Kendall Hazel | Assistant News Co-Editor
In a Student Senate meeting earlier this year, Vice President and Dean of Students Dale Scully brought up repurposing The Underground, according to one of BVU’s student senators, Nic Gibson. Following the re-emergence of Underground proposals, Gibson and several other senators formed a committee.
The Underground has been a student hangout on Buena Vista University’s campus for many years. The main purpose of the Underground has been to serve the students of BVU as a social hotspot for students to hang out, socialize, and have fun.
Despite its purpose on campus, The Underground is seen as under-utilized by members of BVU’s Student Senate. In the past, ideas for remodeling or changing the purpose of The Underground have surfaced but have never come to fruition.
Along with Gibson, the committee is composed of Morgan Langan (committee head), Katelyn Brinkerhoff, Elisabeth Niebuhr, Ashley Lemke, Sarah Mackey, and Samantha Hirschman.
The committee’s purpose is simple, according to Nic Gibson.
“We got together to brainstorm a couple ideas to come up with an idea for the space,” Gibson said.
To come up with some ideas, the committee put it upon other BVU students to help come up with ideas by asking questions through the Student Senate election process.
“One of the things we did was use the at-large elections where we elect different students to senate… We put on an extra question for The Underground. We gave the students who voted the possibility for students to fill in, ‘What do you think The Underground should be used for?’” Gibson said.
In recent years, the Underground has played host to several Student Activities Board events and more recently, it has been the site for Anime Gaming Society meetings. These events and meetings have been a large part of the Underground’s services, but the committee feels the space can be used more effectively.
The committee came up with a few ideas for The Underground. Some of the ideas called for major changes like making the space into an on-campus bar or making it the new site for the late-night grill.
Other changes proposed included making the space more technologically savvy with new gaming systems and a projector. The final idea was to simply have no change, according to Gibson.
The results from the Student Senate at-large elections showed a preference for the food service idea, moving the late-night grill to The Underground.
“When we talked with Ken Allen [Sodexo Manager at BVU], he sounded really excited about possibly moving the late-night grill over there [The Underground] because it is a more centralized area… It would allow them [Sodexo] to close down the entire servery area to make sure nobody is down there messing with anything,” Gibson added.
There are still several steps involved in the process, but Gibson feels that change could be good for BVU. Gibson has worked in The Underground since his freshmen year and has actually been the manager since the spring of his sophomore year.
“After working with it [The Underground] and kind of realizing what would cost the least amount, really I feel like the one that would be the best for the space is the Sodexo route. I think, ultimately, going the food route will bring people down there. Even if it is for just ten to fifteen minutes, it is better than nobody going down there for the four hours it is open,” Gibson said.
Changes to The Underground are still in the early stages of a full-on proposal. Once a proposal is made, it needs to be approved by Student Senate, Student Affairs, Faculty Senate, and finally President’s Council.
Photo by Stephanie Steiner
