Ground broke for the first building of Tarleton State University's new Fort Worth campus Tuesday.
The 80-acre land for the campus was donated by the Walton Group of Companies. The Texas A&M University System Board of Regents approved a $41 million budget for the first building, which will be 76,000 square feet and three stories, located near Old Granbury Road and Chisholm Trail Parkway. The building is expected to open in the fall of 2019.
The new building will have multiple classrooms, computer labs, faculty and staff offices, a counselor center, testing center, cafeteria and a student affairs facility, said Kyle McGregor, vice president for institutional advancement at Tarleton.
Tarleton-Fort Worth currently has 2,000 students and over 40 undergraduate, graduate and certified programs. With the addition of the new building, enrollment is projected to go up to 2,500 students in the fall.
There's just one problem, Tarleton President F. Dominic Dottavio said.
“That problem is going to be, we're going to be out of space the day it opens because of the number of students that are going to come to Tarleton,” he said.
Charles W. Schwartz, chairman of the Texas A&M System Board of Regents, said it won't be long after the first building is complete that a second will be underway and so on.
“Our masterplan stops at nine buildings,” Schwartz said. “But there is no reason that it has to stop at nine.”
Depending on the resource availability for future buildings, the campus could have around 9,000 students by 2030.
“Tarleton is a forward-thinking institution, fiercely pursuing its mission to transform today's students into tomorrow's leaders,” Schwartz said in a statement. “A flourishing Fort Worth campus advances that goal, giving students access to a quality, affordable education and increased opportunities for success.”
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