FY2024 across eight FTEs on two prime service contracts (the ocelot protection and large mammal ecology assessments noted above); FY2023 and FY2025 show zero invoiced SCI revenue. Government-paid hourly rates on SCI-reportable service contracts run a median of $133.10 per hour (10th percentile $89.11, 90th percentile $177.08), reflecting mixed labor mix spanning field technicians and research scientists. The institution self-performs all reported labor; subcontractor hours across SCI-reportable prime contracts average zero percent, indicating no reliance on subcontracted delivery.

Texas A&M Kingsville operates as an academic institution within a state university system, with grant work routed through the Office of Research & Sponsored Programs and operational research executed through specialized centers (Citrus Center, Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute) and academic departments. The institution receives no federal contract primes or IDVs; all federal work flows through grants, cooperative agreements, and purchase orders. Teaming partnerships appear in sub-grant awards under NIFA, NSF, and USDA projects where the university partners with peer institutions (Texas A&M AgriLife Research, University of Florida, University of Texas system entities, St. Mary's University San Antonio) as either lead or supporting recipient on multi-institutional initiatives focused on agricultural workforce development and applied agricultural research.