Not only is UTM known for being named in The Princeton Review as one of the 2013 Best Value Colleges, but UTM is also known for having one of the most beautiful campuses in the Southeast, constantly striving to improve classrooms, technology and infrastructure year-round for its students.
“The appearance of the campus is critical to the recruitment of students,” said Nancy Yarbrough, the UTM Interim Vice Chancellor of Finance and Administration.
“We continually work on improving the campus buildings and grounds so we can offer the most attractive and functional facilities for the campus community. Also, as educational programs change, buildings are renovated in a more efficient and functional manner to accommodate these changing programs.”
Yarbrough also says that the capital construction takes place year round.
These are the larger renovation projects that usually require the relocation of building occupants, like in the case of Clement Hall when Fine Arts was being renovated. Normal campus maintenance happens year round as well; however, during the summer months, intensive work takes place in the dorms and classrooms since they are not as occupied.
Some of the larger projects that have been completed this year on campus so far include the Fine Arts Building renovation that added 60,000 square feet of space, the Tennis court upgrades, the Rhodes Golf Building and the connection of the two chiller plants, which will allow greater capacity for cooling the campus.
A new chiller replacement project will exchange one of the existing 650-ton chillers for an 800-ton chiller in the north plant of the university.
“For the large projects like say, the Fine Arts Building renovation, that go on, the University has to match 25 percent of the total cost to build it. Many times this includes the cost of other factors outside construction itself as well,” said UTM Chancellor Dr. Tom Rakes.
The university also goes to great lengths to try and get funding from donors to help better the educational experience for future students. However, they have a process of doing so.
Rakes says that in a nutshell, graduates are asked when they are financially able to possibly donate. They don’t just target everyone who has graduated from UTM. Many times it’s many, many years after they’ve graduated and have been established out in the world. And at that, the university only asks for what they can possibly afford to spare, not some outlandish figure like many would imagine.
Projects like the upcoming Graham Stadium renovations are mostly being funded like this, especially since athletics aren’t state funded. Thankfully, the university has donors and self-generated money avenues to help complete this project in the future despite minor set-backs.
“The football stadium project has been scheduled to be started at the end of the 2014 football season. This allows proper time for planning and designing of the second floor academic space area,” Yarbrough said.
Other current projects that are being worked on by the university include, but aren’t limited to, a roofing project that will replace the roofs on the Hall-Moody Administration Building, Brehm Hall, the EPS Building and various window and door upgrades across campus. UTM is also currently starting construction on a major elevator upgrade project for the campus to provide new elevators in the Elam Center, Gooch Hall and Clement Hall.
Many students and faculty on campus who use the elevator frequently for various reasons were concerned with the elevator renovation because of the inability of using them for the remainder of the time it will take to finish the project.
“The existing freight elevator and passenger elevator in Gooch will be totally upgraded,” Yarbrough said.
“We are also adding a new passenger elevator directly next to the existing passenger elevator. We will always keep an elevator operational during this renovation project.”
Rakes also added that the elevator renovations would help aid visitors and possibly future donors who are less able to take the stairs.
The following are also in the works and are still in the designing stages: the football stadium renovation, the sorority lodge project (four sorority lodges will be located off Peach Street next to the University Courts), the bookstore relocation and renovation (it will be relocated from the second floor to the northeast corner of the first floor) and the Dining Services project that will upgrade the dining room areas within the University Center.
