Campus recreation facilities have evolved into hubs for student academic, social, and physical engagement. Institutions as diverse as the University of Alabama, Macalester College, the University of Wisconsin – River Falls, and DePauw University have taken very intentional approaches to designing their recreation facilities in ways that contribute to an improved quality of life for their campus communities.
This week, we interviewed George Brown, the executive director of recreation at the University of Alabama. In the podcast below, Brown discusses how his campus has utilized the trends of modern recreation facility design in an on-campus facility that will meet both current and future student needs — and how this effort will help his institution continue to take positive strides in enrolling and retaining students.
Podcast: An Interview with George Brown, University of Alabama
Key Questions to Ask Your Design Team
To ensure a recreation facility that meets student needs, George Brown recommends asking the following questions during the design process:
- Are you building a facility for multi-purpose student use, enabling seamless transitions from exercise studios, to cycling studios, to venues for lunch-and-learn sessions?
- Are you effectively capturing space to minimize down usage?
- Have you fully leveraged technology to enable interactivity for your student users?
