Christian Brothers University has launched a capital campaign to grow the private university into a place for public gathering. The Midtown school recently announced the most ambitious raise in its 144-year tenure as Faith in Progress: The Campaign for Advancing Education. The $70 million campaign promises to add two new buildings and increase program offerings and endowment.
The capstone of these improvements is a $14 million Student and Community Life Center which will be open to the CBU students and alumni as well as the Midtown community. The three-story building designed by
ANF Architects will feature a comprehensive wellness suite with mental health services, a clinic and spiritual wellness offerings. CBU has not yet announced who is partnering to provide these services.
"We're really wanting to open the doors and bring the community on our campus," said Wendy Sumner-Winter, Senior Director of External Affairs and Donor Relations.
CBU's various student services will be centralized in the new Central Avenue-facing location providing a home for student government offices, a coffee shop and performance area, an expanded dining hall, study spaces, administrative offices and more.
Sumner-Winter added that the Student and Community Life Center's dedicated event space will fill a community need. "We really are aware that there are few places in Memphis where community activites can happen, even from a facilities point of view," she said. "We plan on increasing our marketing of CBU as a place to headquarter events."
The new building will also create a new office and position dedicated to connecting CBU students with volunteer opportunities. "We'll be able to increase our capacity to serve the community from a people standpoint," she added.
$30 million of the raised capital will go toward CBU's community outreach programs. Among those benefitting include summer camps for School of Business students and a STEMM Co-LaB partnership endowment with Christian Brothers High School to encourage further collaborative STEM education.
$30 million of the campaign has already been raised through individuals, and the university will next turn to local foundations to contribute to the remaining $40 million over the next four years.
"So much of the investment and initiatives are about this area, the young people in the area, retention of people after they graduate. So it's going to be of greatest interest to the foundations in the Memphis area," Sumner-Winter said.
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