The more schools, the merrier
All agree the education-hungry region can handle two proposed college campuses in Placer County, a third in Rancho Cordova and an expansion in Rocklin
Sacramento Business Journal - by Robert Celaschi Correspondent
Dennis McCoy | Sacramento Business Journal
Sacramento State provost Joseph Sheley says a Placer campus would need private funding.
College-bound students should have an unprecedented number of options in the Sacramento area in a few years.
Three new campuses and one expansion are in various stages of planning. Each has a slightly different approach to education, which could allow them to complement one another rather than compete for students and resources.
California State University Sacramento is looking to build a Placer County campus roughly the same size as the original in East Sacramento. University of Sacramento, a Roman Catholic school, has land ready to develop into a campus in Rancho Cordova. Drexel University, a large private institution in Philadelphia, is eyeing Placer County for a possible West Coast campus. And William Jessup University, which comes from a Protestant church background, is already expanding its main campus in Rocklin.
"I think we all would have a different role out there," said Joseph Sheley, provost of Sacramento State. "The other universities that are building or potentially building out there are looking at markets that probably don't affect Sac State. What it's going to do is elevate the status of that region as a strong education center. And I think we benefit from that. I invite it."
Others agree.
"I don't think you have to worry about available population," said Jonathan Brown, president of the Association of Independent California Colleges and Universities. "Look at places like the middle of Iowa, where Grinnell College is, where there isn't a lot of population around but it still supports the place."
The Sacramento region continues to grow and needs educational opportunities to grow with it, he said.
"There's a real sense that when you bring more of a focus to higher education, we all do better. I think that becomes a real benefit," said Joe Womack, vice president of advancement at William Jessup University. "In the Bay Area, I don't know how many private and public colleges, all needing support, find a way to get their portion of that to keep the institutions thriving."
Catching up
William Jessup University has already started its expansion. Currently serving a student body of about 600, the school hopes to grow to 5,000, with almost half of them living on campus. Enrollment already has grown by more than 80 percent since the school moved from San Jose in 2004.
Jessup has room to grow. It owns about 130 acres in Rocklin, where it converted a former furniture factory into classrooms, offices and dormitories. Now it plans to build from the ground up.
The first step is an apartment building with 196 units and more than 100 underground parking spaces, with a fall 2009 target for completion.
"That would double our on-campus capacity," Womack said. Jessup is also looking to add a gymnasium, dining hall and conference space by fall 2009.
"We're just trying to make sure we've got all the funding in place for about $20 million to $22 million of construction in this next phase. We're ready to go on the apartments, and we are still in the silent phase of any campaign announcement on the other," Womack said.
Jessup has been expanding its academic offerings as well. It now offers more than a dozen majors. Plans call for adding majors in history, marketing, finance and physics in the next few years.
Lining up
Two institutions have land for new campuses and are working through the bureaucracy of getting ready to break ground.
California State University Sacramento has about 290 acres in Placer County's Placer Ranch development. The land, about as large as the main campus, was offered in 2004 by Placer Ranch developer Eli Broad.
Four years later, the university is still going through its due diligence on the land, Sheley said. At the same time, Placer Ranch is working on annexation to the city of Roseville.
"Thus we are also in conversations with the city of Roseville about what a branch campus would look like and what it entails to develop one," Sheley said.
Placer Ranch expects to get through the annexation by mid-2009.
"Then if we don't get sued, which is what you always have to factor into a development project these days, it would take us another year to get infrastructure to the site," said Holly Tiche, Placer Ranch president.
Even though it's a state school, state money won't kick in until the new campus hits a plateau of about 500 students, Sheley said.
"In order for this branch campus to do well, it will depend not on stateside funding but on partnerships with people and entities in the region," he said.
The other institution with land at the ready is the fledgling University of Sacramento. The Roman Catholic university has 200 acres in Cordova Hills, south of Highway 50, donated by landowner and developer Conwy LLC.
"We're going down the process of entitlements with the county," said Marianne Oaks, the university's vice president of communications. "We have said we're breaking ground in 2011, and the first freshman class will be 2012. We've sort of drawn a line in the sand for ourselves and said whether it's at that site or another, in 2012 we are going to have a freshman class."
Working from offices in downtown Sacramento since 2005, the university now has 80 students taking evening graduate and certificate courses. It wants to have about 5,000 undergrads and 2,000 graduate students by 2035.
The first phase, involving about 250,000 square feet of construction to handle 1,500 students, would take $75 million to $100 million. The school already has shown its ability to attract money, having received a $1.5 million endowment for a business school dean.
Being part of a congregation of priests called the Legionaries of Christ, the University of Sacramento can draw on resources far beyond the Sacramento region. The Legionaries of Christ already have 14 other universities around the world. Sacramento is the first in the United States, and its academic programs can be integrated with the others. For instance, University of Sacramento plans a graduate business program that would involve study in four countries.
"The students would study for a few months in Paris, Madrid, the Philippines and Sacramento," Oaks said.
Sizing up
In the "maybe" category is Drexel University. Based in Philadelphia, the private institution has an enrollment of more than 20,000 and includes schools of medicine and law. Drexel officials came to Placer County last summer to scope out a site for a possible West Coast campus.
Several families, including that of developer Angelo K. Tsakopoulos, would donate 1,100 acres west of Roseville. The school would sell off 500 acres to help finance construction on the remaining 600.
None of that can happen, however, until a plan is approved by Drexel's board of trustees and the Placer County Board of Supervisors.
In mid-February, three supervisors traveled to Philadelphia to make their own evaluation.
"It went really, really well. We got a good chance to hear from people how the university is perceived in the region. Overall, we were really impressed," said Supervisor Robert Weygandt, whose district includes the proposed site.
But Weygandt also is urging caution. The same land that Drexel is considering was once earmarked for a Roman Catholic college called De La Salle. That proposal fizzled in 2005 when the Christian Brothers order worried that slow county approval would increase development costs.
"Having that experience, healthy skepticism is more a part of my perspective," Weygandt said. While an unequivocal commitment might be too much to ask for, his vote would depend on Drexel demonstrating that it would follow through, he said.
The county might also create an escrow account for any proceeds from the sale of land so that it can be restricted for some type of university use should the Drexel plan fizzle as well.
For now, Drexel is contemplating offering classes in about a year, probably starting in downtown Sacramento, Weygandt said.
When looking at metropolitan regions up and down the West Coast, Sacramento has been thin on university choices, said Womack of Jessup. The combination of new private, public, large, small, secular and faith-based campuses could raise Sacramento's visibility and add up to more than the sum of its parts.
"I don't know that anybody can claim any great strategic plan, but what is emerging is a pretty good scope of higher education," Womack said. "You combine that with what's here, it really could transform the region."