The WPI Campus Center. This has been one subject that has aroused the curiosity of every WPI student, faculty, staff, and administration member over the past year. There has been much speculation about when the building will actually be completed, and what its opening will signify for our campus.
I had the pleasure of spending a morning with Jim McLaughlin, the new Director of Student Activities Office and Head of the Campus Center, the person who will see the old dream of a WPI Campus Center through to its realization. McLaughlin joined the WPI community in July, a big move after spending 14 years as the Director of the College Union and Student Activities at Plymouth State College in New Hampshire. McLaughlin says that the decision to come here was made primarily because he was well informed of WPI's widespread reputation as an excellent educational institute. He was also very excited by the new professional challenges that his position has to offer. Besides that, both McLaughlin and his wife grew up in Massachusetts, and they took advantage of the opportunity to move back without hesitation.
McLaughlin has high hopes for the Campus Center, evident in his infectious enthusiasm about the changes it will bring to WPI. In addition to the Campus Center project being a fresh professional challenge for him, McLaughlin is eager about the chance of being an administrator at an exceptional school such as WPI. He is certain that the inauguration of the Campus Center will transform the school and community overwhelmingly. By bringing all members of the WPI community together, the Campus Center will serve to improve the sense of unity on-campus as well as enhance quality of life for everyone.
According to McLaughlin, the Campus Center is not just a building, nor is it simply a new feature to make WPI more appealing to new students. It is an extension of WPI's commitment to excellence, forming an intrinsic part of the educational program by "serving as a social learning laboratory that encourages student involvement in co-curricular activities, inspires student leadership and recognizes that a critical part of a student's intellectual, social and moral growth takes place outside of the classroom."
These goals are met through the many services that this 'college living room' will provide to WPI. A tour of the almost completed structure of the building can show only a glimpse of the myriad opportunities that will be available to the WPI community after its opening. The numerous conference/meeting rooms, dining services and lounges merely touch the surface. It is impossible to overestimate the unifying force of having the offices of Student Life, SAO, MAO, Tech News, WPI Radio, SGA, ISC and many more in such close proximity as the Campus Center will provide. Pool tables, couches, coffee, email, entertainment, and a breathtaking view of Higgins House and campus: we will have it all.
The WPI Campus Center will be the finest in all of New England for a university of this size, and Jim McLaughlin summed it up elegantly: The WPI Campus Center will be, put simply, "A celebration of Life."