ALPHARETTA, Ga.—A $6.3 million construction project set to begin in December will bring science labs to Georgia State University’s Alpharetta Campus and eliminate the need for offsite lab work by the university’s Perimeter College students.
The project, which expands one of the two buildings Perimeter College uses on Brookside Parkway, will provide space for two biology and two chemistry labs on two floors. The Perimeter students at Alpharetta now complete their collegiate lab courses at a local high school’s science labs.
The building is scheduled to open to students in January 2018.
By then, Braven Lyall will be a Perimeter College graduate, yet the Alpharetta resident and Perimeter student says he recognizes the far-reaching impact of the science labs.
“More students, more resources, more support,” he said. “It will help build the community overall.”
Dr. Jen Bon, science labs supervisor for Perimeter at the Alpharetta Campus, said the addition is significant.
"You can’t teach organic chemistry labs without proper equipment like fume hoods, and high school labs aren’t equipped with those things,” Bon said. “The same is true of microbiology labs. You need autoclaves and incubators and other equipment external labs don’t offer.”
Adding the labs will have a ripple effect on the Alpharetta Campus, Bon predicts.
“Offering more courses in the science department will also increase enrollment in other departments as students choose to stay on the Alpharetta Campus for their entire associate degree,” she said.
Perimeter College officially became an academic unit within Georgia State University in January of this year, and the former Georgia Perimeter College’s five campuses throughout metro Atlanta became Georgia State campuses.
Tina Philpot, Perimeter College’s interim associate dean for Alpharetta, says the move has brought changes, including heightened prominence in the community, that directly serve students.
Perimeter College is now using a building previously occupied by Georgia State’s Robinson College of Business. The building is across the street from Perimeter’s original Alpharetta campus.
“So, we’ve doubled our space, and that has given us a lot of growth potential,” Philpot said.
The campus also has added a second Learning and Tutoring Center and reconfigured office spaces so student organizations and departments such as Disability Services have dedicated spaces in Alpharetta.
Not all of the Alpharetta changes relate to the physical structures there. Philpot speaks optimistically about her role with the Greater North Fulton Chamber of Commerce Talent Coalition. She, along with Perimeter’s Vice Provost and Dean Peter Lyons and others at the college, has been working with business and economic development leaders to address the area’s gap in job skills. Lyons sees tremendous opportunity.
“The Alpharetta Campus is near some 900 high-tech companies, many of which would like to provide their employees with opportunities for professional development or further education,” Lyons said in a letter to faculty and staff. “We can help companies by offering classes, online and in person. We also can help our students, by offering more science, technology, engineering, math and computer science courses these companies have identified as critical to fulfilling an information technology workforce shortage in the Dunwoody/Alpharetta area.”
Programs and initiatives to address workforce development and student/employee training and education are under consideration. Philpot stresses that any changes are being made with the “same emphasis and same commitment to student success” that have been a hallmark of the college since its beginning.