After years of planning and anticipation, the University of Houston broke ground on its new campus in Katy on Wednesday, May 23. The UH Katy Campus, located at the northeast corner of the Grand Parkway and Interstate 10, will offer programs in high demand throughout the region – engineering and nursing.
“If you’re going to be University of Houston, you have to own Houston and the Greater Houston area,” said Renu Khator, Chancellor and President of the University of Houston System
The 80,000 sq. ft. building is slated to open its doors in fall 2019 as a direct extension of the UH main campus, but sporting its own modern look and feel. The flagship campus will offer undergraduate programs in computer engineering, construction engineering and systems engineering as well as graduate degrees in subsea, petroleum, environmental, power systems and corrosion engineering.
Roughly 600 undergraduate and 480 graduate engineering students are expected to enroll at the Katy campus this fall. The UH Cullen College is planning to increase its program offerings at the Katy campus in direct response to industry and workforce needs across the region.
“Given the demand for engineering talent across the Greater Houston area, the expansion of UH Engineering programs in Katy is both imperative and inevitable. The city of Houston needs a homegrown workforce trained to take on the engineering jobs of the future while filling in the skills gaps of today,” said Joseph W. Tedesco, Elizabeth D. Rockwell Dean of the UH Cullen College of Engineering. “That’s precisely what brings us here.”
Due to overwhelming demand for engineering programs in the area, the UH Cullen College began offering courses at the Houston Community College (HCC) Northwest campus in 2016. More than 15 graduate-level courses in subsea, petroleum, electrical, environmental and mechanical engineering are currently offered at HCC in Katy.
“The Cullen College has continued to grow in the Katy area thanks to the support of our partners at the Houston Community College-Northwest Campus,” said Tedesco. “We are continuing to develop a relationship with HCC, because they will be important to us in being successful in offering courses that this community truly needs.”
Want to engineer YOUR future? The demand for engineering talent is higher in the city of Houston than any other major U.S. city. Starting salaries for engineers with bachelor’s degrees typically range from $60,000 to over $80,000; however, average starting salaries for alumni of the Cullen College are considerably higher. According to PayScale.com, University of Houston engineering students rank 15th in the U.S. for salary earning potential. Learn more and apply today at www.egr.uh.edu/students
To view photos of the groundbreaking ceremony, click here.