Author: Shilpa Bhongir
Occidental has restarted conversations about integrating and adding more offices into the ground floor of the library as part of a vision to turn the Academic Commons into a 21st century learning environment. Administrators propose moving the Advising Center, Center for Community Based Learning, Center for Teaching Excellence and the Undergraduate Research Center into the Academic Commons by the summer of 2014.
Faculty from each of these offices attended two preliminary meetings this semester to discuss the proposed changes and gauge interest among members about the move.
While planning started in 2010, the college still faces challenges forming an ideal vision and finding funding for the Academic Commons project.
“We are still not at the point where we have funding, or we have hired anyone to actually start drawing up the plans,” Marsha Schnirring, Associate Vice President of Scholarship Technology and Chair of the Subcommittee on Integrated Planning Support Services, said. “Trying to talk and think about things without assuming that is exactly how it’s going to end up is a bit of challenge.”
Administrators are working to reengage a contract with architects to draw up official plans for the ground floor renovations. As of now, the team is working from preliminary renderings and ideas drawn by the architectural firm Shepley Bulfinch.
The college is waiting to procure necessary funding before they sign an official contract, according to Thomas Burkdall, Director of the Center for Academic Excellence and member of the 2010-2011 Task Force on the Academic Commons Renovations.
Bob Kieft, College Librarian and member of the Task Force, estimated the costs of the project to be roughly $20 million. He stated that the college intends to generate its funds through capital donors’ money, which are funds the college reserves for property maintenance and construction projects.
“We are at the beginning phases of our fundraising,” Kieft said. “We are assessing our donor pool, and we have contacted some individuals to gauge preliminary interest.”
The idea for the renovations began in 2010 to 2011 with a task force spearheaded by Dean of the College Jorge Gonalez, library administrators and faculty.
The Task Force was divided into a library collections subcommittee and an Integrated Planning Support Services subcommittee, which both took part in year-long investigations.
The subcommittee on the library collections created a screening process to determine which books will have to be eliminated or transferred to digital text to make space for the new offices.
The subcommittee on the Integrated Planning Support Services investigated the best offices to be co-located together, and visited other colleges for reference and ideas.
“Part of the notion of the renovation of the space is to make visible our commitment to a 21st century learning environment,” Schnirring said. “Libraries have a certain iconic quality as the place where the campus is grounded intellectually, and is shared space that everyone uses.”
The task force suggested moving offices together that facilitate faculty-to-student, and peer-to-peer academic support.
“One of the things that we discussed was that it’s clear that teaching, learning and research are tightly interwoven,” Schnirring said. “You can’t say that you are teaching without learning and research. It’s highly collaborative.”
Still, not all offices involved in the proposed moves believe that they fit with the mission of the new Academic Commons. Representatives from the Advising Center have made arguments that it serves a different purpose for students.
“It’s not an issue with people adjusting with the Academic Commons, it’s programmatically does this fit with what we are talking about,” Schnirring said.
Other offices that intend to move to the Academic Commons, however, support the change.
“I think it will help connect us with other offices in a better way,” Celestina Castillo, Assistant Director for the Center for Community Based Learning said. “Sometimes the [Center for Digital Learning and Research] faculty are working with the same [students] we are, and now we can work together.”
Centers already based in the office, such as the Center for the Academic Excellence, could benefit from the changes as well.
“If I am working with a student on a paper, and she needs to do an awful lot more research, I can presumably walk down the hall to one of the peer research advisers,” Burkdall said.
In 2010 and 2011, the task force reached out to students in order to get feedback for preliminary plans and had a student delegate sit in on meetings. Schnirring stated once the group has made plans with architects, they intend to revisit conversations with students.
“I think the purpose of the Academic Commons is to create a dynamic learning environment, and if bringing offices together can do that, I think that’s great,” economics major Emily Linebarger (first-year) said.
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