In the beginning, classes were held in leased classrooms at Eau Gallie Junior High School (now Westshore Junior/Senior High School on Brevard Avenue) and at University of Melbourne's lone building on Country Club Boulevard. Classes were moved from Eau Gallie Junior High to Melbourne Methodist Church on Waverly St. in 1959 after the school district disapproved of two black students using the junior high school classrooms. In 1961, Brevard Engineering College purchased the property of the University of Melbourne which became the main campus in the heart of Melbourne, Florida. The only existing buildings at the time are the current Ray A. Work building. The next building to be built was the Keuper building, which currently houses the President's Office.

In the 1960's and 1970's many buildings were constructed on the main campus. In 1968, the Hydrospace Technical Institute (HTI) was chartered in a donated building in Cocoa Beach. In 1972, the campus of St. Joseph College in Jensen Beach was purchased with the support of a young engineer named Evinrude. The HTI was moved to Jensen Beach and became the School of Marine and Environmental Technology(SOMET). The Jensen Beach campus closed in 1986 and SOMET was transferred to the main campus to become the Department of Marine and Environmental Sciences(DMES). The land was susequently sold, and portions are now part of the Martin County Indian Riverside Park.

Since 1997 the university has been in the midst of much construction and expansion. Following a $50 million grant given to them by the F.W. Olin Foundation, Florida Tech has constructed three new facilities for their engineering, life science, and physical science departments.