Girl + Computer = ?

As some aware NAU students might know, Northern Arizona University - my college, located in the town I grew up in -  is currently int he process of planning a revitalization project for its historic part of campus, simply called “North Campus.”

North Campus includes the buildings that were originally built when NAU first was constructed as a normal school, educating future teachers. The historic buildings on this side of campus are old, gorgeous, red-brick buildings from around the 1910’s through the 1930’s. Old Main, featured below, is the oldest standing building on campus, built in 1894. That is exceptionally old for this town.

This side of campus is gorgeous all year ‘round - nearly all promotional materials for campus are photographed here, campus tours always stop here, weddings happen here. This is a very cherished side of campus.

However, the make-up of the area surrounding North Campus has changed quite a bit in the last several years. A large student parking lot was on the edge of campus, neighboring North Campus, which brought a lot of student walking traffic through. A northern Student Union housed the Undergraduate Admissions office, as well as a dining hall called Timber Inn featuring THE best burgers on campus. The on-campus theatre held movie screenings many weekend during the year. The older dorms - while smaller and not as new - housed students all year long. North Campus used to be a livelier place, filled with students.

Now, so much has changed. That large, free parking lot has been turned into a regional conference center with a hotel and parking garage reserved for guests only. That dining hall turned into an expensive campus-owned restaurant that no longer serves those yummy burgers on the fly. Undergraduate Admissions is now located on the bottom floor of a freshman dorm. Construction on the movie theatre has made service dodgy at best. Only one dorm has students in it - and even then, only sometimes.

The type of people who actually go to North Campus now are staff members who work in the modified dorms, conference-goers with no tie to NAU, or the stray student or parent who needs to pay tuition or argue about a parking ticket. North Campus is not filled with students like it used to be.

Somehow, the solution is to spend nearly $100,000 to remove all the parking, replace it with grass, build 20-foot-wide pedways, and cut down some extremely gorgeous and historic trees - or so I am learning as I get involved with the discussion surrounding the North Campus Revitalization project, slated to begin in a few weeks.

The main problem with North Campus is not a missing welcoming feeling or a lack of  accessibility - from what I have seen at the meetings concerning this project, everyone on campus seems to love and cherish how North Campus looks and feels already. The main problem is the lack of services available to students in the first place.
There is no reason to go to North Campus if you are a student, no draw to hang out there. Improving the current pedway and adding more grass will not inspire students who live at least a 10 minute walk away to suddenly start spending more time on North Campus, even if it is supposedly “prettier.”

NAU bigwigs seem convinced that making campus prettier - building new buildings, remodeling dorm rooms, adding branded dining like Denny’s - will somehow make campus better and more appealing to prospects. David Bousquet, NAU’s senior VP for Enrollment Management & Student Affairs keeps saying all over the place that revamping campus will convince prospective students to attend this university. Sure, campus enrollment is up, but not for these shallow reasons.

What will truly encourage students to attend in the first place would be to offer good classes and programs - offering good services and a good community will get them to stay.
If I could transfer out of NAU, I would - and it has nothing to do with a lack of new buildings or grassy quads.
My Computer Science program just lost three professors. I found out recently that because of this, its likely that my program will lose its ABET accreditation. There’s no current plan to replace these professors - all long-term instructions - with other tenure-track faculty. This is a sign to me that my education is not valued by my university. What is up with that?

The fact that Enrollment Management & Student Affairs seems to believe that students like me are swayed so easily by shiny new construction and wider pedways offends me. It’s as if they’re pulling the wool over my eyes, trying to convince me that NAU is a high-quality university, when in fact its academics are suffering.
There are many other schools in this nation - including the other two universities in-state - that offer stellar programs, especially in my field. That’s what I concentrate on as a university student who is mindful of my degree and my future. I would gladly leave this university for another with a more dedicated program, even if NAU has more grass.