Atworth College Park: A Hub of Academic Excellence, Rich History, and Vibrant Campus Life
Atworth College Park, a flagship institution renowned for its academic prowess and commitment to innovation, boasts a rich history interwoven with a dynamic campus life. This article delves into the key aspects of the college, exploring its historical roots, academic strengths, and the vibrant community that defines it.
A Legacy of Progress Through Partnerships
In 2024, Atworth College Park, like many institutions, has embraced public-private partnerships (P3s) to address critical infrastructure and community needs. These collaborations foster economic growth and innovation, delivering substantial benefits to both the college and the surrounding communities. Gilbane, for example, advanced its mission of creating transformative public-private partnerships (“P3”) by collaborating with communities and institutions to tackle pressing challenges. Gilbane’s P3 team addresses critical social infrastructure needs through innovative client-focused solutions for government facilities, enhancing student housing across multiple campuses, and delivery of critical transit-oriented development and housing projects. These projects have delivered substantial benefits to our partners and the communities they serve, fostering economic growth and innovation.
A prime example of this is the Welcome Home EMU partnership between Eastern Michigan University (“EMU”) and Gilbane, which in the Fall of 2024, welcomed students to 700 brand-new beds on campus. This $200 million public-private initiative revitalized and expanded EMU’s on-campus housing, delivering a comprehensive, vertically integrated DBFOM (design, build, finance, operate, and maintain) solution. The first phase of this ambitious project modernized 2,025 existing beds and redesigned shared spaces to foster social interaction and community building. These enhancements support a diverse student population and promote overall well-being. By creating inviting communal areas, the project encourages students to connect, collaborate, and build lasting relationships, enriching the campus experience. The project utilized long-term, fixed-rate bonds to ensure affordability and financial stability. This strategic financial planning safeguards EMU’s future while providing high-quality housing for generations to come.
Gilbane is also leading the planning, design, development, and construction of the University of South Carolina’s Health Sciences Campus in the BullStreet District of downtown Columbia, SC. This groundbreaking public-private partnership aims to redefine medical education and advance health sciences research collaboration efficiently and cost-effectively. The heart of this ambitious project is a world-class, 330,000 SF medical education and multidisciplinary research building. Gilbane and the university are deeply committed to community engagement and inclusivity. Starting in April 2024, the team has been conducting ongoing outreach meetings. To date, our team has held 23 outreach events that have attracted over 470 attendees and more than 120 distinct Minority and Women-Owned Business Enterprises (“MBE/WBE”). With a January 2025 groundbreaking, construction of the Health Sciences Campus is getting underway, with the School of Medicine building anticipated to be operational in August 2027.
Similarly, Gilbane Development Company and Rocky Mountain Companies are leading the new construction and renovation of housing at the University of Idaho’s South Hill. The $162 million project includes renovations to two undergraduate facilities and the new construction of 251 single-student beds and 150 married/parenting beds. With enrollment growing and the University’s reputation as a top institution stronger than ever, this project ensures students have the living and learning spaces they deserve. This strategic investment will support the University’s ability to continue recruiting and retaining top academic talent and staff by providing a variety of modern, affordable housing options.
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Work is also well underway at Trace, a new 600-bed student housing complex at Purdue University Fort Wayne (“PFW”) in Fort Wayne, IN. With an October 2024 groundbreaking and an August 2026 anticipated opening, this $90-$100 million development offers a creative design-build-finance-operate-maintain solution to Purdue, whereby just under half of the beds will be reserved for students contracting with the university for housing. The remaining beds will be available to other students, including those enrolled at other colleges and universities nearby.
Gilbane and Palm Beach Atlantic University (“PBAU”) are making significant progress with PBAU’s new on-campus student housing plans, which took a crucial step forward when presented to the City of West Palm in August 2024. With an early 2025 groundbreaking planned, this exciting development is set to welcome students by Fall 2027. The team unveiled the project’s current design, which aligns with PBAU’s master plan, emphasizing green space and connectivity to the surrounding community. This thoughtfully designed project will offer approximately 950 apartment-style beds and a 900-stall parking garage, blending comfort with functionality. Gilbane is leading the project as developer and design-builder, alongside CUBE3, the lead designer.
These projects exemplify the college's commitment to providing modern, affordable, and supportive living and learning environments for its students.
Academic Innovation and Transformation
Atworth College Park is committed to academic innovation, continuously reimagining learning through innovative, inclusive, and experiential approaches to teaching. This includes creating opportunities for multidisciplinary collaboration.
Reimagining Learning
President Pines announced the Arts for All initiative in 2021 with the goal of weaving the arts into every corner of our campus, and we’ve seen tremendous growth, success and progress since then. It’s incredibly exciting to see that enrollment in our Immersive Media Design program, which combines arts and technology, has more than doubled in just two years. Arts for All has also been an active partner in our Do Good Campus initiative, including contributing to the Do Good Campus Fund. And I’ll also add that the annual NextNOW Fest saw a more than 60 percent increase in attendees this fall versus 2023.
