On May 11, Wake Forest University made its Charlotte ambitions official, cutting the ribbon on a new campus inside The Pearl and shifting several professional programs into the city’s growing innovation district. The permanent suite is meant to tighten connections between students, local employers and the medical research community that already calls The Pearl home, with university leaders describing the opening as the latest step in a yearslong push to grow Wake Forest’s footprint in the Queen City.
Leaders snipped a Deacon-gold ribbon to unveil the Charlotte campus suite on the 10th floor of The Pearl. The space clocks in at roughly 6,700 square feet of collaborative work rooms, offices and meeting space, while lower floors in the building house classrooms and shared training facilities. The ribbon-cutting drew university officials and local partners to celebrate the permanent home for several Wake Forest programs in the city, according to the Charlotte Business Journal.
The Pearl innovation district grew out of a public-private partnership led by Atrium Health and Wexford Science & Technology and is billed as a hub for health care research, education and commercialization. According to Atrium Health, the development already anchors the Wake Forest University School of Medicine and IRCAD North America and is designed to speed collaboration among hospitals, startups and universities.
Wake Forest’s Charlotte story did not start with this ribbon-cutting. The School of Business launched a professional MBA in Charlotte in 1995, and more than 2,000 business professionals have earned degrees through local programs. The School of Professional Studies, operating from Charlotte since 2021, has awarded about 412 degrees and certificates, and more than 8,600 Wake Forest alumni now live in the Charlotte area, per reporting in the Charlotte Business Journal.
Developers and partners say that mix of education and industry is already drawing corporate collaborators. Releases and coverage highlight a Boston Scientific partnership that supports IRCAD North America and Wexford’s Connect Labs, moves the developers say will help translate research into new products and training opportunities. For more on those collaborations, see updates from Boston Scientific.
“This space represents how we think about education as something connected and integrated into the larger ecosystem,” Wake Forest President Susan R. Wente said at the opening, according to Wake Forest News. The university also noted that the School of Medicine launched its Charlotte campus in 2025 and welcomed an inaugural cohort of roughly 49 students who are based nearby in the same innovation district.
What It Means for Students and Employers
The new suite is geared toward short courses, executive education and flexible classroom time that officials say should make it easier for working professionals and undergraduates to plug into Charlotte employers. Local coverage and district materials emphasize that having classrooms, labs and company partners under one roof is meant to speed up internship placements and applied research collaborations in health care and beyond, according to CLTtoday.
Wake Forest says it plans to move additional programs, including the School of Law and a study-away undergraduate semester, into the Charlotte campus within the next year. That expansion is expected to grow the university’s in-city offerings and deepen ties to local employers, according to Wake Forest News. For Charlotte, the new suite is another signal that The Pearl’s blend of education, research and industry is staking a long-term claim in the region’s economy.
