O’Connor Hall repurposed as faculty and staff office building

[Athena Venetsanakos]

Cesareo Contreras

Arts & Features Editor 

As of this week, all faculty and staff who were scheduled to move into office spaces in O’Connor Hall have done so, said Dale Hamel, executive vice president.

The offices that moved to the ground level this week were marketing and communications, grants and sponsored programs, institutional research and assessment and university services, Hamel said.

The departments that moved over during phase one in August were First Year Programs, Student Advising, education, psychology, philosophy, world languages, sociology and political science.

The office of Chon’tel Washington, director of the center for inclusive excellence, was also moved over. The Center for Inclusive Excellence is scheduled to be moved to O’Connor Hall later in the year, Hamel said.

The move was initially going to occur all at once, just prior the start of the semester, but due to the prolonged construction on the ground level of O’Connor Hall, the move was broken into two phases, according to Hamel.

Warren Fairbanks, associate vice president of facilities, said one of the biggest renovation challenges was updating the bathrooms, as they had been out-of-date and were set up as dorm restrooms, Fairbanks said.

“They were all completely renovated and brought up to code,” Fairbanks said. “We had to open up walls and get into the plumbing, [and] every time the contractor opened up the

wall, there was a beam in the way or a pipe wasn’t where it was supposed to be.”

He said it was not “necessarily unexpected,” but it was “not planned for.”

The total renovation cost is spread out through a number of the O’Connor Hall building projects, Hamel said.

The commonwealth provided 2.4 million dollars toward the heating and ventilation of the building, according to Hamel. Rent revenues paid for part of the building’s elevator project, as well as 2.5 million dollars for general enhancements to the building, access projects and restrooms.

College operations paid for the other part of the elevator project, which cost nearly a million dollars, and $200,000 was taken out of college funds to pay for furniture and equipment, he added.

Hamel said one of the goals of the move was to help “consolidate” departments that had offices scattered throughout campus.

“A good example is education,” Hamel said. “[It] had been in three different buildings, and this was used as an opportunity to put them together.”

Susan Dargan, dean of the social and behavioral sciences and interim dean of education, said another major objective of the move was making sure full-time and tenured faculty were given their own offices.

Dargan said the education department was spread out in Crocker, Dwight and Hemenway halls. Other departments were also having problems, she explained.

“We’ve had a lot of growth in the past 10 years,” Dargan said. Due to the increase in FSU faculty, the world languages, sociology and political science departments were crammed for space, Dargan explained.

In O’Connor Hall, each department has its own dedicated space and full-time faculty members have their own individual offices, Dargan said. Part-time professors share o8ce spaces.

Education Professor James Cressey said his transition to O’Connor Hall has been smooth.

Cressey said it was hard for students to get to his old office in Hemenway Hall, as it was near an

observation booth and located near furniture. His new office on the first floor of O’Connor Hall is much easier for students to find, he said.

“The biggest advantage for the education department is that we are all now together,” Cressey said. “It’s better for us, and it’s better for students who might want to see one or more professors.”

Although he’s happy with the move overall, Cressey said one of the disadvantages of the hall is its smell.

“It does have a dorm room smell,” said Cressey, who described it as a “little funky.”

Sociology Professor Patricia Sànchez-Connally said, “I am grateful to finally have my own office.”

Sànchez-Connally originally shared an office space on the third floor of Crocker Hall with three other people.

She said she is now able to meet with her students right in her office, instead of having to set up meetings in other areas of campus.

Like Cressey, she said she also appreciates having her whole department on one \oor.

She does, however, see some disadvantages to her new workspace.

“I’m still trying to get comfortable in the new space,” she said. “The place sure looks, feels and smells like a residence hall.”

Dominique Kerins, an adjunct professor in the philosophy department, said she initially had some trouble moving, as her originally planned office space was turned into a storage facility space in the middle of the summer without her knowledge.

“In fact, I was told that my newly assigned office space had not yet been decided by the department,” she said. Kerins speculated she hadn’t been assigned a new office because she was an adjunct instructor.

“When I visited my office in July, I soon realized that my belongings had been uprooted and relocated without my knowledge,” she said.

Kerins was later able to retrieve her supplies with the help of her department chair and the facilities crew, she said. They were placed in a spare room on the third floor of O’Connor Hall, according to Kerins.

Aside from that initial move and since she was assigned her new shared office space, Kerins said her transition has been smooth.

“I picked my choice of the ... three available desks, knowing that [ve people were expected to eventually occupy the space,” she said. “The room was repainted. It was clean and close to the ladies’ room, which is important to me as a pregnant woman!”

Christopher Gregory, associate dean of academic a4airs, who moved to the [rst \oor with the Advising Center during phase one, said he is excited about being close to First Year Programs, and the Office for Inclusive Excellence, both of which are on the same hallway as Gregory.

“One great advantage for us all is being in a hall filled with faculty. We interact with them formally and informally, sharing ideas along the way,” he said.

When he first learned about the O’Connor Hall renovation project, sophomore and former O’Connor Hall resident Josh Rumple said he was a little bothered.

“I was upset because O’Connor was a great place to live in. It was a comfortable place with large doubles and air conditioning, which we all know is an incredible commodity in college,” he said.

He does believe that overall, the renovation was a smart move by the University.

“With the addition of West Hall, I think it was an intelligent decision to renovate O’Connor,” he said. “The fact that where I lived will now be someone’s office is entertaining to me.”

Junior Karl Bryan, a former resident assistant in O’Connor Hall said, “Many people, especially freshmen, don’t know about Crocker Hall, and even when you try to explain its location people still are confused. O’Connor Hall is a great building location-wise, so having a central building where there are offices is really good.”

Sophomore Sarah Ellis said she was “honestly sad” to hear about the repurposing, as she found O’Connor Hall to be “homey.

“I think I just liked how quiet it was,” she said.

Sophomore Katie Francendese said she wished the administration had been clearer in explaining the renovation, as she failed to understand the rationale behind the conversion of O’Connor Hall.

“I just didn’t understand why they needed to switch buildings,” she said. “I’m almost never in Crocker, so I don’t know personally what’s wrong with it. If they sent out a blast email saying, ‘Hey, this is what we are doing, and when we are doing it, and why...’ It would have made more sense to me.”

Sophomore Alyssa Figueiredo, an elementary education major with a coordinate in psychology, said one major advantage of the O’Connor Hall move for her is “having the ability get what I need done in one building without having to run from building to building!”

Junior Cameron Grieves, a former O’Connor Hall resident, who now lives in Larned Hall, said, “I like Larned better as a dorm, so I hope O’Connor finds a better life as an admin building.”