Falcon campus in works

Pikes Peak Community College plans to open a full-service campus in Falcon as early as this August.

The campus would be housed in what was formerly Falcon Middle School on U.S. Highway 24 in Falcon School District 49. It would be the fourth campus for PPCC and the first new site in a decade.

Currently, anyone in eastern El Paso County, from the booming suburbs of Falcon and northeast Colorado Springs to the rural plains, must drive to one of three Colorado Springs campuses or take online community college courses. The nearest PPCC campus, northern Colorado Springs’ Rampart Range, is more than 13 miles from Falcon and much farther for people in such places as Peyton, El- licott and Calhan.

“Bottom line is it’s more opportunities. That’s what we’re giving,” said Falcon School District 49 board member Dave Martin. The district plans to lease part of the middle school to PPCC.

Eastern El Paso County, according to PPCC, has the lowest completion rate for postsecondary education in the region. Immediately around campus, 40 percent to 50 percent of residents have no degree or certificate beyond high school. In rural areas to the south and east, that number rises to slightly more than half.

The D-49 school board Wednesday night unanimously approved a memorandum of intent that acts as a nonbinding nod to the project while final negotiations are worked out.

A final plan must be approved by the D-49 board, the State Board for Community Colleges and Occupational Education, and the Colorado Commission on Higher Education.

Still, PPCC President Tony Kinkel said Wednesday that negotiations are about “95 percent” complete and that he expects no major barriers in getting such approvals. A task force of D-49 and college representatives has been working on the plan for months.

PPCC would lease the middle school building for five years at a price of about $125,000 a year, or $5 a square foot, Kinkel said Wednesday. The college would share the building with a new D-49 alternative school.

The campus would accommodate about 600 students, with 400 expected to transfer from existing campuses and the remainder being new students.

The middle school was vacated this year when the students moved into the old Falcon High School building. A new Falcon High School opened in the fall.

D-49 students would benefit from the PPCC campus, according to the plan, from dualcredit options where high schoolers can take collegelevel classes that simultaneously count toward a diploma and a degree. Students at the alternative school, in a different wing of the building, would get exposure to higher education opportunities, Kinkel said. Martin said that might allay alternative students’ fears about attending college.

Martin said he hoped adults, too, would benefit. “It may be a kid and his parent have an opportunity to attend school together,” he said.

Initially, PPCC plans to offer 180 courses and the usual host of services such as advising and financial aid help. Students will have the option to take courses available only at other campuses via a videoconferencing site.

Courses at the Falcon campus will be mostly general in nature, Kinkel said. Eventually, there could be as many as 220 courses offered.

“It’s safe to say you’ll have everything you need to get a full associate of arts degree,” he said.

The other PPCC campuses have informally become associated with specialties. The Rampart Range campus, adjacent to New Life Church on Colorado Highway 83, is home to the nursing programs and other hard sciences. The downtown campus focuses on arts and music. Kinkel said the Falcon campus may develop unique programs based on the demand from students there. As an example, he pointed to interest in horses in eastern El Paso County as perhaps leading to an equestrian program.

The school district, Kinkel said, would offer a lease at just a fraction of the going rate for real estate there.

The partnership between PPCC and D-49, Kinkel said, falls in step with an education trend to erase the lines between high school and college in areas such as curriculum, expectations and accessibility. Ridding education of that gap is part of Gov. Bill Ritter’s educational initiative, Kinkel noted.

The new campus would help relieve crowding at other PPCC campuses. The system, with about 12,000 students, has seen steady growth for years. It grew by nearly 10 percent in the fall and has grown by nearly 7 percent so far this spring semester.

PPCC is expecting as many as 700 new students from troop relocations to Fort Carson over the next few years, Kinkel said.

The community college expects to pay about $500,000 in initial costs to furnish the building, replace signs and make technology improvements, Kinkel said. The campus is expected to cost about $450,000 a year to operate.

Kinkel said the project would break even in about three years, at which point tuition and fees would cover costs.

Barring setbacks, people could register for fall classes beginning in May, he said.

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