Wichita State University awards $10m contract for Student-Athlete Success Centre

Wichita State University (WSU) has approved a US$10 million contract to build their state-of-the-art Student-Athlete Success Centre and renovate parts of 10,000-seat basketball arena, located on its Kansas campus.

Local construction firm Hutton were successful and are expected to break ground in June. They will be working closely with architect GLMV to perfect the design.

Hutton was one of six contractors that presented proposals for the project in March. It will be the first construction job for Hutton on the WSU campus.

The main component of the development, the construction of the new athlete’s centre, will consist of a 36,000 sq foot, two-storey building devoted to the academic and athletic development of students in WSU’s sports programmes.

The department looking after the academic success of student-athletes say they have “outgrown” the current facility in the Downing Learning Centre.

“When this facility opened 14 years ago, we thought we had died and gone to heaven,” WSU Athletes manager, Gretchen Torline, told Wichita State University Foundation.

“But we have outgrown it, both in terms of the higher number of students we serve and the expanded services we offer them.”

The new facility will offer more opportunity to better support students juggling athletic performance and academic achievement.

The new Success Centre will have eight private study rooms – five more than in the current centre. The Study Hall will be much larger, about 2,500 sq feet compared to 1,600 in the current space, and the new computer lab will also be larger with more workstations.

Torline believes the new facility is nothing less than what the hardworking students deserve.

“Between going to school and being an athlete, that’s a full-time job with lots of overtime,” she says.

“We ask a lot from our student-athletes, and we should do what we can to make sure things go smoothly for them.”