UC worth wait despite early complaints
Reprinted with permission of Royal Purple staff
Rewind the clock to last spring. The UW-Whitewater campus was still at the early part of a tremendous facelift. Fences were thrown up and the University Center was shut down, patches of sod were overturned and made into holes and the majority of the UC had been torn down.
Fast forward to the present. The gaps in the building have been replaced by beautiful expanses of glass and stone, the holes have been filled and covered with rolling walk ways, the fences have been torn down and the UC is now back online. The construction was a long process. Students and staff sacrificed a lot, but their patience has paid off as we are now blessed with a brand new and vastly improved UC.
Those who have been close to the project anticipated a warm welcome for the new building. "People can't wait to see what the new building looks like inside," Kim Adams, assistant to the director of the University Center said in a university press release.
Bob Barry, Director of the University Center, had been anticipating a positive response by students since the early stages of the project.
"Earlier last semester, we were giving some student groups tours of the new building," Barry said in a university press release. "Even though the building was far from completed, the students could see its potential and were excited about it." And they were right.
There wasn't a better way to kick off the opening of the building than to have the people who missed it the most celebrate with, essentially, a day long party.
Hundreds of students packed every inch of the UC Saturday for UC Live!, a series of fun events, contests and activities that began early in the afternoon and ended late at night. The event was no cost to students.
The event featured free bowling and pool at the recreation center, art activities at the Fiskum Art Gallery, athletic trivia in the Schaffer Commons, a murder mystery dinner in the Old Main Ballroom, comedian Isaac Witty at the Down Under, casino night at the Hamilton Center and free showings of "Superbad" in the Summers Auditorium.
Ask any one of the students who turned Isaac Witty's comedy show into a standing room only event if walking around the construction to get to class was as bad as they had made it out to be.
Ask the same thing to any one of the numerous students who took advantage of free bowling and pool, forcing the Recreation Center staff to fill up waiting lists for both.
And ask any one of the many students who walked out with free stuff that night or simply had a good time breaking in their new UC if the project was such a burden to them in the previous months.
Traversing the campus through the rain and the snow, the lack of a place to congregate and an eye sore in the middle of campus were a few of many complaints to the construction of the new UC; they now seem trivial.
Ask any of the hundreds of students who made their way to UC Live!, and very few will say the wait wasn't worth it, that is if they can even remember the year and a half when the UC wasn't open. The majesty of the building, with all of its features, overshadows those earlier complaints.
Many thanks should be given to the numerous alumni and other donors who gave money for the project. Their contributions will be felt by every student and member of the community who steps foot into the vast atrium, grabs a meal in the Down Under or observes artwork at the Fiskum Art Gallery.
Thanks should also be extended to UW-Whitewater graduates from recent years who paid for the building in their final years here. You may not be able to use it everyday like current students, but you can return to campus and experience what has been missing from this campus for the last two and a half years.
Welcome back UC. It's been a while.
The UC would also like to thank the VIP Association for donating the fireplace in the Ike Shaffer Commons.
Watch the video tour of the new UC.
