First Day of Class at UL: ‘It’s a great time to be a Cajun’

Nicholas Persac, Daily Advertiser, Aug. 20, 2012

The University of Louisiana at Lafayette’s fall semester is under way. Thousands of students are returning to the campus today as classes resume.

The Ragin’ Cajun football team is looking for another standout season, and the campus is bustling with development.

"It’s a great time to be a Cajun," Bill Crist, UL’s facility management director, said during a phone interview Friday. "The fall is always extremely hectic, and it’s exciting because of that. There’s so much going on on campus."

The freshmen, class of 2016, gathered Sunday at the Cajundome to celebrate the start of collegiate careers during the annual new-student convocation. Those students will be able to join an array of student organizations during "Get on Board Day" Wednesday and will cheer on the football team during the "Ragin’ Roar Pep Rally" Aug. 30.

UL’s freshman enrollment this summer was 60 percent greater than the school’s freshman enrollment one summer earlier.

Summer enrollment for freshmen increased drastically because many students wanted to enroll at UL

before tougher admission standards took effect at the beginning of this fall semester.

Another reason for the student body to be excited: The U.S. Department of Education’s College Affordability and Transparency List released in June named the school the most affordable university in Louisiana and found it is "among the top 10 percent of most affordable four-year public universities in the United States," according to a UL news release.

Crist, a 1980 architecture graduate from the university, has worked at the school for more than 20 years. When Crist was a student, he lived on campus in McCullough and Voorhies halls as well as in married student housing.

Those living quarters, he said, were far less appealing than the apartment-style residence halls that have opened in waves.

"Our housing was so substandard in the past, and to create a living and learning atmosphere like we’ve been able to do is an exciting thing," Crist said. "These are facilities I’d be proud to have my kids live in to go to school."

The 2010 UL Housing Project cost $80 million and is "95 percent done," Crist said. Details include:

» The Taft Street site, which includes Baker and Huger Hall and Olivier Tower. Baker, a 460-bed, apartment-style dorm, and Olivier Tower, a six-story parking garage, opened at the start of last year’s fall semester. Huger Hall, another new dormitory, opened before the start of the spring semester.

» The Rose Garden Site included Corona, Bonin, Alumni, Harris and Buchanan halls. Corona and Bonin halls, each 120,000 square feet, will house about 460 students for the first time this fall.

UL’s student union is also getting a major facelift.

Crist said construction on the union’s renovations will begin in September, and officials expect the project to be completed by fall 2014.

Crist said most of the student services provided in the union have been moved to nearby buildings, several of which will be either demolished or renovated once the new union opens.

Students began paying a self-assessed fee to fund the union’s improvements in 2002, and have paid $75 each semester since 2005 to fund the construction.

Crist said the university collected about $13 million in student fees and about $5 million in rent from food services in the union, and then borrowed another $22 million to fund the $40 million project, which will add nearly 50,000 square feet to the building.

Steven Oubre, an architect with Architects Southwest, is working with the university to create a master plan that will guide the school’s growth. He said that plan is finished, and he’s working to put together a final budget analysis.

Oubre said he will spend the next eight weeks soliciting interest from various developers who could help make the far-reaching improvements in the plan a reality. He will also meet with student government leaders in the coming days to present the completed plans.

"This are really beginning to move forward," Oubre said. "It’s really exciting and starting to come together."