“The Decade of Downtown,” as proclaimed by former Mayor Julian Castro in 2010, has resulted in a rapid increase in the number of businesses and workers in San Antonio’s downtown. The city’s ability to continue attracting businesses that support high-paying jobs depends on the presence of qualified and educated workforce. This initiative will lay the groundwork for UTSA to play an integral role in this effort by:

• Offering select College of Business programs and classes downtown — in addition to those offered at the Main Campus — allowing UTSA to create a multitude of academic and professional connections between students, faculty and the San Antonio’s central business community.
  
  
• Increasing market share of students, particularly at the master’s level. An overall academic program demand survey conducted last year by Ruffalo Noel Levitz (RNL) showed that General Business Administration and Management is the top program in greatest demand in the San Antonio metro area and other Texas metro areas. RNL will conduct a more detailed demand survey to systematically assess the academic programming and professional development needs at the Downtown Campus.
  
  
• Aligning programming with the specific needs of the San Antonio business community. Academic Affairs and External Relations will host a series of CEO roundtables to fully understand San Antonio’s specific workforce needs. These roundtables will engage select business leaders representing a variety of industries, as well as small and historically under-utilized business.
  
  
• Supporting the innovative entrepreneurs who are launching new businesses that will shape San Antonio’s workforce of the future. The burgeoning Tech Bloc in our downtown core already has shown great success. Furthermore, there are other small and historically under-utilized business entrepreneurs that can benefit from access to business-focused educational programs and career-engaged services. This new downtown building will serve these needs by placing an enhanced focus on entrepreneurship, which includes not only business, but also engineering, sciences, and social entrepreneurship skills.

The Classroom to Career task force report revealed that San Antonio businesses are eager to identify students for internships, co-ops, and other career-focused learning experiences, and sometimes struggle to do so. This initiative will leverage this opportunity by:

• Creating a career-engaged services network hub – a one-stop shop to connect students and prospective employers. These hubs will have multiple physical campus locations, with one situated in the new downtown building.
  
  
• Supporting the professional development needs of UTSA's working adult students in the city's core

The College of Business is currently operating with a shortage of more than 200,000 square feet according to standards set by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. Over the next decade, enrollment in business programs is estimated to exceed 13,000. Without additional facilities, the space shortage will increase to 550,000 square feet. We simply cannot meet our strategic goals for UTSA and our community without a new building to expand UTSA’s ability for business-focused programming.

• Building a new state-of-the-art facility downtown - As a part of the Downtown Campus Initiative, last fall UTSA announced plans to establish the National Security Collaboration Center and a new School of Data Science in downtown San Antonio. In conjunction with those plans, the university is working toward constructing an Innovation, Entrepreneurship & Careers building downtown on a parcel of land transferred by Bexar County.
  
  
• Ensuring College of Business alignment with the university’s strategic vision. In fall 2018 College of Business Dean Gerry Sanders organized a half-dozen “strategy squads” composed of faculty as a self-study process. Two of these teams are focused on efforts directly aligned with this initiative: strategic enrollment and the Downtown Campus. They are gathering data that will be made available and incorporated into the planning and building programming. Two faculty senate representatives will serve on these teams. A to-be-named faculty planning advisory committee, similar in scope to the SDS/NSCC Planning Advisory Committee, will work collaboratively in support of this initiative and begin the formal space programming for the new downtown building.