A home away from home
By Amy Geiszler-Jones
 The university is planning to convert the former Alpha Tau Omega fraternity house at 17th and Hillside, vacant since fall 1996, into an international student center. In recent months, work on the exterior was started. About $1 million in donations will be needed to renovate the interior of the 1925 building, which was donated to the university in fall 1998 by Fran Jabara. |
Efforts are under way to convert the vacant Alpha Tao Omega fraternity house on the southeast corner of 17th and Hillside into an international student center, according to John Koppenhaver, executive director of international education.
In recent months, work on the exterior, including roof and concrete repair, was started with some existing university funds.
About $1 million in donations will be needed to renovate the interior of the 1925 building. "President Beggs is raising the funds to completely renovate it," Koppenhaver says.
Programs related to international education, including the Intensive English Language Center, are currently housed in the IELC building on the southwest corner of 17th and Hillside, and Fiske and Henrion halls.
On Aug. 1, WSU will take back possession of the building that housed a credit union directly north of the IELC building.
"The intent is to then make these three buildings into an international education complex, with the international education center in the old ATO house." says Koppenhaver.
The former credit union and the IELC building, now housing international admissions and intensive English, would house intensive English-related activities.
The former ATO house would become home to administrative and service areas. Such services would include a lounge, computer labs for e-mailing family and friends back home, areas for satellite reception of foreign news broadcasts and meeting rooms for international student organizations.
"We’d like to make this a sort of home for international students to meet, a place to receive them when they first arrive, to provide for their personal as well as visa/immigration needs while they are at Wichita State, and a place they can remember with pride once they graduate and move on from our community," Koppenhaver says.
The timeline for realizing such plans will depend on fund-raising efforts, he says.
"We have to find the right donor or donors interested in providing this kind of support for our international students and the international community in Wichita."
