Huckaby says south Georgia campus consolidations not on table — for now

ATLANTA — Despite rumors to the contrary, the chancellor of the The University System of Georgia Board of Regents said Tuesday that colleges and universities in Southwest Georgia are not yet on the radar for consolidation.

Chancellor Hank Huckaby, who started the consolidation ball rolling when the BOR appointed him to office in 2011, quickly shot down talk of pending mergers in the region.

“We’re not looking at south Georgia at this time, but I’m not saying that we won’t at some point,” Huckaby said. “This current consolidation is going to occupy us for some time because it’s huge. But consolidation is not off the table and I’m not going to mislead you. Let’s just say we are not working on anything else in regard to consolidation at the moment.”

Huckaby made his remarks after a Board of Regents meeting Tuesday in which the Regents officially gave their blessing to the consolidation of Kennesaw State University and Southern Polytechnic State University, the fifth consolidation of USG schools since 2011.

The BOR also approved a proposal to consolidate Georgia State University and Georgia Perimeter College, which once complete would make GSU the state’s largest university with nearly 54,000 students.

Rumors have run rampant through south Georgia for the past several years that Darton State College, Georgia Southwestern State University and Bainbridge College could be in the consolidation mix. Albany State University and Columbus State University have also been mentioned as future possibilities.

In the past four years, the BOR has consolidated five campuses, reducing 36 USG institutions to 30. The mergers include:

— Gainesville State College and North Georgia College & State University;

— Middle Georgia College and Macon State College;

— Waycross College and South Georgia College;

— Augusta State University and Georgia Health Sciences University;

— Kennesaw State University and Southern Polytechnic State University

While more consolidations appear inevitable, Huckaby did not discuss a specific number on the table.

“We look at these consolidations individually and we’re not working towards a magic number out there anywhere,” the chancellor said. “There is no sweet spot in regard to the number of consolidations. We’ve been going year-by-year because consolidation takes about a year to complete. We are a little behind the time from on this one. Ideally, we would have liked to have done it in November.”

Georgia State President Mark Becker will serve as the president of the new institution. The consolidation timeline calls for the approval of the plan by the board of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges by the end of this year, followed by Board of Regents approval of the new institution in early 2016.

An implementation team with representatives from both institutions to work out the many details associated with consolidating the two universities will soon be formed. The implementation team will also be responsible for submitting the required documents for accreditation.