Surprise! Georgia State, Georgia Perimeter to merge
Didn’t see that one coming, did ya?
Ah, the early days of January. It’s a time when all the news that was bottled up over the weeks when everyone was off wrapping presents and skiing in the Alps explodes, surprising everyone.
Case in point: the proposal to merge Georgia State University, the Downtown research institution that’s caught a serious case of expansion fever under President Mark Becker, and Georgia Perimeter College, a two-year college with five campuses in metro Atlanta. The aim: for “student success,” of course. The consolidated university would keep the name Georgia State University.
The Georgia Board of Regents approved the recommendation proposal — news of which was only broken last night — made by Chancellor Hank Huckaby at today’s meeting. Here are the basics, courtesy of the Georgia Board of Regents:
“Georgia State is a recognized national leader in improving student retention and graduation rates and will be able to apply its best practices,” said Chancellor Hank Huckaby. “Combining these attributes with Georgia Perimeter College’s leadership in providing access to students across the metro area presents a major opportunity to improve student success.”
The decision to consolidate the two institutions, whose combined enrollment this fall is 53,927 students, follows the six guiding principles for consolidation approved by the board in Nov. 2011
Georgia State President Mark Becker will serve as the president of the new institution. The consolidation timeline calls for the approval of the plan by the board of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges by the end of this year, followed by Board of Regents approval of the new institution in early 2016. An implementation team with representatives from both institutions to work out the many details associated with consolidating the two universities will soon be formed. The implementation team will also be responsible for submitting the required documents for accreditation.
We’ll have more on this story. But in the meantime... go Panthers?