KALAMAZOO, Mich. — Kalamazoo College is making some upgrades to its campus. Its ten-year plan focuses on things like parking, traffic and infrastructure; however, many students say they are most excited about the planned on-campus housing renovations.
"I am definitely very grateful for all the renovations that are happening and I'm very happy for the future students who get to have those renovations," said Jessica Kaplan, a first-year student at the college.
Most of the residence halls on campus are 75 years old, and the most recent renovation was in 1968.
Susan Lindemann, the Associate Vice President for Facilities Management, said it's time for improvements.
"It's important to the students. I mean, we want students to feel like this is their home in every respect, so it's not just where they study, but it's also where they spend time with their peers and, in some ways, where they engage with the community," she said.
The first order of business is to build a new residence hall. Then, the college plans to demolish an old residence hall and rebuild in the same location.
Additionally, the college will make upgrades and repairs to existing dorms, which is exciting to Kaplan and her friend Sophia Sajan.
"It floods all the time, so the idea that next year's and the years after them probably won't have to deal with the same flooding. That'll be nice," said Sajan, who is also a first-year student.
Both students say the dorms are old and need repairs.
"Literally just like yesterday, my radiator or a pipe under the radiator, I'm pretty sure it started flooding. It wasn't bad. It was a couple of drips here and there. But we definitely had to put a couple of towels under there just to keep it from getting into our room," Kaplan said.
On top of the repair issues, upperclassmen have struggled to find on-campus housing.
"We believe that those upperclassmen are really important to the underclassmen in terms of mentorship. So we want them to be together and so so it's true that the ultimate goal here is for us to provide additional opportunities for students to live on campus and keep our community together," said Lindemann.
The master plan will cost millions of dollars, and the college has already started working on designs and fundraising.
