Archive for ‘Ceremony’

If the initial student reaction to Abilene Christian University’s newest building could be summed up in two words, they would be: “Cool!” and “Wow!”

Beginning with Chapel and culminating with a massive community lunch that spread over the campus mall, the grand opening Friday of the Royce and Pam Money Student Recreation and Wellness Center ended years of waiting for students, faculty and staff and began a new era focused on whole wellness for the student body.

The 116,000-square-foot renovation and expansion of the Gibson Health and P.E. Center features a bouldering wall, eighth-mile jogging track, leisure pool featuring a lazy river, wet classroom, two large exercise classrooms, a large dividable classroom with demonstration kitchen, new basketball court, cardio floor and suite of offices for the Medical and Counseling Care Center.

A visual look at the grand opening follows the jump.

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The Royce and Pam Money Student Recreation and Wellness Center officially was dedicated Saturday, with members of the Abilene Christian University Board of Trustees and Alumni Advisory Board touring the facility and recognizing the major donors who contributed a significant portion of the building’s $21 million cost.

Board members and donors stood in the Bullock and Anthony Lobby while the facility’s student workers watched from the balconies overhead as Phil Boone, vice president of Advancement, thanked those who played a role in funding and constructing the Money Center.

The grand opening is scheduled for 11 a.m. Friday.

More photos of the dedication ceremony after the jump.

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Dates have been set: The Royce and Pam Money Student Recreation and Wellness Center will be open to Abilene Christian University students on Sept. 2, the first Friday of classes for the fall semester.

Here’s what the summer looks like heading toward that momentous event:

• Principal construction and city inspections end with granting ACU certificate of occupancy: Aug. 17
• Technogym begins installing and setting up exercise equipment: Aug. 17
• Policy and facilities training for student workers: Aug. 24-26
• Grand opening ceremonies for Board of Trustees and major donors: Aug. 27
• Technogym training for student workers: Aug. 29-30
• Grand opening for students: Sept. 2
• RecFest: Sept. 2-3

More details on both grand openings and the subsequent RecFest will be coming soon.

Above is a video of this month’s topping-out ceremony for the Royce and Pam Money Student Recreation and Wellness Center at Abilene Christian University. If you’re having trouble seeing this video, you can watch it here.

You’d be hard-pressed to find many relics of Viking heritage in West Texas, but for the next few days, one sits atop the newest building at Abilene Christian University.

In a ceremony born from ancient Scandinavians’ love for evergreen trees and carried through the generations to America by the immigrant ironworkers who helped build New York’s tallest skyscrapers, ACU and its contractor celebrated Friday the installation of the top-most piece of steel on a sprawling new wellness center.

“Mark this date,” said Dr. Jean-Noel Thompson, vice president and dean of Student Life. “Feb. 18, 2011, is one to remember. Today marks an important milestone in the life of the Royce and Pam Money Student Recreation and Wellness Center.”

Crews lifted the tree into place using the massive crane that has dominated the Abilene skyline for months — and which has captivated campus residents as it has lifted beam after beam of steel into place on the $21 million facility — as members of the ACU community, ranging from students to members of the Board of Trustees, applauded during what is known in the construction industry as a “topping-out” ceremony.

The topping-out beam itself was visible from the parking lot in front of the construction site, its purple hue standing out from its neighbors at the top of the structure’s east face. The beam spent nearly a week on the campus mall earlier this month, allowing hundreds of students, faculty and staff to sign their names before crews hoisted it to its place 35 feet above what will soon be a new leisure pool in the facility. The signatures, however, will soon be invisible; the beam is set to be covered with fireproofing material and buried within the walls of the wellness center, which is scheduled to open in late August or early September.

Phil Boone, vice president of Advancement, introduces four members of ACU's Board of Trustees, all of them among the lead donors to to the wellness center (l to r): Dale Brown, Billy Busch, Rick Wessell and April Anthony. Dr. Jean-Noel Thompson, vice president and dean of Student Life, and Students' Association president Samuel Palomares look on.

The brief ceremony also recognized some of the facility’s lead donors to date: April Anthony, Dale Brown, Billy Bush and Rick Wessell, members of the Board of Trustees who collectively have given more than $8 million to the project.

