About.
The new Student Services Building at The Claremont Colleges is being developed under the guidance of The Claremont Colleges Services. The building will serve as a new hub for student activity on campus and provide a centrally located home for select student services. The future Student Services Building is intended to be a new type of forward-thinking building on campus, supporting diverse student needs in innovative ways and creating a welcoming home for all. The project is in the design phase and will ultimately be constructed at the southeast corner of Dartmouth Avenue and Tenth Street, just north of the Library.
Project Timeline.
Planning is underway for a TCC Student Services building to serve the evolving needs of consortial students seeking to gather and connect in a post-pandemic world where engagement, space, and communal relationships may be reimagined and redefined. The project timeline began with student services building visioning and is currently in the design process, with preconstruction planning underway too. We anticipate groundbreaking in summer 2024, with the grand opening projected for spring 2026.
STUDENT SERVICES BUILDING VISIONING
BEGINNING FALL 2021
DESIGN PROCESS
SPRING 2022
PRE-CONSTRUCTION PLANNING
FALL 2023
GROUNDBREAKING + CONSTRUCTION
SUMMER 2024
GRAND OPENING
SPRING 2026
Collaboration with the Hive.
The project team continues to partner with The Hive’s Human-Centered Design class to gain additional student insight into the center as part of the ongoing outreach process. The Hive’s fall 2022 class facilitated team projects in which the students designed an element of service that the new student services building could offer for a specific type of user. The spring 2023 class explored opportunities for indoor and outdoor “sticky” spaces for the TCC community to use. Options presented considered places where students could relax, enjoy privacy, refresh, interact, seek connection and grow.
The project team was present for the student’s project presentations and was excited to see the wide variety of ideas and insights the students conceived and demonstrated. Students’ perspectives and feedback continue to inform and shape the design of the Student Services building.
We look forward to working with The Hive in fall 2023.
Project Overview.
Through all the project phases, the project team hosts community engagement opportunities to gain insights for the building. The stats below show the engagement metrics from the visioning phase. In this phase, engagement opportunities included focus groups, open houses at each institution, recurring meetings with select committees, and ongoing online open comments. Over 1,000 individuals participated, of which 875 participants were students across The Claremont Colleges. Campus community engagement like this will be conducted repeatedly throughout all phases so that the Student Services Building continues to reflect the needs and interests of the students using it.
In early 2022, the visioning process for the Student Center was completed by TCCS and Ayers Saint Gross (ASG), an architectural and design firm.
The visioning process creates a vision for the new central facility that allows for better placement and delivery of TCCS services and provides a welcoming, accessible, and inclusive space for the entire TCC community while simultaneously re-imagining existing space.
The project outcomes establish a vision that includes goals, priorities, and guiding principles for the Student Center.
In fall 2022, TCCS proceeded with a design competition to select an architectural firm to fully design the facility. A design competition encourages visionary design professionals to form well-organized, talented, and experienced teams to undertake this unique project. An evaluation jury consisting of the TCCS Student Center Planning Team, staff representatives from Pomona, CGU, Scripps, CMC, and Pitzer, and key staff and faculty of The Hive comprised the jury. The teams presented their designs during project presentations. Following the jury evaluation, HMC Architects prevailed as the preferred team to design the TCC Student Center. The concept designs presented by HMC Architects are preliminary but reflect many of the concepts, ideas and suggestions gathered in the visioning phase of the project.
The Programming Phase defined the project scope and budget for the architectural design work. This phase included robust community outreach, with the project team meeting with various stakeholders to obtain input. Key constituencies that provided input included students-at-large at various campus events, campus student leadership, The Hive, Student Deans and their staff, and general community input. From our student engagement, the following themes emerged: 1) unmet desire for strengthened consortial experience, 2) intersectional experience of spiritual life and affinity groups and student identity, 3) shared space that is “neutral ground” and easy to access, informal and restorative, and 4) space to study, socialize, and engage that is less formal and more tactile in nature.
Through the Programming Phase, almost 1,500 students, faculty, and staff have shared input on this project. Through these interactions, the team confirmed how students use student services and spaces and what areas need improvement. This input helped the team to understand all of these dynamics and diverse needs and then tailor plans to fit the needs and expectations of the campus community.
The Schematic Design Phase began in May 2023 and is concluding in fall 2023. Schematic Design is the first phase of the architectural design process. During this phase, the design team takes the programming and concept design and translates it into architectural and spatial designs. The concepts and designs were informed by the continuing engagement of the presidents of The Claremont Colleges, which included design charettes. Through this process, the presidents aligned on the development of the “Vertical Village” design. Please see the Project Design for more information.
Project Design.
Since late 2022, the project team (TCCS staff and the architect, HMC Architects) have engaged TCC stakeholders to understand the preferences and needs of the TCC community. The Student Services Building will provide community spaces (large meeting rooms and various “hang-out” areas of varying sizes from intimate to large-group size), offices, and engagement space for Chaplains, Office of Black Student Affairs (OBSA), Chicano Latino Student Affairs (CLSA), and Student Disability Resource Center (SDRC). The project design will continue to be refined during the Design Development Phase beginning this fall.
Student Health Services (SHS), Monsour Counseling and Psychological Services (MCAPS), and Health Education Outreach (HEO) will remain in the Tranquada building. This building will undergo a remodel to improve flow and provide greater space for these services. The design for Tranquada’s remodel will begin this fall, with construction beginning in the summer of 2024 and concluding in the winter of 2024/2025.
The following preliminary designs are subject to further refinement, pending municipal approvals.
Input.
Let us know what you want to see in the new TCC Student Services Building! What design elements and services would appeal to you? The TCC Student Services Building team welcomes suggestions from the campus community.