New student center is sanctuary for commuting students

Ryan Fitzgerald Arizona Daily Wildcat Communications junior Eunice Roberts gets off-campus housing information from Program Director Ann Wolnick yesterday at the Commuter Student Affairs Center on the third floor of the Memorial Student Union. The center allows students to check e-mail, receive free tutoring and participate in activities put on by the center and the University Activities Board.

The Commuter Student Affairs Center on the third floor of the Memorial Student Union is designed to give students who live off campus a place where they can relax, study, check their e-mail or get campus information. Most importantly, the center gives them a place to build a community, said Ann Wolnick, program director for the Department of Student Programs.

"We very much want to create a welcome atmos-phere and support center," Wolnick said. "The best part about a commuter center is when somebody recognizes your face and gives you a smile."

The center's mission, she said, is to give commuter students a stronger campus connection and make information about university events and resources as readily obtainable to them as it is to students who can find it in their dorms or Greek houses.

"Students that don't live in residence halls or are not Greek-affiliated perceive that those groups get some kind of privilege or advantage that they don't," Wolnick said. "I simply believe that's not true."

The center, which has taken over the recently renovated Student Union Rotunda Gallery as a lounge and study space, held its open house yesterday, where students snacked on cookies before surfing the World Wide Web on two new Pentium computers. Two more terminals will arrive soon, Wolnick said.

About 30 students were nestled into the center's newly re-upholstered chairs yesterday afternoon. Some slept; others gazed at the bustling UA Mall through large windows or read books at individual study corrals that encircle the Rotunda Gallery's balcony.

By the beginning of October, the center will have seating for about 75 people and feature a board where students can find information about everything from advising to art exhibits, Wolnick said.

"A commuter student can come up here and find out what they want to know without running around all over campus," she said. "There's so much to take advantage of, but you get to be a senior before you figure it out."

Student Programs retired its cramped New-Traditional Student Center to form the new venue, which is more spacious, accessible and visible, Wolnick said. The Student Union worked with her to renovate the Rotunda Gallery and purchase the computers as part of a summer project that also included renovating The Cellar, a basement venue for bands, comedians and other activities.

Carmon Greene, a pre-physiology transfer student starting her first semester at the UA, said the computers are convenient and easy to use.

"It is really convenient because you don't have to go to the library and wait in a really long line," said Greene, who was getting information from her Communication 100 class's Web site yesterday.

Wolnick said she expects to hire a commuter student affairs coordinator within two weeks. That also is when free tutoring will become available several hours each week, and the University Learning Center is making plans for group tutoring at the new site, she said.

The new coordinator and a panel of commuter students will devise programs and activities - like gathering students to see a concert together or holding events in conjunction with Homecoming - and offer them in conjunction with the University Activities Board, Wolnick said. She said she hopes such activities - and the center itself - will foster a stronger community environment for off-campus students.

The center has an annual programming budget of about $16,000 that comes from annual Off-Campus Housing Guide revenues as well as the Student Union's beverage contract with Pepsico Inc.

"I could give you a whole list (of activities), but I want students to tell me how to spend the money," Wolnick said. "One of our number one goals was to make sure the student is the center of everything we do. This brings us one step closer to it."