As Purdue University continues to build out its Indianapolis campus, it’s now proposing a new multi-million-dollar Health, Science & Engineering Hub.

The new 13-story building would be near Indiana Avenue and West Street next to Purdue’s Academic Success Building, which is under construction and expected to be completed next year. The proposal includes four floors for academics with classrooms, labs and student collaboration spaces. The other nine floors would be about 500 beds for student housing. It comes with a $275 million price tag and Purdue plans to ask the state to chip in $100 million.

“At Purdue, three-fourths of them study a STEM discipline, exactly the kind of skills that the modern economy needs, and to bring more of them to Indianapolis for at least part of their Purdue experience, where they can in turn have summer jobs and be captured, let’s hope by Indiana businesses, we think is an enormous opportunity for the state, and therefore a responsibility for us at Purdue,” said Interim President Mitch Daniels.

Part of Purdue University in Indianapolis’ master plan is being a STEM pipeline for Indiana and offering a STEM-based experience to students.

“The entire world knows that science and engineering and what those disciplines we call STEM is where growth is coming from. That’s where the great jobs are going to be,” Daniels said. “The trick here is going to be to keep more of them here, and that’s why our extension into Indianapolis, I think, has so much promise for the state and, of course, for the businesses.”

Daniels said the number one goal right now for Purdue in Indianapolis is becoming the “brain gain engine for the state” — to help the state retain college grads. Right now, about 60% of graduates with a bachelor’s degree were employed in Indiana one year after graduation. Five years after graduation, the retention rate drops to 55%.

The Health, Science & Engineering Hub is one more step toward Purdue’s 50-year master plan for the downtown campus. The university wants to construct 16 new buildings after its split with IU two years ago. Part of the master plan is to enroll 15,000 students a year, too. Right now, Purdue in Indianapolis has about 2,600.

“We’re going to have to take this a year at a time. We need to see at what rate we can provide attractive opportunities for students to come here,” Daniels said. “We’ve got almost 300 businesses who have signed up that they want to offer internships, summer jobs, and maybe first job opportunities to those students, and so a lot of reasons for hoping that we can not only meet that growth plan but maybe exceed it.”

West Lafayette will always be the main hub for Purdue students, but Daniels sees downtown as a place to offer students specialized opportunities.

Purdue says it needs the Health, Science & Engineering Hub building by fall 2030, but there’s no construction timeline yet. First, the project needs to be approved.