Dateline: January 24, 2002

CC plans new dormitory  

Roger Estlack, Clarendon Enterprise

Clarendon College is planning to build a new residence hall to meet the growing needs for on-campus housing.

“We need 12,000 to 14,000 square feet to accommodate an additional 80 beds,” said CC President Myles Shelton, who hopes to have the hall ready for the fall 2003 semester. “We’re going to move forward with this fairly expeditiously in the next few months.”

The number of students seeking campus housing has exceeded the current capacity of the residence halls for the last two years. Enrollment has grown from 331 on the main campus in the fall of 1999 to 363 in 2001.

CC Regents will not know the estimated cost of the new hall until a final site and design is selected, but Shelton said he anticipates construction costs to be $100 to $120 per square foot. The facility would be financed with revenue bonds, which would be paid by fees on students using the building and not by taxpayer monies.

“The low interest rates provide an opportunity for Clarendon College to go after revenue bonds at this time,” Shelton said. “The opportunity is here, and we clearly have the need.”

This last fall, the college met the need for beds by making several two-bed rooms into three-bed rooms. In the past students who requested on-campus housing were put up in a local motel when dorm rooms are not available.

The CC Board of Regents authorized BGR Architects and Engineers of Lubbock to draw up proposals for two sites for the facility on College Hill during their regular meeting January 17. The school hopes to go to bid on the project in 60 to 90 days.

The first site under consideration is now occupied by the former Vo-Tech Building. That structure was originally a World War II era barracks that was moved to CC’s modern campus in the 1970s and bricked for use as a student union building. In recent years, the college had taken steps to renovate the aging facility for use as a dormitory before realizing that the idea was unfeasible.

The old Vo-Tech Building would be torn down to erect a two- or three-story building, Shelton said.

The second site is the area between Vaughan Hall and Phelan Hall. Shelton said a three-story building might be erected there that would connect the two existing halls.

The challenge for the architect at the second site, Shelton said, would be to come up with a design that connects the two-story Vaughan Hall with the one-story Phelan Hall in the same architectural style as the rest of the campus and that would look as though it had always been there.

On either site, the new facility would be a co-ed facility, which would likely use a magnetic strip card to control access to different levels. The facility would also need to provide some flexibility for changing campus demographics in the future. The college currently needs 15 to 20 new male beds and 60 to 65 new female beds, and Shelton said that gender breakdown should meet CC’s needs for the next three years.

While local enrollment has grown steadily since 1999, enrollment at the school’s largest satellite slipped this year. Enrollment at the CC Pampa Center was 167 for fall 1999, surged to 243 in the fall of 2000 after the opening of the new campus there, then dropped back to 177 last fall. The numbers are picking up in Pampa, however; and Shelton says he expects spring 2002 enrollment to settle around 190.

Overall enrollment for the home campus and all CC satellites last fall was 891.