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Weber State University's presence in Davis County is greatly expanding thanks to a $40 million classroom building going up just south of Hill Air Force Base in Layton.
Construction began Tuesday on the 110,000-square-foot building, marking the biggest project to date on the campus established eight years ago. WSU Davis now serves 3,700 college students.
"We've had growing pains that are typical, but all of those things are indicative of a strong demand from our community. We've pretty well maxed out. We've actually converted several conference rooms into classrooms, and we are using portables in the evenings. We've done everything we can to accommodate the need, but really the solution is another building," said Weber vice provost Bruce Davis.
For the past few years, Weber has shared the campus at 2750 N. University Park Blvd. with an "early college" charter high school.
"The classrooms are pretty full. They need this expansion for classrooms alone. It caters to working families in Davis County [who] work full time and go to school at night. That's how I started coming back to school," said student Brady Harris, who represents the Davis campus in the Weber student senate. "At lunch period there is no room to eat, every classroom is full during the day. Even at night, by 6 that campus is full. It is running out of parking places."
Harris, who is from Nephi, started college at Southern Utah University, but dropped out because there were few jobs for students in Cedar City. He found work in Salt Lake City, and moved to Farmington, about a 10-minute drive from Weber's Davis campus, where he resumed his studies. UTA buses serve the campus, but the nearest FrontRunner station is a few miles away in Clearfield.
The new building will also contain laboratories to accommodate such high-demand programs as nursing, electronics engineering, construction management and interior design.
"This campus wouldn't exist without the support we've received from the community over the years. The degree programs we're bringing out here are a response to community needs, especially the bachelor of science in electronics engineering in support of Hill Air Force Base, in particular," Davis said.
The university is issuing up to $31.5 million in bonds to finance most of the project, but student fees will also be tapped because the building will feature student facilities.
"It will provide community space for enriching activities to bring that social element so it will feel like an actual campus, along with study space and food services," said Harris, who expects to major in integrated science.
The Northern Utah Academy of Mathematics, Engineering and Science, or NUAMES (pronounced "new aims"), is contributing $4 million toward the project to secure its own space on the third floor. Currently, the school shares many of the 15 portable classrooms on the site with the university, as well as five rooms in the existing building.
"This is a partnership that is made in heaven. We don't have any sports, but we do have a lot of extracurricular things. The kids come here to get a head start on college," said NUAMES principal Alan Stokes. The school now enrolls 443 students, in grades 10 through 12, and hopes to expand to 500.
"It will be a nice arrangement we have with them because we have offsetting peaks: They're busiest in the daytime and we're busy in the evening, which is when a lot of our professional program degrees have classes," Davis said.
Weber State University's Davis campus
The campus, which serves more than 3,700 college students at 2750 N. University Park Blvd., Layton, broke ground this week on a 110,000-square-foot, 30-classrooom building. The campus is also home to Northern Utah Academy of Mathematics, Engineering and Science, a charter high school.