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Del Mar College approves “phase one” of South Side campus

Posted at 4:45 PM, Aug 30, 2018
and last updated 2018-10-16 17:20:21-04

CORPUS CHRISTI – Del Mar College’s South Side campus has taken a major step forward. The new campus will be located near Rodd Field Road and Yorktown Boulevard.

The Board of Regents approved phase one of construction earlier this month.

The idea of a new campus was first proposed by the board in 2009. In 2016, voters approved a bond package that cost nearly $140 million.

Dr. Beth Lewis, DMC Chief Academic Officer, said the new campus will provide a new sense of convenience for a large percentage of students.

“We did a lot of research and found that about 35 percent of our students live on the South Side,” Lewis said.

Lewis offered a timeline approved by the Board of Regents.

Del Mar College will bid for a general contractor in June of 2019. Construction is scheduled to begin in October of 2019. A majority of construction is projected to be complete during May of 2021.

Administrators say they are hopeful the campus will be open for the Fall 2021 semester.

Lewis said the campus will facilitate several special programs for students, including an architecture program partnered with a Big 12 University.

“We are in talks right now with Texas Tech University to do a continuing program. So they would do their first two years with us, and then Texas Tech would have some of their upper division classes on our South Side campus,” Lewis said.

The campus has not been given an official name yet. Until that is decided, it will be referred to as the “South Side” campus.