Clay Hall to close in May for renovations

Clay Hall residents will have to find an alternative place to drop their suitcases in the fall.Clay Hall will close when classes end in May because the university is remodeling the dormitory.

The hall will reopen in August 2008, according to Kenna Middleton, the university housing director.

The hall will receive several renovations, include removable furniture, and new flooring and windows.

"New windows are the best thing since sliced bread," Middleton said. "New windows changes what you can hear, the outside noise. It changes your capability to maintain temperatures."

The dorm will also be given heating, ventilation and air conditioning upgrades, and kitchens will be placed on every floor.

Some kitchens will be solely for cooking, and others will have an extra space for dining, Middleton said.

The lobby will be refigured, and some handicap rooms and bathrooms will be added, but the room structure will remain the same.

In other words, there will be no suites.

And the laundry rooms will get a high-tech makeover.

A new laundry room, which will be placed on the sixth floor, will have a "surfing bar" where students can plug in their laptops and get an Internet connection while they wait for their clothes to dry.

But the infrastructure is not the only part of the building that will change.

The "guts" of Clay Hall will also be renovated, Middleton said.

"We can go in and make it the Taj Mahal," Middleton said, "but if your sinks overflows, all you do is ruin nice stuff."

Major work will be done on the plumbing. The dormitory will get new plumbing lines and the showers will be redone, Middleton said.

The electrical capacity will also be upgraded so students can plug in their hair dryer, laptop and CD player at the same time.

The changes will make students more comfortable and some changes, like the new windows, will be environmentally savvy, Middleton said.

Still, there are some consequences to closing a residence hall for a year.

The main issue students have to deal with is deciding where they want to live next academic year, Middleton said.

Clay Hall currently houses about 270 students and those students will get first dibs on where they will stay next semester, Middleton said.

Laura Kincaid, a sophomore recreation major and Clay Hall resident, said she is looking into living in either McGregor or Burnam hall.

"I heard McGregor was really nice," Kincaid said. "I lived in Burnam and the room I lived in was really big and they have suites."

To accommodate the former Clay Hall residents, Commonwealth Hall, which is currently a male dormitory, will become coed starting the fall semester, Middleton said.

Commonwealth Hall will be "spruced up" for the females' arrival, but it will not receive any special changes.

Those students who live in Clay and want to return will be the first to choose their rooms when the hall reopens next August.

And, when Middleton met with Clay Hall residents this week, several expressed interest in returning.

"When I'm sitting with a group of students who, a year from now, will have the capability to live off campus and they are wanting to come back," Middleton said, "I think that tells us that as we move forward with renovation plans, we are doing the right thing."

Reach Jenna at jenna_mink6@eku.edu