A Student Government Senate vote on Wednesday, Feb. 19, supported a bill that will put the Student Life Center through another period of renovation.
The legislation, proposed by Sophia Constantine, chair of SG legislative affairs, calls for an SLC expansion to provide students with a comprehensive student space # what was intended for the University Student Center at its conception.
Davis 107, which housed the old Davis Lounge, gave students a space of their own. Last spring, it closed for renovation, reopening as the Student Success Center.
The Cove, the new student lounge located on the first floor of the USC, is often overshadowed by the Reef.
The SLC has a student lounge, equipped with a pool table, arcade games and a piano, but Constantine said her expansion bill, cosponsored by four other Senate members, will create an “effective and open” haunt for students, a true student life building.
“We really need an all-encompassing student space … We want to have the spaces that the USC didn’t have that we were expecting,” Constantine said.
…
In a story published in fall 2012 titled “USC bait and switch,” The Crow’s Nest reported that the campus master plan was changed by the Board of Trustees in 2009. The USC would be combined with a future housing expansion, and the student services portion of the new building would be nixed.
Kent Kelso, the former regional vice chancellor of student affairs, said removing student services and organizations from the student center was an economic reality. He said the university would be turning away students without housing and could not manage an influx of new resident students without an expansion of services, dining and health specifically.
So, the activity and service fee-funded building manifested. According to the article, “a University Student Center fundamentally different than the student union [students] had agreed to support.”
…
Constantine said the 26-member Senate was unanimous in its decision.
SG’s budget for the 2013-14 academic year was determined on June 25, 2013, and $100,000 was dedicated to the SLC expansion during that time. Out of the $1.2 million available to be spent, Constantine’s bill secured a maximum of $500,000 for the SLC, which includes the $100,000 initially set aside.
In the bill, it notes that USFSP Director of Facilities Services John Dickson recognized there are “major facility improvements that must be addressed to assure basic operations of the SLC.” To clarify, The Crow’s Nest contacted Dickson and Student Body President Mark Lombardi-Nelson, who worked with Constantine to create the expansion bill, but did not hear back.
The bill will fund the new student lounge, which involves expanding the outside rotunda of the SLC to become enclosed, equipment for the lounge based off SG’s collection of student feedback and a design that updates the existing lounge. However, the expansion is not limited to these changes.
Constantine said spaces already established in the SLC have potential to grow, and the current lounge area could be renovated in many ways.
“It could become Multicultural Affairs’ entire center,” she said, “It could become a 24-hour quiet study room or nap room.”
How the space will be renovated depends on the input the ad hoc committee, temporarily formed to collaborate with the building designer, gathers from students. Composed of two resident students, two commuters and two SG members, the committee and designer will obtain ideas and specifics on what students want incorporated into the SLC.
Before the bill passed, Constantine said she was garnering responses from students. She said they were in favor of a lounge space and showed interest in a community kitchen. The kitchen, for example, would cater to everyone: commuters, those with extra time in between classes and students living in the USC who do not have access to a kitchen.
The ad hoc committee will be assembled by Lombardi-Nelson and Franklin Alves, the Senate president. Constantine said the two will market committee participation to students, allowing them to speak up if they wish to get involved.
The committee ensures the $500,000, which is comprised of activity and service fees, will reflect what students envision for the SLC, according to Constantine. She said one way this project is different from the USC is that the process of gathering student opinion will be more facilitated.
Once the ad hoc committee emerges, it will meet with the designer and build plans until the end of the semester. Construction on the SLC will happen over summer and is expected to be completed by the beginning of fall. Set to end by mid-March, the construction along Sixth Avenue S. should not interfere with the expansion.
