CBA administration pursuing upgrade for building to remain competitive in conference

The current College of Business Administration building consists of classrooms, winding hallways of faculty offices, a student lounge and a student area. This building is drastically different from the average Big Ten business school, which offers students small group study rooms, restaurant food and ample space to relax between classes. As the University of Nebraska-Lincoln moves to the Big Ten, the College of Business Administration hopes to offer its students a building similar to its peer institutions.

At the conclusion of the fall semester, the College of Business Administration Facilities Task Force recommended the college consider pursuing a new facility. The college is currently in the initial steps of gaining approval for a project proposal, a lengthy process in itself.

"We're dreaming right now," said Donde Plowman, who has been dean of the College of Business Administration since July. "We're not getting a new building. We're looking at how a new building can help us do the things we want to do."

Current Progress

When Plowman took her new position, she put together seven task forces to provide her with recommendations to help the college create a five-year strategic vision. This included the Facilities Task Force.

After the Facilities Task Force recommended the college consider pursuing a new building, the college began the five-step process for a capital project planning decision, which applies to any university project expected to exceed $500,000.

The proposal to pursue a new building was approved by the chancellor, so CBA is currently in the middle of the second step: creating an early estimate of the size of the building and the amount of money it would require.

Big Ten Business School Facilities

The Facilities Task Force's main goal was to survey and gather information about other universities' facilities — particularly the other Big Ten universities — and compare the data with UNL's facilities, said Jim Schmidt, an economics professor and chairman of the Facilities Task Force.

Along with collecting large amounts of data, Schmidt and Dave DeFruiter, director of Information Technology Services and a member of the Facilities Task Force, visited three Big Ten schools: Purdue University, Indiana University Bloomington and University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

"Our facility would be mid-level in the Big 12 and at the bottom of the Big Ten," Schmidt said.

By visiting the schools, Schmidt said he was able to get a good sense of the scope of the buildings, their size, contemporary styling, educational equipment and learning environments.

Overall, the buildings were bigger, more spacious, offered more services and promoted small group education, Schmidt said.

"They're just bigger in scale," he said. "We, by far, have the smallest facility."

All of the business schools offered classrooms, expansive lounge areas, restaurants serving cafeteria food, coffee shops (most had contracts with Starbucks), trading rooms for finance students to trade on the exchanges, small breakout study rooms and mini-lockers for students to use.

"We were pretty much blown away by everything," DeFruiter said. The schools had a "corporate feel," and the services to go along with it.

In comparison, UNL's CBA has one student lounge, the Daily Drip and a large open study area for students — unimpressive and basic facilities compared to other Big Ten colleges.

"They (Big Ten peers) made sure the spirit of their facility was very inviting to students," Schmidt said. "There was a concentrated effort to make you feel wanted, comfortable and productive."

The deans of the business schools Schmidt visited told him that they want their students to come to the building and stay there for the course of the day.