Treanor Student Life

While 80% of American college students make it through freshman year, only 55% on average complete a degree after six years. As college students spend nearly three-quarters of their day in their living environments, designing an environment that sets students up for success now extends far beyond the classroom – to the residence.

“Every piece of national data there is shows that the residential environment is a critical factor in academic success and achievement,” says Julie Weber, Director of Housing and Residential Life at New Mexico State University. Students who live on campus are more likely to graduate within four years ...

Foster Academic Success “Students study in different ways,” notes Treanor Architects’ Nadia Zhiri. “An ideal floor plan balances opportunities for individual and group study.”

By Julie Williams Lawless

Learning, particularly for college students, is not limited to the knowledge acquired from a book or class. It is a social action where acquiring social skills is as important as acquiring study skills. Providing an environment to facilitate active learning and development of social skills creates a depth of understanding that passive observation cannot replicate (Stimpson 1994).

An estimated 80% of college students persist through the first year of study, yet only 55% on average will ultimately complete a degree after six years (Brandon, Hirt and Cameron 2008). The persistence needed to complete a degree may ...

Click the link for results of Treanor Architects’ Survey on Student Life Facility Trends.

Treanor's Nadia Zhiri and Joseph Stramberg along with Susan Grant from North Carolina State will present this informative session at this year's ACUHO-I Conference in New Orleans. Send your new and mid-level professionals to interest session 5 on July 11 at 2:30pm.

Learning Objectives:
1. …learn the basics of residence hall/ building design, construction, building systems & delivery.
2. …understand building maintenance, operations and material choices.
3. …identify ways the residential environment can contribute to student success.

You may have mad conflict resolution skills…but do you know where your fuse box is? What room types best support ...

What to Watch in 2011-2012

Treanor Architects is conducting this brief survey to investigate the trends today’s campuses are responding to in the programming, design and construction of their student life facilities. This should take less than 5 minutes and we would greatly appreciate your valuable insight and perspective.

Please complete this survey before July 15, 2011. You will receive a copy of the survey results once they are tabulated.

Providing four walls and a bed is no longer sufficient, but pie-in-the-sky aside, what is the reality on your campus?

Click the link below to take the survey.

When planning a new student life space, whether residence hall, dining hall or living learning space, starting with a few rules of thumb can put you on the road to success.

Establish a clear process. Outline your process ahead of time and be sure that you include adequate time and means to involve all stakeholders, including your students. “In some cases, the space requirements, programming or intention of the project has changed because of student influence and input,” says Nadia Zhiri, principal at Treanor Architects. “Sometimes students can surprise you.”

Conduct a cultural assessment. What are the goals and objectives ...

Millennial generation students grew up in smaller families than most of their predecessors. They live and breathe technology that evolves daily. They come to campus with expectations about the place they’ll be calling “home.”

So what do students value in a residence hall? How does where they live impact their well being? Those were questions undertaken by students in Bill Carswell’s fifth year architecture studio at the University of Kansas, sponsored by Treanor Architects.

Working with several real campuses, the students were charged with designing ...

Sunset Steps. Design by Jennifer Tierney, KU Architecture Student.

BUILD Student Community. Design by Brent Forget, KU Architecture Student.

In April 2010, Treanor Architects surveyed college and university chief administrators, financial officers, facilities professionals, student housing officers, and student affairs representatives on topics relating to student life facility challenges. The results are in! Click the above pdf to download. Thank you to all participants for taking time to provide this information.

It’s a question that comes up on most campuses. How do we create a modern, sustainable living environment within the confines of the spaces we currently have available?
Whether your student life facilities date back to 1960 or 1890, transforming them into high-performance buildings – ones that meet student expectations, accommodate desired programming, consume less energy, employ green design elements and are cost-effective to build and operate — isn’t a pipe dream. Successful renovation projects on a number of campuses are proving that, with the right approach, it can be done. Here’s how:

On many campuses, the answer is yes. But a careful evaluation of your facilities means weighing a number of competing factors. Consider the following questions before green-lighting a demolition:

Programming. Is the building design truly capable of serving the desired programming and occupancy, now and into the future? Once it’s renovated, will your new building be flexible enough to be redesigned to meet new program needs 40 or 50 years down the road?

Structure. Is this building structurally sound enough to last? Are there significant structural or space limitations? If you can’t save the building, can you salvage ...