WSU grant applications predict large Innovation Campus employment

Wichita State University predicted its Innovation Campus will have more than 8,000 jobs when its years-long development is eventually complete, according to a federal grant application.

WSU also anticipates about 448 experiential engineering jobs will be created in the first three years of the $32 million Experiential Engineering Building, according to a grant application. The building opened in January and houses engineering classrooms, 25 laboratories and a Go Create lab filled with equipment the public can use such as a 3-D printer and equipment for graphics design, welding and cutting wood and metal.

The university would not release numbers on where employment figures stand, saying any job growth would occur long term.

Under the Kansas Open Records Act, The Eagle requested Innovation Campus-related grant applications by WSU to the U.S. Economic Development Administration, as well as awarded grants. The request covered a period from 2013 to 2015, when the Innovation Campus came together as a major WSU initiative.

The Economic Development Administration, which is housed in the U.S. Department of Commerce, awarded $1.9 million for multi-robotic additive manufacturing equipment and $200,000 to boost strategic planning efforts.

The university was also awarded $7.1 million to ramp up economic development efforts to create new manufacturing jobs to replace ones lost during the recession. In its application, the university noted the Innovation Campus was being built in multiple phases, the first of which included the Experiential Engineering Building and the new Airbus Americas building.

Airbus relocated its engineering center Old Town to a new building on WSU’s Innovation Campus near 17th and Oliver.

“The full Innovation Campus development is estimated to have more than 8,000 jobs,” according to a sub-section in the grant application titled “Innovation Campus Employment.”

The number of high-quality jobs to be created or retained over a nine-year period is one of the factors the Economic Development Administration considers in awarding grants. The agency has a “non-relocation policy” meaning that the money cannot be used to move jobs from one area to another within the United States.

WSU also applied for funds to boost Innovation Campus infrastructure such as roads and parking spots around the Experiential Engineering Building. It received about $1 million to upgrade roads and water lines.

The university said in its 2015 application the facility would “engage” 20 businesses in its first year and train 400 workers or students in the second year.

“According to the grantee, the new EEB (Experiential Engineering Building) facility will engage businesses, train students and create 448 experiential engineering jobs within three years,” the U.S. Commerce Department announced at the time of the award, mirroring WSU’s language in the grant application. The building, which opened in January, was the first on the 120-acre development on the former Braeburn Golf Course near 17th and Oliver.

The university has not released information on the number of jobs created to date. WSU Vice President for Strategic Communications Lou Heldman said any job growth would occur long term.

“Economic Development Administration grants are meant to create the conditions under which growth will occur,” Heldman wrote in an e-mail. “They aren’t designed as contracts to produce xx number of jobs.”

Heldman also said some grants have a time horizon nine years into the future.

“It can take that long or longer to go through an economic cycle or two to see if there has been meaningful structural change,” Heldman said.

He said the university’s grant awards from the Economic Development Administration represented “a vote of confidence in the university’s plan and capability to build an applied learning, research and entrepreneurial environment.”

The Economic Development Administration’s “investments in Wichita State and our region are to support long-term employment growth and workforce stability,” Heldman said. “There’s no ‘Miracle-Gro’ for jobs. You can only do your best to create the right conditions.”

“We believe WSU has the people, the expertise and the plan to enlarge our city and region’s contributions as a hub of innovation and a global center of advanced manufacturing,” Heldman said.

This story was originally published October 24, 2017 at 8:56 AM with the headline "WSU grant applications predict large Innovation Campus employment."