Gavilan College officials are eyeing sites at Cochrane Commons
and Cochrane Plaza for additional classroom space to complement the
bursting-at-the-seams main campus in Gilroy and satellite site in
Morgan Hill.
Gavilan College officials are eyeing sites at Cochrane Commons and Cochrane Plaza for additional classroom space to complement the bursting-at-the-seams main campus in Gilroy and satellite site in Morgan Hill.
“We are very successful with the Morgan Hill site, and we are outgrowing it,” Trustee Mike Davenport said, adding that the board is seeking “agility” and will take a look at as many locations as they can find.
“We don’t want to be so constrained that students would go to West Valley and other colleges because there’s no room” at Gavilan, he said.
Trustees have met in closed session to discuss price and terms of payment for the former Circuit City building in the Cochrane Commons shopping center, on the northeast corner of Cochrane Road and U.S. 101 and a location in Cochrane Plaza, located on the southwest corner of Cochrane Road and U.S. 101, according to recent agendas.
The long-term plan is to build a second campus in Coyote Valley. Gavilan owns 55 acres on the south side of Bailey Avenue, which was purchased for $19 million using Measure E bond money. But this plan is five to 10 years away, she said.
“The interim plan might be to identify more spaces to hold classes in on a temporary basis,” Bernstein-Chargin said.
Along with the Cochrane Commons and Cochrane Plaza sites, Gavilan trustees have met in closed session on two sites in Hollister, 351 Tres Pinos Road and 380 San Benito St.
The Gavilan College district spans South County and bleeds into San Benito County and through Coyote Valley into south San Jose.
Already, there are more Morgan Hill students than the 10,000-square-foot satellite site at the Community and Cultural Center can accommodate, said Gavilan spokeswoman Jan Bernstein-Chargin. A little more than 15 percent of the students this semester are from Morgan Hill, while less than 9 percent of enrollment was for classes in Morgan Hill – and that’s at its current capacity, she said.
Of the 15,243 seat count, 1,944 are in Morgan Hill. Most students attend Gilroy’s sprawling 73-acre campus that boasts 26 buildings, athletic facilities and career facilities.
