National medical university to establish new campus in Santa Maria

Santa Maria leaders gathered Wednesday afternoon to celebrate the announcement that a nationally-reknown medical university is soon coming to the city.

In front of the still-under-construction CoastHills Credit Union Corporate Center, it was revealed A.T. Still University is planning to open a campus in Santa Maria.

“A.T. Still University of health sciences is a health science university. We’re a national university that has degrees in medicine, dentistry and other health professions,” said Dr. Craig Phelps, A.T. Still University President. “A.T. Still University of Health Sciences has degrees in medicine, dentistry and other health professions.”

The 127-year-old university has two current campuses, in Kirksville, Mo., and Mesa, Ariz.

“Our students are graduate students, so they’ve earned a Bachelor’s Degree,” Phelps said. “Often times in a physician assistance program, they come with experience outside of the typical student who may have applied to health profession schools.”

The new Santa Maria site will be located on the second floor of the new CoastHills building and will occupy about 30,000 square feet.

Initially, the university will provide education in physician assistance.

“Physician assistance is work with physicians to deliver healthcare, so they help in areas of diagnosis, treatment, prescription writing. They help to deliver preventative and can work in all areas of healthcare,” Phelps said.

Phelps added the school plans to start with about 100 students.

Recruiting A.T. Still was a long process for both the school and city leaders.

Phelps said the university has looked to expand into California for the past seveal years and visited many other sites around the state.

Ultimately, they chose Santa Maria and the CoastHills location, which is the last major site still under construction along Betteravia Road in the Enos Ranch development.

“Why not Santa Maria? The folks in Santa Maria are amazing,” said Phelps. “We think that there’s a great need in the State of California and specifically in the region for healthcare providers that are really committed to delivering quality care, having access for the citizens to receive care and care in a way that is important.”

A major attraction for A.T. Phelps is an ongoing partnership with Community Health Centers of the Central Coast (CHC), which operates several clinics in the region.

“Being able to work with Community Health Center is a really a great advantage for our students and having Marian hospital here is an ideal environment for our students to see and learn about healthcare,” said Ted Wendel, A.T. Still Senior Vice President of Strategic Initiatives & Planning.

For Santa Maria leaders, bringing in A.T. Still is a big victory for advancing the city’s goal of increasing higher educational opportunities for local students.

“It gives our community major options for education and other things,” said Suzanne Singh, Santa Maria Valley Chamber of Commerce Economic Development Director. “Bringing a university like this into our community really does help our full economic goals in the future.”

For CoastHills, the school will take up a majority of the second floor, with additional space still to lease.

CoastHills CEO Paul Cook was excited to add A.T. Still to the building, which is set to open later this year in September.

“They’re so community minded and their focus truly is making people’s lives better and we’re just excited to be a part of that. We see a great synergy between our two companies and our missions and values are very much aligned,” said Cook.

The university is already looking to ahead to possible future expansion.

Phelps said Phase 1 of the move is to establish the school’s educational programs at the CoastHills site.

Later on, Phase 2 would include establishing a much-larger stand-alone campus, much like its two current locations in Missouri and Arizona.

The two campuses combined total more than 200 acres.

It’s unknown how long the university expects to be in the CoastHills building, but is likely for at least 5-to-10 years.

Phelps said first classes are expected to start in July 2020.

For more information on the university, visit the A.T. Still University website.