TODAY at Minnesota State Mankato is published in May, August and January and mailed to 90,000 alumni and friends. The mission of TODAY is to entertain, inform and connect readers to campus.
Photo by Ken Bush
West end of the new Julia A. Sears Residence Hall.
As Cindy Janney leads a tour of Minnesota State University, Mankato’s new Julia A. Sears Residence Hall, she points out details most people wouldn’t think twice about. Things like the floor-to-ceiling bulletin board material flanking the doors to each room in rich, warm colors.
Janney, the director of Residential Life, says the material is more than just a durable wall choice — it’s a way for students to take ownership of their space, to present who they are to the rest of the community and feel they truly belong at Minnesota State Mankato.
“We could have just left the regular wall and let students put up Dry Erase Boards,” she says. “But this really encourages them to tell others who they are.”
Janney doesn’t mention many of the amenities that would catch the eye of anyone who lived in a dorm back in the day, surviving heat waves without air conditioning and hitting their heads when they sat up in lofted beds. The air temperature in Julia Sears Hall is constant and comfortable, and the ceilings are high.
But such features are a given here. Every detail has been thought out and planned exclusively for the benefit of student life in Julia Sears Hall. And that’s what makes the building more than just “the new dorm.” This is the residence hall that breaks the mold of double-loaded, double-room corridors with endless hallways and no-privacy bathrooms.
This is the residence hall designed to give students new opportunities to belong, to be involved, to be connected and to be successful.
Julia Sears Hall is located west of the Centennial Student Union on the former rugby field overlooking the Minnesota River Valley. Built in Kasota stone and red brick with floor-to-ceiling glass curtain walls, the four-story, 608-bed building looks distinctively modern, yet it blends with the landscape and nearby buildings as if it’s always been a part of campus.
Like the other residence halls — Crawford, McElroy and Gage — Julia Sears Hall is named after a former university leader. Julia A. Sears served as Mankato State Normal School principal from 1872-1873 and is celebrated as the first female leader of a coeducational higher educational institution in the country.
As the first new residence hall at Minnesota State Mankato in more than 40 years, Julia Sears Hall is the University’s fourth residential community, increasing the capacity for on-campus living to 3,500.
Minnesota State Mankato doesn’t require first-year students to live on campus, but Janney says 85 percent choose to do so — a number she’s proud to report, but she doesn’t take it for granted, especially because none of the Residential Life department budget comes from tuition or tax dollars.
Janney’s department is funded by room and board fees paid by students living on campus. The $25 million price tag of the hall was borrowed through Revenue Fund bonds and is repaid by those same room and board fees.
The hall, which is considered a "sustainable structure" by the State of Minnesota, is the first of two phases to effectively replace Gage Towers, which will be razed. Now in operation for one full school year, Julia Sears Hall is part of an ongoing housing plan that calls for transitioning from old to new, which includes the remodeling of Crawford and McElroy.
“College can transform anyone’s life, but the support first-year students get from residential living is critical,” Janney says. “Students need a lot of connections and social support so they can be academically successful, and housing design helps shape that.”
Janney says the simple-but-important design elements that encourage belonging — like the bulletin boards outside of student rooms — translate to greater academic success. And those two things, a sense of belonging and academic success, have a cumulative effect. Research shows that students who live on campus are more likely to get better grades, more likely to graduate in four years, make friends more quickly, manage time more effectively, become more involved in campus life and leadership experiences and, after graduation, tend to become greater supporters of Minnesota State Mankato.
“If you think of residence halls as just housing, the impact of a building like Julia Sears Hall isn’t readily evident,” Janney says. “But we have an entire structure designed around helping students get what they need to be successful, to help them belong and to help them get connected all while paying attention to their physical and psychological safety.”
Janney points to a shelf filled with thick binders containing years of student surveys, research and first-hand student feedback that helped shape both the physical space as well as the ideas behind the design of the hall.
Topping student wish lists over the years: more privacy, more space, more flexibility, temperature controls and more convenience.
No surprises. But when students were asked to name the number one thing impacting their satisfaction of living on campus, the answers had less to do with tangible amenities like air conditioning, and everything to do with simply having opportunities to interact with other students.
“That data told me that we needed to design a facility that would help students interact with each other, even when there aren’t activities to help that happen,” Janney says.
From there, architects set out to create a building that would include specific student-requested amenities while providing the kinds of opportunities that come with cooperative living — opportunities to practice conflict resolution, meet new people and work on relationships and interpersonal communications.
“It all starts with a student, their roommate and the space they share. A building emerges out of that,” Janney says. “We started with the students’ desires and their needs — which aren’t necessarily the same thing.”
J. Eric Moss, AIA, LEED AP, an architect with the firm Ayers/Saint/Gross in Baltimore said knowing students ultimately wanted a place that provided a mix of social opportunities, designers created a building he described as having “cascading scales of communities.”
“The design was done so students could see themselves first as part of their room, then their suite, their floor, their side of the building, their residence hall and their university,” Moss says. “It’s all very purposeful.”
Even the “the communicating stairs” (and yes, almost everyone calls them “the communicating stairs”), were designed to encourage community and participation. The open, four-story, light-filled staircase essentially funnels students from both the North and South wings and all floors of Julia Sears Hall to a wide, centrally located staircase complete with spacious landings.
