Quinebaug Valley Community College

Narratives

Architect Narrative

The motivating ideas behind the design twofold: Enhance a much-loved existing building by matching scale and materials and provide light and open spaces to meet the current needs of the College. When the school first opened in 1983, the typical community college student was a commuter and likely several years beyond high school. The spacious parking lot was set directly in front of the building making it easy to drive up, park, attend a class, and return to the car. Now the student body is mixed in age and expectation; the school requires more of a campus as well as places within the building to study in groups and socialize. In addition to the nearly two thousand students currently using the facility, the school serves as a resource for area residents and businesses. Classrooms and public spaces therefore are flexible in size (through the use of folding walls) and function. The plan for the new wing is a double-loaded classroom building connected by an open two-story space. By rotating the new wing on an angle, a green space is created off the art wing.

The Program includes an Art Gallery, multi-purpose and specialized classrooms, libraries, offices, and social spaces. The renovation includes a library addition, re-fitted computer lab, offices, a high-end training room for Continuing Education, and a light manufacturing plastics lab.

Technology for the classrooms is designed to accommodate future growth and change. Each classroom has a projector and screen with controls at the teacher station with access the College server as well as room controls. Current teaching practices make heavy use of wireless technology through the use of mobile carts. While the new design calls for the data to be hard-wired to rooms, there are provisions for the future installation of wireless infrastructure. Specialized rooms include: A Collaborative Classroom with a mobile teacher station and plug-in points on desks with café style seating, distance learning technology at both the seminar room and the Corporate Training Room, a computer lab, and an Art Gallery with AV equipment for multi-media exhibits. Plug-in points for laptops are provided in all common spaces as well as at classroom seating.

Publicly funded, the Additions and Alterations project is on a tight budget. Higher-end finishes are reserved for the public spaces; stone floor and stair treads are used in the entry hall, glass and wood in the main stair railing. The Art Gallery has a maple floor and high ceilings. The Corporate Training Room has boardroom level finishes with solid wood paneling over wall covering. Light and modulated ceiling heights are used throughout the building to enhance standard classroom and hallway finishes.

Educator Narrative

Two statements best capture the essence of our college and what drives our decision-making and sets our priorities, and our facility should support both. One is the concept or driver of “Learners First” which is a combination of the process of learning and the human beings who both facilitate learning and come to us for learning. The second is the first line in our Vision which reads as follows: “(school name) will be a center for intellectual and cultural enrichment that serves as a source of pride for our students and the community.”

This planned expansion and renovation does indeed support both. The majority of new and renovated space has as its learning purpose, not just using the technological tools available now but providing flexibility for those that are yet undiscovered. Just as computers were not used when the original building opened a short 21 years ago, the space needs to be functional and provide flexibility not only now but long-term. College staff and students as well as the entire community as a whole take pride in the appearance of the campus buildings and grounds beginning with the view from the road as one drives onto our campus through the internal layout with common services to learners located as the core of the building. These are enhanced in this design. New visitors often comment on the superb condition of our facility now with a very small maintenance staff and the design takes issues related to maintenance into account without sacrificing esthetics. The expansion of the library to the size it was originally to be and the renovation of our learning center will allow these key learning spaces to continue to be the “happening” places they have always been but accommodate more students since we have grown 35% in credit headcount in the past five years with no additional space.

Because of space limitations resulting from that enrollment growth, the community and credit-free programming have been squeezed out, and this not only brings them back but does so with space that is welcoming and better suited to their meetings and conferences, receptions and art shows, corporate training and testing. As our full-time student body becomes younger and the part time student body remains primarily adult, the addition provides students with gathering spaces of various configurations so important to a “real” college atmosphere.

Every staff member was involved in some way in creating the message or providing feedback to our architects, and the conceptual plans and even drawings have been shared with most of the community leaders through this process. The verdict is strong and clear-the project, both the renovation and expansion, will indeed be a source of pride and allow us to expand and improve in meeting our mission, achieving our vision, and demonstrating “Learners First.”