After years of discussion, plans for the revamped use of Lerner Hall’s sixth floor were announced this afternoon in an e-mail from the outgoing Columbia College Student Council and Engineering Student Council presidents, Michelle Diamond, CC ’08, and Liz Strauss, SEAS ’08.

The project would move administrative offices from the fourth floor to the sixth floor of Lerner—a space that is relatively unused—thereby making space for a centralized Center for Student Advising on the fourth floor. This will, according to Diamond and Strauss, both improve advising and free up more on-campus space for student use.

Centralizing advising, Strauss said, means that “no matter what you’re dealing with, this will be your first stop, and they [advisers] will have connections to all the other advising systems.”
Diamond added that students will be able to talk to many different advisers without leaving the building, and that advisers will be able to communicate and collaborate more easily with one another. Strauss added that it will allow faculty to “better develop resources in a way that really benefits everyone.”

The initiative will also open up more dormitory space, some of which is currently used to house advising and other administrative offices, making it available for student use—an important change for many campus groups. In their e-mail, Strauss and Diamond wrote that the initiative aims to “alleviate some of the difficulties students have in organizing meetings and events.”

“This is going to create so much student space,” Diamond said. “The sixth floor was never going to become free student space, so this plan is the best way to create more space in other parts of Lerner and in the dorms.”

Strauss lauded the behavior of the University, which will retain control over the use of the new space despite continued CCSC and ESC involvement. “I think there really is a dedication from the administration to student space,” Strauss said.

Diamond estimated that it would be another year until the new Center for Student Advising is complete.

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