Pushing ADA Beyond the Limits

Sometimes it's lonely on campus, being a planner. Start planning now to attend higher education's premier planning conference for 2010, SCUP–45, July 10–14 in Minneapolis, where you can network and converse with more than 1,000 of your peers and colleagues.
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From University Business:

The Americans with Disabilities Act requires specific measurements and codes that allow access for disabled students. Some campus planners say that isn’t enough—and are looking to universal design concepts.

Structural and Safety Issues

Sometimes it's lonely on campus, being a planner. Start planning now to attend higher education's premier planning conference for 2010, SCUP–45, July 10–14 in Minneapolis, where you can network and converse with more than 1,000 of your peers and colleagues.

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From University Business, Report Finds Structural and Safety Issues on College Campuses (MO):

Missouri’s college campuses look good from the outside, but within are cramped classrooms, deteriorating walls and outdated lab equipment, according to a state report out this week.

Smart Building Ideas: A Call for Stories

For a round-up feature in the November/December, Melissa Ezarik of University Business magazine is seeking examples of “Smart Building Ideas.” Complete this form to share your story. Respond by September 30, please.

Similar in format to previous end-of-year roundups - http://tinyurl.com/c8ynsm and http://tinyurl.com/57bel5 - this feature will include examples of how colleges and universities have been able to continue with building plans despite the economy. She plans to cover several creative financing and fundraising strategies (e.g. fundraising messaging specifically devised to convince donors of the importance of donating despite the economic situation), as well as ideas such as altering project timelines or building in phases rather than all at once.

Please share your stories via this easy-to-use form, and they will be available for Ezarik and also to SCUP. She will not be doing additional reporting, so please include in your short write-up all of the details she might need, including project dates and costs. (See the examples of previous work at the links above.)

Thanks! Complete this form to share your story.

Questions: mezarik@universitybusiness.com or terry.calhoun@scup.org.

P.S. While you are anticipating this feature article in UB, SCUP has three great related webcasts coming up in October and November

9/30 - The Future of Campus Planning and Design: Trend Spotting with 2009 Design Award Submissions
http://www.scup.org/page/profdev/notravel/2009/awards

10/21 - Campus Sustainability Day 7, Sustainability: Strategies for Vibrant Campus Communities
http://www.scup.org/page/profdev/notravel/2009/csd/7

11/19 - Carbon Neutral Campus Architecture: Climate Specific Design and Innovation
http://www.scup.org/page/profdev/notravel/2009/carbonneutral

Complete this form to share your story. Respond by September 30, please.

Smart Hiring: Strategic Staffing Plans

This article, by Carol Patton in University Business, looks at ways a number of institutions are looking strategically at hiring and retention practices.

[A]s schools look toward the future, staffing becomes a big question mark. More and more baby boomers are exiting the workforce, which is fueling the skilled labor shortage. Some institutional leaders are concerned that they won't be ready, that they will be unable to recruit the talent they desperately need. So they're focusing their energies on designing strategic staffing plans that enable them to explore their school's risks and vulnerabilities as well as marketplace opportunities in order to build a competent labor force.

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HR leaders need to ask themselves two questions: Does HR hire people to fill jobs? Or does it recruit candidates who can grow into positions that reflect the changing marketplace? If your practices are more in line with the first option, watch out. Your staff could be stuck in neutral, unable to develop new skills demanded by their new environment. High turnover is usually one of the symptoms.

Special Delivery: Public Institutions Slow to Adopt Design-Build?

The article, "Special Delivery," is from University Business magazine's July 2007 issue by Julie Sturgeon: "Competitive bidding may rule the construction scene, but that doesn't make it the best choice for all campus projects. Here's how your peers are breaking out of the box."

Let's be perfectly clear: No one is kicking the traditional design-bid-build model to the curb. It remains the most widely accepted model for getting campus construction projects done, because its linear process is easy to manage and it sets the stage for the lowest, responsible price. After all, the system offers college and university officials more than one set of checks and balances and controls, and it works in real time for truly market-driven invoices.

But sometimes it pays to get the cart before the horse. For instance, campus architects and pencil pushers aren't hesitant to explore alternative delivery methods when opening a dormitory faster means an income stream sooner, or when the facility design becomes complicated and the available in-house staff amounts to just a handful of already overworked architects.

Dormitory Complex at Massachusetts Maritime

This item, "Dormitory Complex at Massachusetts Maritime," is part of a series from University Business titled "Sense of Place." The "problem" described below was "solved" with a $3.5 million for upgrades and $13 million for two-story addition. The series is useful and worth following:

- PROBLEMS: As enrollment grew at Mass Maritime-a public, co-ed maritime college in which the regimented lifestyle of cadets has traditionally required students to live on campus-it became clear that more beds were desperately needed. In fact, this school year nearly 1,000 students had to occupy a circa 1968 dorm complex designed to accommodate 880, reports Allen Hansen, vice president of Student Services. Even with students residing in every recreation room and study lounge, administrators still had to break tradition and allow a handful of students to commute. And with just one location on the 55-acre campus available for expansion-which officials hope to use for a new library complex-it seemed that a vertical expansion of the existing complex was the best bet.