In time for the fall semester, the ribbon has been cut, and students will soon move into Georgia Tech’s newest traditional residence hall — the Bud and Val Peterson Residence Hall.
Located along Northside Drive between Eighth and Ninth streets, the 191,000-square-foot facility offers 862 beds in double-occupancy rooms. The first traditional residence hall constructed on campus since 1969, Bud and Val Peterson Residence Hall features collaborative learning areas, an esports lounge, a fitness room, community lounges, a kitchen on the first floor of each wing, and a 24/7 cashierless market.
The opening of the new residence hall allows Tech to keep pace with enrollment as the Institute continues to grow. This fall, over 4,100 first-year students will enroll at the Institute, along with 1,400 transfer students in the fall and spring. With growth comes the need for new infrastructure, as Georgia Tech President Ángel Cabrera said during Thursday’s ribbon-cutting ceremony.
“It turns out that more unbelievable students from every county in Georgia, from every corner of our country and countries around the world, want to have the learning experience here. It’s our duty to figure out creative solutions, not just to house them, but to provide them with a transformative experience,” he said. “The transformation of our students happens right here. It happens in the residence halls. It happens in the friendships that you make, the study groups, the activities, and when you’re learning to be independent and to grow up. This is not just a dorm where you come to sleep.”
The residence hall is named in honor of Georgia Tech’s 11th president and first lady. During Peterson’s tenure from 2009 to 2019, Tech enhanced student programs and grew enrollment; increased collaboration and built strategic partnerships in Atlanta and Georgia; expanded its global reach, with a focus on innovation; executed Campaign Georgia Tech, which raised $1.8 billion for the Institute; and more than doubled new research awards, exceeding $1 billion for the first time in 2019. As president, Peterson launched the Online Master of Science in Computer Science program, which has since become a global model for accessible education.
He has remained involved with the Institute as president emeritus, a Regents’ Professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, and a member of the steering committee for Transforming Tomorrow: The Campaign for Georgia Tech.
In his remarks, Peterson recounted his first time visiting Tech, the feeling he got when he was on campus, and his path to eventually becoming Tech’s next president, succeeding President Emeritus G. Wayne Clough, who was in attendance at the ceremony.
Becoming a candidate for the job of president was “one of the most important decisions I’ve made in my professional career,” Peterson said. “This is a remarkable place with remarkable people doing remarkable things. Val and I are enormously honored to be recognized in this fashion.”
As first lady, Val Peterson was a dedicated presence on campus and an ardent supporter of students and faculty. She served as the chief spokesperson for the Tech Ends Suicide Together initiative when it launched in 2016 and mentored students and campus organizations. Val Peterson holds two bachelor’s degrees and a teaching certificate from Kansas State University and a master’s degree from Texas A&M. She has been recognized as an honorary alumna by the Georgia Tech Alumni Association for her devotion to the greater good of the Institute. Nicknamed the “Queen Bee” of Georgia Tech, she found it “quite fitting” that the new hall bears the couple’s names, because they lived together in a dorm room at KSU when they were first married.
“That’s where it all began. Those two towers, like us, together forever,” she said. “My hope for the students who live in Peterson Hall is that their experience parallels our paths, not only in school but in life.”
Each space in the new residence hall is designed to encourage students to interact and develop shared experiences, a mindset that Kasey Helton, associate vice president of Campus Services, says was fostered during Peterson’s tenure.
“We weren't trying to create 860 places to sleep. We were trying to create 860 opportunities to belong. That sense of belonging is exactly what Bud and Val spent a decade here building. They championed living-learning communities, expanded opportunities for students to develop global perspectives, strengthened support for student well-being, and helped make a Georgia Tech education accessible to all students. That same spirit is built into this hall,” Helton said.
The opening of the Bud and Val Peterson Residence Hall brings the Institute’s capacity to more than 9,600 bed spaces across nearly 50 residence halls. Move-in for the fall semester begins Aug. 15, including the first group of students who will call Bud and Val Peterson Residence Hall home.