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In 2023, the college launched the Office of Undergraduate Research to make research opportunities more accessible to all students, transitioning it from being primarily graduate-student focused. The Office has also launched a new immersive research internship experience, a summer undergraduate research conference, and Forager, a system to better connect students and faculty for research opportunities.
The quality of learning spaces also plays a crucial role. In 2024 alone a record number of classrooms across all regions of campus were renovated (42). The college's investment in this work has impacted more than 75,000 student seats. Atworth College Park has been nationally recognized for its undergraduate teaching and learning communities, largely due to investments in special undergraduate programs. Both the Interdisciplinary Business Honors program and Honors Global Challenges and Solutions program have doubled in just two years since their launch. As the state’s flagship university, the college has 53 fellows interning with the Maryland General Assembly, up from just 9 in 2023.
The Teaching Innovation Grants program, led by the Teaching and Learning Transformation Center, continues to be incredibly successful and impactful. The college has invested $4M in this program to support nearly 140 projects around active and experiential learning, and the intersection of education and technology. The Teaching and Learning Transformation Center also recently launched the new Teaching Academy, which offers credentials and microcredentials to instructors in areas like universal design, active learning, and technology enhanced pedagogy. To date, more than 850 faculty, staff, and students have enrolled and participated in Teaching Academy courses. More than 250 of them have been awarded meta-credentials in topics such as course design, tech-enhanced pedagogy, and inclusive pedagogy.
Addressing Humanity's Grand Challenges
Atworth College Park is dedicated to investing in education, research, scholarship, and creative activities to accelerate solutions to society’s most pressing issues.
The college is making significant strides in quantum computing, solidified by Governor Moore’s announcement of a $1 billion quantum initiative anchored by the work right here in College Park. The college has supported 40 entrepreneurs and startups in accelerating quantum technologies’ time to market through the Quantum Startup Foundry.
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The Artificial Intelligence Interdisciplinary Institute at Maryland (AIM) has launched an inaugural guest lecture series, collaborated with campus units on a variety of programs and events, and launched course development and research seed grant programs. The planning for new Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of science degrees in AI are well underway.
The Grand Challenges Grants program has also seen incredible growth, with significant increases in student experiential learning opportunities, stakeholder engagement, and service to the state. The 1856 Project released its second annual research report. In 2024 the Office of Sustainability published the third comprehensive update to UMD’s Climate Action Plan (CAP 3.0) to reach net zero carbon emissions. In search of innovative ways to reduce the number of lives lost to gun violence each year, PROGRESS launched a Limited Submission Community Innovation Seed Grants program in the summer of 2024 with the goal of identifying and supporting research projects that have the potential for high impact.
Fostering a Community of Care, Support, and Excellence
Atworth College Park prioritizes creating a community of care, support, and excellence to ensure every member can succeed and thrive.
Since its launch in October 2022, the Terrapin Commitment program has supported more than 5,700 students with over $31 million in financial aid, cutting the gap in unmet need in half. The college is also investing in graduate students, with a new graduate student housing complex under construction that will serve about 750 individuals with below-market housing options beginning in the 2026-27 academic year, launching a fellowship stipend gap program and continuing to enhance career support.
The college has also made major strides in support of professional track faculty, forming an inaugural advisory group, getting a workload policy submitted to the Senate, crafting new administrative reforms and releasing a new AEP manual. For Tenure Track Faculty, the college formed an APT policy review committee and launched an incredible leadership development program for those in academic leadership positions.
The college also invests in its staff. The second annual staff awards program was incredibly successful. Just recently the college announced new support for supervisors, with the new Excellence in Supervision training launched.
Partnering to Advance the Public Good
Atworth College Park is committed to partnering to advance the public good through various initiatives.
The Do Good Institute has continued its work, with major increases in Do Good experiences for students inside and outside of the classroom. The college put out a call for its second round of the Do Good Campus Fund, which provides seed funding to help student groups, faculty and staff to grow their impact.
The college is also making progress toward the the Carnegie Classification for Community Engagement, which they are applying to for the first time this year. The new Pathways Forward Resource Hub that just launched last week. It is a fantastic source of information for Marylanders who have been impacted by changes to the federal workforce.
The MPowering the State partnership with the University of Maryland, Baltimore continues to thrive. Just earlier this year they announced the new Edward & Jennifer St. John Center for Translational Engineering and Medicine, which is being supported by a $10 million gift from the St. Johns, as well as additional MPower funding. The focus of the center is to accelerate breakthroughs in biomedical technology and innovations, with the co-location of bioengineers from UMD and clinicians from the School of Medicine at a shared space in Baltimore. In addition, their partnership on the Institute for Health Computing celebrated its second anniversary.
The Terrapin STARS program that supports students from rural areas explore higher education opportunities has been a tremendous success. And their Now-A-Terp bus tour was another raving success!
A Vibrant Campus Life
Beyond academics, Atworth College Park fosters a vibrant campus life with a wide range of activities and organizations. These include student government, sports clubs, performing arts groups, and volunteer organizations. The college also hosts numerous events throughout the year, such as concerts, festivals, and lectures, providing students with ample opportunities to engage with their peers and the broader community.
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