Skip to content
Link copied to clipboard
Link copied to clipboard

Penn State bought private college for new campus

Penn State has agreed to buy Lehigh Valley College as its new Allentown-area campus.

UPDATE: Purchase price: $12 million. Plus, the Penn State board voted to do this back in March, Penn State spokesman Geoff Rushton told me.

EARLIER: Penn State has agreed to buy the 30-acre, 100,000-square-foot Lehigh Valley College campus at 2809 E. Saucon Valley Rd. in Upper Saucon Township from owner W.P. Carey & Co. of New York, and will move Penn State Lehigh Valley to the site, doubling its classroom space, according to broker Cushman & Wakefiled, which is also trying to sell Penn State's old campus at 8380 Mohr Lane in Weisenberg.

The transaction will double Penn State's Allentown-area classroom space. It also shows Penn State has the muscle to keep building its collegiate empire despite a fight with Harrisburg over taxpayer subsidies for the state-affiliated system. More small private colleges are expected to merge or close as financial aid is increasingly targeted to community colleges and other cut-rate institutions.

135-year-old Lehigh Valley stopped accepting applications last year after its owners, Allentown Business School Ltd. and Career Education Corp., agreed to pay Pennsylvania $200,000 to settle allegations of "false and misleading" statements about financial aid, transfer credits and job placement. Attorney General Tom Corbett's announcement here.