California State University San Marcos is building its biggest academic addition in years. The Hunter Hall of Science and Engineering, formerly the Integrated Science and Engineering Building, topped out in May 2026 and is on track to open for the Fall 2027 term. HGA designed the building and C.W. Driver Companies is the general contractor.
Project Scope
The three-story, roughly 70,000-square-foot building carries an estimated $110 million cost. It packs teaching and research laboratories, a robotics suite, and collaboration-focused learning space into a campus that has outgrown its existing science facilities. The building took its name after a $10 million gift from Hunter Industries, the San Marcos-based irrigation manufacturer. C.W. Driver has moved the structure from a July 2025 groundbreaking through topping out in under a year.
Why It Matters
Institutional construction is one of the few nonresidential categories still forecast to grow this year, and public universities are a big reason. CSUSM sits in a fast-growing North County San Diego corridor, and the region’s employers keep pressing for more STEM graduates than the campus can currently train. Purpose-built lab space is expensive and slow, which is why a building like this reshapes enrollment capacity for a decade. The robotics and collaborative-learning emphasis reflects where lab design is heading: flexible, interdisciplinary rooms rather than the single-subject teaching labs that defined mid-century science halls.
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Project Team & Details
| Owner / Client | California State University San Marcos |
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| Architect | HGA |
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| General Contractor | C.W. Driver Companies |
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| Status | Topped Out |
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| Delivery Method | CMAR |
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| Funding Source | Public (State) |
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