And similar to the bulletin board material, which means more than it seems on the surface, the stairs aren’t just a means to get up or down a level without having to wait for the elevator. Rather, the stairs are one way the building encourages students to meet and make connections. It’s a space for chance encounters, and a place that welcomes “coming and going” conversations. In fact, the stairs have been so popular with students and staff that they’ve often been a designated meeting place and a site for planned activities.
Moss, whose firm works with campuses across the country, says that while students will ultimately choose a university based on academics, its housing does come into play. On average, he says, students spend about 80 percent of their time where they live, making the need for quality non-academic buildings critical.
“What we’re talking about is a work-life balance for a new generation,” Moss says. “It’s a quality of life issue. And in the end we were able to create a building that is uniquely suited to the mission and the students of Minnesota State Mankato.”
What works about the design is that none of the “purposeful” elements feel forced, but rather Julia Sears Hall simply offers a menu of subtle opportunities for the various interactions students say they want, and staff know they need.
As for the rooms themselves, designers and residential life staff knew semi-suites were the way to go — student feedback was loud and clear on that. Gone were double-loaded corridors with double rooms and a common bathroom down the hall. Also gone: things like closet doors and keyboard trays. Open spaces and laptops have replaced those.
Each semi-suite has two bedrooms with 10-foot ceilings, and large windows overlooking the campus mall or the Minnesota River Valley. Bedrooms have individually controlled air conditioning and heating, tile floors and sound-resistant walls, loftable beds, dressers and desks with lockable drawers, upholstered office chairs that convert to gaming chairs, closets, plentiful electrical outlets and Internet, telephone and cable TV jacks. A compartmentalized, private bathroom for use by the suite’s four residents connects the two bedrooms.
Those features aside, the rooms still feel similar to those of a classic dorm room. Most rooms still sleep two, although some single rooms are available. All floors have lounges, common kitchens and laundry areas.
Janney says by having a compartmentalized bathroom, usually with a shower, a private toilet and sinks in each bedroom, all four “suite-mates” can use a fixture with some reasonable amount of privacy. She says sinks in each room help reduce conflict because only two people are negotiating use of the space.
Ann Voda, AIA, LEED AP a principle with the design firm Bentz/Thompson/Reitow in Minneapolis, says the suite layout provides an important balance: most students still have a roommate, but the design allows for some level of privacy.
She also acknowledges that yes, many generations of students have survived living in residence halls with fewer amenities and managed to graduate and “be just fine.” But she says that now more than ever, there’s a greater understanding of how good design can support academic success and personal growth.
“While amenities don’t make a student, they can definitely help take worry and discomfort off their plate, which helps them become more successful,” Voda says.
Janney knows how it goes at Minnesota State Mankato: traditionally, many students spend their first year on campus, and move off campus their sophomore year so they can have their own room and more privacy.
But student surveys revealed a bit of a twist on that. If semi-suites like those in Julia Sears Hall were an option, more students said they would remain on campus beyond their first year.
With this information, combined with the research that showed students performed better academically the longer they remained on campus, Janney set out to make sure Julia Sears Hall not only created more on-campus living choices for all students, but would also help boost the number of upperclass students remaining on campus.
So far, it’s working. In its first year of operation, Julia Sears Hall housed 60 percent upperclass students and 40 percent first-year students. Across campus, more than 750 returning students chose to live on campus last year, up significantly from an average of about 500. The bulk of them chose Julia Sears Hall.
Ryan Amato, a senior marketing and international business major from Pine Island, Minnesota, was one of those. He lived on campus his first year, but decided to give off-campus living a try as a sophomore. Last year, he moved back to campus and into Julia Sears Hall.
“I knew coming back to campus that my grades would be better,” Amato says. “And, here, there’s always someone you can go to. Off campus you’re entirely on your own.”
Amato, who saw his grade point average jump quickly after moving back on campus, says Julia Sears Hall is an ideal place for those who want to transition back to campus, or those looking for a smoother transition to living off campus.
“You get a taste of what it’s like being more independent, like having to clean your own bathroom, all while having to adjust to living with more people,” Amato says. “Living in Sears seems like home.”
Because the building was designed with upperclass students in mind, activities and programming target a more mature group of students, but still include traditional activities like floor socials, carnivals and other special events.
Johannes Anderson is one of two graduate hall directors for Julia Sears Hall. He says planned activities are geared toward preparing students for the future by giving them more social and leadership opportunities along with “real life” experience.
“We work with basic things students can take with them in life like taxes, budgeting, credit cards and making healthy choices,” Anderson says. “We’re also helping students think more about academics, majors, careers and graduation.”
Anderson, who moved to Sears Hall from Pullman, Washington to pursue his master’s degree, says the design of the building — the “ripple effect of communities” — as well as the two acres of landscaped green space outside the hall creates an ideal living and learning environment.
“Students feel part of multiple communities,” Anderson says. “They get to know their roommate and their suite mates and the connections ripple out from there.”
And Janney says it’s the experience and skills students build in those multiple communities that help students become good citizens.
“When an on-campus building can attract more students to live on campus, which we know helps students stay in college and get better grades, then it’s reasonable to believe that living in a residence hall helps students become more successful,” Janney says. “And that’s the golden ring — that’s what we’re after.”
