Berkshire Community College is preparing for $32 million in upgrades to its Pittsfield campus, including building renovations, a turf athletic field and resurfaced parking lots and driveways.By the time spring break rolls around in mid-March, renovation work at Berkshire Community College is expected to start. The major piece is the campus’s two main academic buildings, Hawthorne and Melville Halls. President Ellen Kennedy says it will be the first major investment in the spaces since they were built in 1972.
“There’ll be all new technology, better seating, better boards to work with and better lighting,” Kennedy said. “We’ll be a LEED-certified Silver we hope when all this is done. There’ll be more natural light in the space. It’ll be a better vibe in the buildings. They’re a little bit tired right now. Although they’re warm, very useful and highly used, this will give them a different feel and different ways for our faculty to teach our students.”
Also on tap: accessibility upgrades to the entrances and new elevators. Kennedy says movement throughout campus for some of the college’s 3,000 students and 330 full and part-time faculty and staff will be dramatically changed.
“Normally you’d go outside to go between the two buildings,” Kennedy explained. “Now there’ll be a wonderful connector that will connect them with a lobby. You can travel within the buildings completely. You won’t need to go outside. You’ll even be able to do that downstairs. Even now, when you are going in and out of classrooms, you go in and out of the building. We’ll be putting some back corridors in to allow people to stay right in the building when they get in.”
Kennedy adds the college also plans to further enclose its outdoor staircases and walkways to protect from the weather. State money is covering most of the upgrades to Hawthorne and Melville. Meanwhile, the BCC Foundation is funding the centralization of new faculty spaces in the Field Administration Center.
“We are creating adjunct office space,” Kennedy said. “So right now the adjuncts share – there might be five desks and 20 people are sharing these pretty small spaces. So what we tried to do is create a space that would work better with their needs – provide some private offices, new furniture, new seating, new everything, but in one space. So students would know where they could find their faculty.”
Areas you can both see and feel need an upgrade are the campus roadways and parking lots.
“We’re very excited about the investment in the roadways, driveways and walkways,” she said. “They’ll really change the feel and the look of the campus. Those parking lots are 44 years-old and actually they’ve held up much better than you might expect. I know we have some bad spots, but when you think about how many parking lots are original to over 40 years later.”
Across the street from the academic and administrative buildings, BCC is planning to install a roughly $2 million athletic turf field in the spot of its current lighted grass field. The community-driven idea was brought to BCC leadership and by working with the city of Pittsfield and the area’s legislative delegation has secured $200,000 from the city and $1.1 million from the state. State Senator Ben Downing says it will be an asset for area schools and the community at large, especially during fall playoff rounds or when hosting tournaments.
“Instead of those districts having to go out and try to fundraise for the various amenities around that we thought it made a lot more sense to include funding for one centrally-based field for all of the school districts to be able use instead of having to travel far and wide when they’ve won and earned the right to host a game,” said Downing.
Kennedy says most of the renovation work is expected to be completed by the start of the fall 2016 semester. She added BCC is also in the process of updating its master plan.
