| Tech Center = Social Center
by DaQuita Hardeman
The furniture was removed from the University
Center and into the Patio Café and Residence Halls, and now the
floors of the UC’s Green Room are left green and bare.
“Much of the furniture in the Green Room was
broken and torn due to its being moved in and out of the Green Room when
performances and dinners were held in the room," explained Vice Chancellor
for Student Affairs Dr. Peggy Doss. "Also, some of the furniture
had been torn and even holes punched in it.”
“The Green room is used almost every week for a university function
and also for community functions so the furniture was constantly being
moved. We have never really had a crew just to move furniture and still
don't. The best of the furniture that could be saved is in Bankston and
in the Patio Café,” Doss continued.
Nicole Barrett, a senior Health and Wellness
major from Morton, Mississippi noted, “Before the furniture was removed
from the UC, students would go there to lounge, study, eat, watch television,
socialize, and dodge the weather between classes. Now students walk through
the UC doors and go either to the cafeteria/Patio Café or straight
through taking a short cut to the downstairs parking lot.”
Before the University Center's Green Room
was designated as the place where students hang out there was the Student
Union located in the current post office building on the north side of
campus.
Dr. Matthews, Professor of English, and a
UAM alumnae, remembered how things were when she was a student.
“I was an undergraduate here, from 1955-1958.
At that time the Student Union was called exactly that, the 'Student Union'.
It was located in the P.O building that now houses the UAM Bookstore, which
previously took up much less
space, as did the Post Office, although in the same building. Things
were very different in those days. The Union was a gathering
place for all students and faculty on campus, and any day you could go
there and find students and faculty
sitting together at the many round tables, drinking coffee and getting
to know each other. Everybody went there during the hours when they
didn't have classes, and sometimes when they did, and there was a much
more collegial atmosphere in those days than exist today.”
“There were no social or racial boundaries--distinguished
faculty, members of all the fraternities and sororities on campus, coaches,
athletes, all mingled together and felt a common bond. The SU was much
more accessible than the current small space that now calls itself a gathering
place but isn't. When I came back here to teach in January of 1967, it
was still there, and once again I spent lots of time there as a faculty
member rather than a student, but things hadn't changed all that much." |
She concluded by noting, "The building of the Gibson
Center brought an end to what had once been a long and proud tradition
of Arkansas A&M/UAM, and I miss the old SUB."
By contrast to the quiet filling the University
Center, a low-toned roar arises from the students conversing both up and
down stairs of the new technology center. Students sit on the benches in
the lobby, at the tables in Java City, and stand around while keeping out
of the cold wintry weather.
Shamon Coger, a senior CIS major from Dumas
and a Bankston Hall resident said, “If the furniture was still in the UC
I would only go to the library to study, not to socialize. I would go to
breakfast and then to the UC for a quick nap before class.”
The Library and Technology Center offers Java
City for an early morning pick me up, the library for a quiet place to
study, an upstairs computer lab for online work, and now a lobby full of
lounging students awaiting their next class.
Andreka Walker, a sophomore Nursing Major
from Hamburg and Horsfall Resident Assistant said, “I would hang out in
the UC between classes. The UC would be a place to go to between classes
when it’s cold and raining and instead of the students gathering in the
residence halls, they’ll have somewhere to hang out also.”
Matisha Bobo, a junior CIS major from Helena
who works in the computer lab, has noticed that the number of students
using the lab increases during the cold morning hours, but later on in
the day the numbers decrease.
Shandolyn Watson, a commuter from Dumas said,
“If the furniture was still in the UC, I would go there between classes,
but because of the discomfort I, a lot of times, go home.”
So does Corbie Vassol, also from Dumas.
She leaves campus and goes home rather than spending any time on campus
between classes.
While Robin Garcia, one of the assistants
in the Patio Café said, “When it’s cold outside or when it rains,
I lose business because there doesn’t seem to be anyone on campus", the
service in Java City on the other hand tells a different story.
“When it’s cold outside my business
improves. The colder it is the more coffee I sell and the more hot chocolate
I sell. When it’s cold a lot of people just come in to sit,” said Diana
Brinkley, Java City’s main assistant.
“We are working with Aramark Food Services on a design and plan
to add soft seating to the Café, so students, faculty and staff
have more new seating for a more casual atmosphere and a place to "hang
out". I have asked Dr. Brown to price a pin ball machine and some other
kind of game for the Patio Café also,” said Doss. |
Weevil
