New Building to Improve Educational Experience on Motlow’s Smyrna Campus

By Anthony Czelusniak

Motlow Buzz Staff Writer

SMYRNA, Tenn. – The new 80,000-square-foot building will provide Motlow’s Smyrna campus with new classrooms, offices and more to improve the educational experience available from Motlow State Community College.

 On Friday (March 23), the groundbreaking ceremony for the new building will make history. The building is expected to take 18 months to complete and will be ready for the 2019 fall semester.

The third building will include a new library, student lounge, bookstore and administrative offices. When it is completed, the current bookstore will become the all-new Media Center. The Tutoring Center will move from the Student Success Center in the Mary Lou Apple Building to a renovated space within the Arthur L. Walker Jr. Building as well.

The brand-new classrooms will provide more space for the expected record increases in student population. According to the enrollment fact book provided by Motlow, student enrollment in the 2016 fall semester was 5,144 throughout all the campuses, a growth rate of 11.1 percent from the previous year. The Smyrna campus accounted for nearly half of that population and growth.

Because of this population increase, educators are struggling to find appropriate rooms for their classes. For example, Professor John Hart teaches multiple literature classes in computer labs.

“As much as we love the second building, we have outgrown it,” Hart said, sharing what the new building will mean to him and his students. “We look forward to having more classes, offices and places for students to study and socialize.”

A new student lounge will bring the possibility of an outside food vendor to set up inside the building. This possible addition will be great for students and staff who do not want to travel, or do not have the ability to travel to the restaurants on nearby Sam Ridley Parkway.

The new building will also bring with it possibilities that haven’t been thought of yet. With more than 80,000 square feet on three floors, there will be a lot of room for growth within Motlow’s Smyrna campus.

Eventually, the campus will have five state-of-the-art buildings surrounding acres of beautiful green space.