Ideas begin to shape new building

Ken Snyder

The new building is starting to take shape even though we haven’t even had the groundbreaking yet.

In my last blog I asked students, faculty and alumni for their ideas on what we need to be including in our new building. Some suggestions came in the comment section and others were e-mailed directly to me. I was relieved to discover they all seemed to be thoughtful and reasonable suggestions.

Here are some comments regarding ideas that have come up:

The Shingo Prize for Operational Excellence – Our internationally known Shingo Prize headquarters has not been located in our building for years. We envision it being an important part of the new building. But the solution has to be part of a greater consideration. The Shingo Prize is an example of a program that cuts across departments. We have announced our intent to form other “centers” that cut across departments, such as for global engagement, for entrepreneurship and for leadership. It is not clear to us what the long-term staffing needs of these programs will be.

A student lounge – A few years ago, a renovation project took out the dean’s offices and created a student lounge on the main floor that is in constant use for study, meetings, socializing and eating. It has become the best-used space in the building. There is a consensus that more student space like our current lounge is needed.

A café or coffee shop – This is on the list of things to be considered.

A Huntsman School of Business merchandise shop – This is on the list of things to be considered.

Water-bottle equipped drinking fountains – Good idea. We’ll make sure at least some fountains have this feature.

Faculty lounge – We’ve visited a number of business schools and some have a faculty lounge and some don’t. Often when there is such space set aside, it also serves as a meeting room or lunchroom. This is something we are still considering.

An open design – We have begun negotiations with a Salt Lake City firm, GSBS Architects, which would be teaming up with a Seattle firm, LMN Architects, to construct our new building. GSBS designed the Merrill-Cazier Library right here at Utah State University. The library has the type of open building space that takes advantage of natural light and lots of windows that we want in our new building.

This, of course, is only the beginning of the ideas we will be considering as we make thousands of decisions in the months to come. Thanks for the feedback. Feel free to share more ideas with me.

Ken Snyder