Daytona State marks construction start of new Flagler/Palm Coast Campus building

PALM COAST, Fla. (Oct. 1, 2013) - Daytona State College will celebrate the expansion of its Flagler/Palm Coast Campus on Oct. 10 with a ceremony marking the construction of a new 24,000-square-foot building.

The construction celebration will take place at 4:30 p.m. immediately following the monthly meeting of Daytona State’s District Board of Trustees, which will be held at the Flagler campus, located at 3000 Palm Coast Parkway SE in Palm Coast, starting at 2 p.m.

Construction of the $7.6 million, two-story building is expected to be completed in fall 2014. It will feature a state-of-the-art, “next-generation” teaching-and-learning environment that will include 13 multimedia classrooms, offices, a conference room, lecture hall, bookstore, Internet café and student lounge. Modeled after a faculty-driven design dubbed the “Classroom of the Future,” the new facility’s classrooms are designed with a focus on collaborative learning that leverages digital and Wi-Fi technology, and encourages students to use their own mobile devices as learning tools.

Classrooms will include: 

• Interactive projectors and touchscreen whiteboards
• Adjustable HD TVs and multiple display units
• A digital lecture capture system
• Mobile device charging areas
• Reconfigurable rolling chairs and desks

Daytona State also plans to add additional parking and renovate existing buildings on the campus, including relocating its testing center, expanding its academic support areas, adding a chemistry lab and building new offices for professors.

The new building will accommodate projected enrollment increases, mitigate a 60-plus mile round-trip commute for many Flagler residents who must attend classes in Daytona Beach, and open opportunity for new programs and course offerings in areas such as marine sciences, health care and business.

The Flagler/Palm Coast Campus is among the Daytona State’s fastest growing regional instructional sites. It originally opened in 1979 as the Flagler County Center, with three classrooms housed in the Palm Harbor Shopping Center, offering 33 college-credit courses to 335 students. In 1980, ITT Development Corp. donated 100 acres to the college and in 1983 helped fund construction of the first building on the current site. A second building, which tripled the size of the campus, was constructed in 1995.

Over the past 10 years, the Flagler/Palm Coast Campus has had an average enrollment of nearly 2,500 students.

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