A local couple officially donated a large piece of Central Coast land to Cal Poly Monday-- one of the largest, private land donations in the university's 114-year history.
Stuart and Jan Bartleson announced they would the 450-acre avocado and lemon ranch at a press conference along with university officials.
The ranch, located near Arroyo Grande, will increase Cal Poly's existing agricultural land holdings to more than 10,000 acres.
Andrew Thulin is the Dean of the College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences and said it will give students more resources.
"It gives us more space that we can now do much more applied research projects with industry people, we can focus more on some of the irrigation things we'd like to do and each of our students do senior projects so it gives us more opportunities for that. So it really compliments what we have on campus," Thulin said.
The southern San Luis Obispo county ranch is valued at 11.3 million dollars.