“We’re inching closer to going over the $15 million mark” in funds raised for the facility, said Phil Boone, vice president of Advancement. “Our next topping out ceremony will come when we go over full funding.”

The 113,000-square-foot expansion of the Gibson Health and Physical Education Center has been enormously complex, said Brian Cook, vice president and Texas division manager for HOAR Construction, the contractor for the project. Cook cited as an example the pouring of a concrete base above the new pool at the top of the building, 35 feet above ground.

Thus far, crews have expended more than 100,000 man-hours in constructing the facility, Cook said.

“We have had no major incidents or injuries,” he said, “and that’s an amazing success so far.”

The evergreen tree — which Thompson said he sees as a symbol of “the life God gives us,” as well as the university’s mission to “nourish mind, body and soul” through the wellness center — ultimately will be planted on campus, leading Thompson to address ACU’s grounds crews.

“Do all you can to keep the tree alive,” he joked, “or it will kill my analogy.”

Photos by Gary Rhodes.

The topping out ceremony — the moment when the top-most beam in the Money Student Recreation and Wellness Center will be added to the steel skeleton that sprawls east of Moody Coliseum — will take place Friday.

The short ceremony will be emceed by Dr. Jean-Noel Thompson, vice president and dean of student life. Attendees are expected to include ACU’s president, Dr. Phil Schubert; members of the Board of Trustees, including the facility’s lead donors, April Anthony (no relation) and Dale Brown; and the facility’s namesake, chancellor and former president Dr. Royce Money with his wife, Pam.

Festivities are scheduled to begin at 11:40 a.m., giving interested students time to make their way from Chapel.

The highlight of the ceremony will be the placement of a ceremonial tree atop the beam, which was signed by ACU students, faculty and staff over several days last week. The tree eventually will be planted on campus. We’ll bring you photos from the ceremony shortly after its scheduled completion at noon Friday.

The beam early this afternoon. The underside had already been covered with the signatures of students, faculty and staff.

ACU’s students, faculty and staff had the rare opportunity Friday to make their mark — literally — on the new Royce and Pam Money Student Recreation and Wellness Center.

One perhaps little-known tradition for major construction projects is the “topping out” ceremony, the moment when the topmost piece of steel in a new facility is lifted into place. That day is coming soon, perhaps as early as next week, for the center.

Most ceremonies include placing a tree on top of the beam for a short while before planting it on the grounds of the new building. ACU plans to do that, as well, but added its own twist to the tradition this morning, when the steel beam was painted purple, brought onto campus, chained to a tree and left for students to sign however they saw fit.

Mark Lewis, assistant dean for Spiritual Life and Chapel programs, told students during Chapel that immediately afterward, they could immortalize their names, doodles, artwork, inspirational quotes or Scripture verses on the purple-painted steel.

Clint Coulter, junior exercise and sports science major from Celina, and his fiancée, Briana Sastre, junior psychology major from Carrollton, were the first students to sign the beam.

The immortalization will be mostly symbolic. As Physical Resources Director Scot Colley noted shortly before students swarmed the steel, it will be coated with gray fireproofing material, then placed at the very top of the structure and covered with drywall, brick and other materials. That knowledge didn’t stop Colley himself and several of his colleagues, including this blogger, from signing their names before Chapel ended.

Clint Coulter, junior exercise and sports science major from Celina, and his fiancée, Briana Sastre, junior psychology major from Carrollton, were the first students to discover the surprisingly unassuming piece of steel as it lay chained to a tree in the mall between Moody Coliseum and the GATA Fountain. Fittingly, Coulter will work in the center once it opens in the fall.

Within seconds, dozens of students were swarming the steel, and less than two hours later, signatures covered all eight surfaces of the I-beam, many of them simple names, but also social club braggadocio, messages to friends, even a duck.

Students — a trickle now, rather than a flood — continue to stop and add their names, append comments to others’ and continue a sort of campus conversation, one soon to be preserved for decades to come.

ACU's chancellor and the new facility's namesake, Dr. Royce Money, signs the beam.

It wasn't long before students made their permanent mark on the new facility.