The Department of Philosophy occupies the entire top floor in the McIntosh Humanities Building. Here you will find the department office, seminar room, faculty offices, and the Agora student-faculty lounge. Space is at a premium on our campus and we have been unable to obtain more space, so renovations required rethinking the use of our current space to accomplish more.

In the fall of 2000, as the new department chair, I asked faculty to brainstorm with me for ideas on how to make better use of our existing space to meet department goals, including a seminar room, a reception area, private faculty offices, and better working conditions for the lecturers. I set about restructuring the department budget to find the funds for these projects and also found extra funds from other campus sources to make these renovations possible over the next two years. I am pleased to report below on the dramatic improvements in the working conditions and quality of life for everybody, accomplished in 2001 and 2002.

SEMINAR ROOM

Faculty had always dreamed of having our own seminar/meeting room, but thought it impossible because of the unavailability of additional space on campus.

This room (MHB-916) had previously been used as the department's  Xerox/storage room and then was used in fall 2000 as temporary office space for part-time lecturers. In spring 2001, the xerox machine was moved into the front office, old materials were sent to storage, and the lecturers were moved to newly renovated offices down the hall. 

With budget savings, we installed wall-to-wall carpeting, new paint, new blinds, and a new conference table and chairs picked out by the faculty themselves from catalogs I provided. A year later, at the request of faculty, I bought more chairs, and added whiteboards and a clock.

Today the seminar room is used for seminar classes, meetings, faculty colloquia, and student-faculty meetings.

LOUNGE AND RECEPTION AREA:

Previously, when visitors came to the department, there were no chairs for them to sit in while waiting! This room, adjacent to the front office, had been used for file cabinet storage, a coffee machine, and an ancient refrigerator, but had not a single chair either!

This is the result of brainstorming with faculty in 2000. We moved out the old storage units, painted, and bought new blinds. We moved in some lounge furniture and carts for our coffee machine and microwave.

I added a networked PC with laser printer for students to use. I also bought a new refrigerator and wall-mounted storage (out of view on the right).  Later, I had bulletin boards bolted to several walls for department publicity.

The Agora Lounge, as we call it,  is available for informal discussions among students, faculty, staff, and visitors.

FRONT OFFICE:
The front office (MHB-916) is home to our hard-working staff, Administrative Support Coordinator, Donna Reese, and the Student Office Assistant. In 2000, most of the space was taken up with two huge L-shaped wooden desks, leaving no room even for chairs for visitors!

We worked with a furniture designer for ideas on how to use modular furniture to make better use of the space and you see the results here. We also had the room completely repainted in off-white to brighten the space and make it more inviting, including walls, old wooden built-in cabinets, and mailboxes. The Xerox machine was moved into a corner to free up space for the seminar room (above). In 2002, I replaced the beat-up file cabinets with floor-to-ceiling cabinets and storage (on the left, out of view) matching the new desks.

SHARED LECTURER OFFICES:
With about 15-20 part-time lecturers each semester, space is at a premium.

In 2000, almost all full-time faculty shared their offices with from 1-3 lecturers, an unhappy situation for almost everybody. My goal was to provide private offices for the full-time faculty who wanted them, as well as better working conditions for the lecturers.

The office on the left (MHB-909) is the first of two shared lecturer offices which I renovated with department savings in 2001 and 2002. I asked the lecturers to brainstorm with me for ideas on what they wanted for the design of a shared space and they came up with the ideas you see here -- individual locking storage spaces (the file drawers on wheels under the counters); carpet to minimize the noise in a shared office; fresh paint and new blinds; whiteboards; a round table set apart with a room divider for working with students; and networked PCs, scanner, and laser printers.

By scheduling the lecturers on staggered days, I tried to avoid having more than two or three lecturers using a shared office at the same time, to give them more privacy.