Senior class gift may ease lack of study space

By Mason Stockstill

Daily Bruin Senior Staff

The Associated Students of UCLA has been paying a little more
attention to study space lately.

ASUCLA recently announced the Kerckhoff third-floor study lounge
will be undergoing renovation as a result of the senior class gift,
and a room in the Terrace Food Court eating area in Ackerman Union
has become an evening study area three nights a week.

The third-floor lounge, located in Kerckhoff Hall above the art
gallery, will be updated to include new furniture, better lighting
and Internet accessibility.

“The lounge needs cosmetic renovation, but it also needs
more substantial renovation,” said Jerry Mann, ASUCLA student
union director.

The idea was proposed to the senior class cabinet, which
selected it from several suggestions.

“The lounge idea was actually not born of a proposal put
together by an administrator, but was suggested to (the senior
class cabinet) at a Senior Day event,” said Tim Kawahara,
director of development for the Alumni Association.

Kawahara said he expects that at least $75,000 can be raised
from the senior class through telemarketing and pledge cards.

“If you look at the history of the gift, the monetary
success has been varied,” he said. “It’s hard to
say if the senior class is going to grab onto it or
what.”

Mann said that it will be at least six months before any more
specific plans are made regarding what shape the renovations will
take.

“By then we’ll have a better idea of what
we’ll be looking for,” Mann said. “We’ll
have picked out the furniture, identified costs, and will be able
to make an estimate of the cost.”

Mann said there are funds set aside in the student union budget
to make up whatever costs of the project that are not covered by
the senior class gift.

In addition to the plans to renovate the third-floor lounge,
ASUCLA has made extra study space available through a partnership
with the Campus Retention Committee in the Terrace Food Court area
of Ackerman Union.

The CRC had previously used study space in Campbell Hall and
Dodd Hall to hold their structured study hall time, but that space
is no longer available, Mann said.

“(ASUCLA Board member) Cori Shepherd came to us to try to
find some space,” he said. “We looked around for some,
but … meeting room space is at a premium.”

Fortunately, however, in the back of the Terrace Food Court is
the Westwood Room with folding partitions that separate it from the
rest of the area.

“It was just the right space for them,” Mann said.
“They didn’t want couches like in our other study
lounges. They needed tables and chairs. It’s like a classroom
setting.”

ASUCLA made the room available to the CRC Mondays through
Wednesdays, from 7 p.m. to midnight.

CRC officials were pleased with the arrangement.

“The program will impact students the most because study
space on campus has been shrinking,” said Gabino Arredondo,
chairman of the CRC, in a statement. “The joint venture with
ASUCLA is a step toward making UCLA facilities more accessible to
student groups and student needs on campus.”