SMSU begins $1.5 million Morris Center renovation

Plans include new classrooms and seminar rooms, a larger welcoming area, a distance-learning lab, a new English language learning lab, additional office space and a student waiting area for the SMSU shuttle buses.

The $1.5 million renovation is being funded through a combination of money from the College of Continuing Education budget and funds from the sale of property donated by Jim D. Morris. The project will complement the second and third floors, which were renovated in previous years. Work is expected to be completed in May 2005.

The building is still known to many in Springfield as the old Bell Telephone building. It was built in 1912 to house the new switchboard for Bell Telephone.

The fourth and fifth floors weren’t added until 1948, when it was determined that more switchboard space was needed. At that time, the switchboard operation was one of the largest in the country, and the new addition brought the total available space to 60,000 square feet.

In 1988, the company, which had changed its name to Southwestern Bell, left the building, and it was donated to the university in 1990.

The renovations now under way on the first and fourth floors of the five-story building began in early September.

Nesbitt Construction Inc. is serving as contractor on the project, with Smith-Goth Engineers Inc. doing the engineering work. Neff Architects is the lead architect on the project. The Jim D. Morris Center for Continuing Education houses several SMSU programs, including the Computer Institute, the American Sign Language program, the English Language Institute, the Spanish for Healthcare Professionals program, Play Therapy, Camp Bear and several continuing education conferences and seminars.