U. of Phoenix will build in Pleasant Grove

PROVO — The University of Phoenix plans to move its Utah County campus north.

Construction on the Pleasant Grove campus, at The Grove office complex at 2174 W. Grove Parkway, is expected to begin in September. The campus will open the following September.

"We polled students, who want to be closer to their home when class is done," said Darris Howe, vice president and director of the five Utah campuses of University of Phoenix, a for-profit school.

More students live in northern Utah County — Pleasant Grove, Lehi, Alpine, Highland, American Fork — than in the past, Howe said.

Howe said the students travel to class from their workplaces in Salt Lake and Utah counties but indicated in a survey they would prefer to be closer to home than work.

For the past 22 years, the for-profit school's Utah County campus was in Provo at 561 E. 1860 South.

The new campus will be closer to the freeway exits and visible to commuters.

"That is very important to us," Howe said.

The new building will be equipped with the latest technology for instruction.

The new campus will have about 20,000 feet of instructional space, which is larger than the Provo location.

Howe hopes enrollment will increase.

Currently about 370 students attend classes at the Provo campus, about 40 percent of them graduate students.

Many of the University of Phoenix students are mid-level managers. Classes are frequently offered at night after business hours.

Most students study business.

As with the campus in Provo, the University of Phoenix will lease in Pleasant Grove.

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