Texas A&M University-San Antonio opened the doors on a new $55 million Public Health and Education Building on Wednesday, which will serve over 1,200 students working toward degrees in education, public health and medicine.

The investment is part of TAMUSA’s growing health sciences offerings and partnership with nearby University Health, officials said during the ribbon cutting ceremony.

The new academic building will house the university’s College of Education and Human Development, Community Health Program and Genetics and Genomics Group, a team of experts who research diseases like Type 2 diabetes and obesity.

The new building also advances the university’s collaboration with Texas A&M’s Naresh K. Vashisht College of Medicine in College Station and University Health.

The organizations announced a new program in April that would bring medical students from College Station to San Antonio’s South Side to complete rotations at University Health’s Palo Alto Hospital and the Vida clinic. The hospital is planned to open next year, and the Vida clinic opened across the street from the TAMUSA campus in January.

“Students and faculty from Texas A&M’s Vashisht College of Medicine will have classrooms and offices in this building, right across the street from the hospital where they’ll treat patients,” Texas A&M University System Chancellor Glenn Hegar said. “Doctors tend to put down roots where they train. We want more of them putting down roots here.”

TAMUSA’s new academic building features clinical teaching spaces, labs and research spaces where the medical students will spend some of their time as part of the program, according to Guido Verbeck, vice president for research at the university.

“We want to try to push for a new health building that’s directly connected to the hospital,” he said. “The idea is, students on one end, patients on the other — being much more part of that University Health community.”

TAMUSA is also launching a new bachelor’s degree program in biomedical sciences beginning in fall 2027.

“This building … represents our belief that healthier communities create brighter futures,” TAMUSA President Salvador Hector Ochoa said. “And it represents our belief that the talent, determination and potential throughout San Antonio deserve every opportunity to flourish.”