The Rice Thresher, Vol. 91, No. 29, Ed. 1 Friday, May 21, 2004 Page: 4 of 32
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THE RICE THRESHER NEWS FRIDAY, MAY 21, 2004
Fondren renovations
to include coffee shop
by Ian Everhart
THRESHER EDITORIAL STAFF
Spending time in the library may
soon be more relaxing, with the
eventual addition of a coffee shop
and iniormal lounges for under-
graduates and graduate students.
Assistant University Librarian
Sara Lowman said, pending ap-
proval from the Board of Trustees,
designs will be drawn up over the
summer and fall, and renovations
may begin as early as 2005.
The library's renovations would
include physically remodeling
many parts of the building, an April
8 article in Rice News stated.
Current proposals call for creating
a "main street" through the first floor
of the library. The walkway would
extend from die current western door
of the library facing the Academic
Quad through to a new door on the
eastern side of the building and would
be intended to eliminate some of the
more confusing design features of the
current layout.
The plans also include the addi-
tion of a coffee shop on the second
floor of the library to create a more
relaxed reading area for individual
work and group collaboration. The
sixth floor may be converted into
an informal reading room with open
and closed study areas. The sixth
floor would also have a lounge de-
signed for graduate students.
The plans include the addition of
both wireless and wired technologies,
Lowman said. She said data ports will
be added in study spaces throughout
the building with the goal of support-
ing individual and collaborative uses
of technology.
Lowman said renovations to the
library are overdue, especially since
library users' needs have changed in
recent years.
"Over the past 10 years, the way
that people access and use infor-
mation has changed radically, and
Fondren Library needs to change
in order to better meet the needs
of our users," Lowman said.
Lowman said many disciplines
rely increasingly on electronic
resources, and being able to sup-
ply data electronically will help the
library stay up-to-date in the organi-
zation, management and delivery of
information.
"The library staff are very excited
about this project and look forward to
the design phase after board approval
of the project," Lowman said.
' Over the past 10
years, the way that
people access and use
information has changed
radically; and Fondren
Library needs to change
in order to better meet
the needs of our users,"
— Sara Lowman
Assistant university librarian
Some space for the renovations
was freed up by the opening of the
new off-site Library Service Center
earlier this year and the relocation
of the English department to Her-
ring Hall, Lowman said. Lesser-
used volumes currently stored
at Fondren will be moved to the
Library Services Center but will
still be accessible through an online
retrieval system.
- yy ' ,
♦
Grad students can have fun too ...
ELIZABETH KIM/THRESHER
Graduate student Alex Almarza and Facilities and Engineering Analyst Mark Gardner serve drinks at the April 23
Spring Picnic hosted by the Graduate Student Association.
I
Next Century Campaign reaches goal a year late
By Alana Newell
THRESHER EDITORIAL STAFF
Rice's first major fund-rais-
ing campaign has reached its
$500 million goal one year after its
original deadline.
President Malcolm Gillis said he
began thinking about the Next Cen-
tury Campaign in 1995 and started it
July 1,1997without a public announce
ment In September 2000, Gillis and
his wife Elizabeth held a black-tie gala
to celebrate the public start of the
campaign. The original date set for
completion of the campaign was June
30, 2003, but Gillis said he was not
bothered by the late culmination.
"Deadlines are always extremely
elastic; no campaign ever has a
hard and fast completion date,"
Gillis said.
The campaign experienced set-
backs due to the flooding from
Tropical Storm Allison in July 2001,
Gillis said.
'The flood during the summer
of 2001 was a tremendous blow, not
because of damage to us, but because
local foundations and philanthropists
that we depend on decided — rightly
so — that their most urgent task was
to help the [Texas Medical Center]
and museums recoverfrom the flood,"
Gillis said. "They didn't include Rice
because there was not much damage
done to the university."
Gillis said the economic downturn
was also a setback to the campaign.
"Some of the pledges were in
stocks, and the drop-off from the
dot-coms meant that a lot of those
pledges were lost," Gillis said. 'The
recession slowed things down, but
we made up our lost ground."
The bankruptcy of Enron af-
fected Rice somewhat, but no
more than any other organization
in Houston, Gillis said.
Some of the planned uses for the
money raised changed during the
course of the campaign. The original
plan called for a new library to be built,
but after the flooding during Tropical
Storm Allison, Gillis said it became
clear that keeping much of Fondren's
collection underground, as the original
plans called for, would be unwise.
Another plan that was abandoned
was the construction of a convoca-
tion center.
"The building and grounds com-
mittee had originally planned for a
convocation center and decided not
to move forward with those plans,"
Assistant Vice President for Develop-
ment Carolyn Warszawski said.
Despite the various setbacks and
the later-than-anticipated completion
date, Gillis said he is very satisfied
with the campaign.
"It was our first comprehensive
campaign ever, we were one of the
last major universities to ever mount
a campaign, so we had to make it
up as we went along," Gillis said. "It
went astoundingly well given that
and the state of the economy"
Gillis predicts the Next Century
Campaign will surpass its goal by
the end of June.
He said the future of Rice fund-
raising is in the hands of President-
Elect David Leebron, who will take
Gillis' place July 1.
"He'll need to create another
strategic plan and, with the ad-
ministration and faculty, will have
to decide what the new priorities
are," Gillis said.
Despite all the work that goes
into a new campaign, Gillis said he
is proud to have paved the way for
future efforts.
"I'm very happy to leave an
infrastructure for fundraising that
wasn't present before," he said. "I
had to make it from scratch."
The campaign money will be used
in several different areas of concern
at Rice and will primarily be used to
fulfill the campaign's four original
goals. The first—to enhance un-
dergraduate education and student
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life—was allocated $175 million and
included improvements to student
life, such as the construction of Mar-
tel College as the ninth residential
college, as well as athletic scholar-
ships and funding for programs such
as Leadership Rice.
The second area of focus —
strengthening faculty and graduate
programs — was allocated $270
million. This goal included funding
for graduate fellowships, as well
as the construction of the Humani-
ties Building and the new Jesse H.
Jones School of Management, and
the renovations to Keck Hall. It
also provided for endowed chairs in
various departments.
According to the Next Century
Campaign Web site, the main function
of endowed chairs is to provide recogni-
tion to existing Rice faculty, attract new
faculty and provide continuing funding
to the academic departments.
Twenty-five million dollars was
allotted to the third goal, expand-
ing and strengthening outreach
programs, such as Continuing
Studies, the Baker Institute and
K-12 education.
The final area of concern for
the Next Century Campaign was
increasing the annual fund and un-
restricted gifts, which was allocated
$30 million and included funding for
financial aid, library improvements,
scholarships and various other
campus improvements.
Gillis said that many of the
goals were met — some were even
surpassed
"We expanded the faculty by
more than we thought we would,"
Ciillis said. "Additionally, we funded
improvements in Brown, Jones
and Martel Colleges. We hit all
the targets."
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Gilbert, Lindsey & Yardley, Jonathan. The Rice Thresher, Vol. 91, No. 29, Ed. 1 Friday, May 21, 2004, newspaper, May 21, 2004; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth398446/m1/4/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.