Texas Wesleyan University in Fort Worth is planning to build a $20.25 million university center at the heart of campus.
The university says the 44,000-square-foot Nick and Lou Martin Center is the most significant capital project at Texas Wesleyan in more than a century. It will establish for the first time a centrally situated hub for student life. The facility also will provide meeting space for east Fort Worth community members.
“The Martin Center takes the energy and activity across our campus and community and centers it in one strategic location,” says Texas Wesleyan President Frederick G. Slabach. “It is more than a new building—it will be the living, beating heart of our invigorated student life...a central place where students, faculty, staff, visitors and our community will come together to socialize, study and connect.”
The project is expected to break ground in 2018.
The two-story facility will have a student and family welcome center, food court, ballroom that can accommodate 300, bookstore and convenience store, spaces for student organizations and student life offices, lounge areas, meeting rooms and additional office space.
The center is named in honor of Nick and Lou Martin of Fort Worth, longtime supporters of Texas Wesleyan. Lou Martin is a member of the Texas Wesleyan Board of Trustees; her family has been involved with Texas Wesleyan since it was founded in 1890.
The center is a part of Texas Wesleyan’s 2020 Vision strategic plan. Over the last five years, the university has nearly doubled its endowment, grown enrollment and invested more than $23 million in campus enhancements and improvements.
