The Welcome Center, University Advising Center and Registrar Office are all due to be moved by next summer, according to Marlin Collingwood, vice president of enrollment management and marketing.
The Registrar Office, currently on the ninth floor of Thayer Hall, will be moved to the first floor in the space previously occupied by the Graduate Admissions office.
The move is scheduled to be finished by the start of the Spring 2025 Semester. It is currently unknown what will fill the space left after the Registrar Office is gone.
Collingwood said the University Advising Center will also be moved from the fifth floor of West Penn to the first floor of Thayer to create a “help center.”
The two offices will be moved to be closer to the Financial Aid office.
“We’re calling it a one-stop shop,” Collingwood said. “The idea was, how do we take our existing space and make it more student friendly? How do we take the existing infrastructure we have and make it more conducive to students getting done what they need done?”
Collingwood added that by moving the offices in closer proximity to one another he hopes it will streamline the paperwork process for both staff and students.
The Online Education building will also receive several renovations.
The Welcome Center, which currently sits to the left of Conestoga Hall’s lobby, will be moved into the Online Education building. There are not yet any plans to fill the space it leaves.
The dance studio that currently sits on the first floor of the building will be replaced with the new Welcome Center in the Spring Semester next year.
Jacquelin Welch, a sophomore dance student with a concentration in Ballet has enjoyed using the new studio space.
“Overall, it’s a very nice space and it’s great to have another studio,” Welch said. “The floor is definitely pretty hard. It’s also a long space which is nice but it’s narrow so we can get a bit cramped.”
“Because of increased enrollment, the School of Dance needed additional space,” said Chris Hill, vice president of operations for Physical Plant. “The funding for the space came from an operational account we have to build needs. Whether it’s an office or a dance studio or classrooms.”
The new studio was at one point the Office of International Enrollment. Over the summer it served as Picklesburgh’s command center.
“It has been a vacant space, so we thought it could give us an opportunity for a dance studio,” Hill said. “Eventually it will be a welcome center so the dance studio will go away.”
The Undergraduate Admissions office will also be moved into the second floor of the Online Education building. Graduate Admissions made the move last July.
The Office of Alumni Engagement and Giving and the Office of International Student Services and Enrollment currently sit in the building as well.
Collingwood said he hopes this change will simplify the process of tours.
The university did not provide a cost estimate for the renovations.
“It’s a tough time in higher education right now,” said Collingwood, “and so I think we have to do things that set us apart from other folks.”
