PEMBROKE — Sunshine fell on university officials Thursday as they broke ground on a School of Business and promised a bright future for business education at The University of North Carolina at Pembroke.
The building, located between Dial Humanities and Sampson Hall and facing Prospect Road, has been a dream at UNCP for many years, and $36 million from multiple sources made it a reality.
This building will be “pretty spectacular,” said Barry O’Brien, dean of the School of Business and a 1976 UNCP graduate. The building is expected to be completed by spring 2021.
A team of business faculty members visited other new university business buildings to help architects craft the final product. It will have a 300-seat auditorium, food court, career services center, an interactive market trading room, video conference room, computer lab, collaborative study spaces and a room for events capable of holding 150 people.
Chancellor Robin Cummings thanked the people who made it possible, including state Sen. Danny Britt, Jim and Sally Thomas, Mary Ann Elliot, Mary Upchurch and the Golden LEAF Foundation.
“Thank you all for believing,” Cummings said. “This will be a modern learning environment that is worthy of our world- class faculty.
“These are exciting times at UNCP,” Cummings said, noting construction on both sides of the groundbreaking.
Kellie Blue, a 1993 UNCP business graduate and a member of the UNC Board of Governors, said, “Today, I am so proud of my alma mater.
“As county manager, I have seen that UNCP’s School of Business is a mighty engine driving the economic development of our region,” Blue said. “This new building is the future of our county and region.”
Don Metzger, Lumberton businessman and UNCP’s Board of Trustees chairman, agreed with Blue. Metzger was one of many contributors to the building.
“This is where the future lies for Southeastern North Carolina,” Metzger said. “The future has come to fruition at this groundbreaking.”
The future is coming fast to UNCP’s School of Business, O’Brien said. In three years, undergraduate and graduate enrollment in business programs has risen from 800 to 1,400, with enrollment in the Master of Business Administration program quadrupling.
O’Brien said the $29 million that the state has invested in the building will produce “a rate of return that is almost immeasurable.”
State taxpayers approved $23 million for UNCP in the Connect NC bond referendum, and Sen. Britt was able to add $6 million more through special legislation.
Jim and Sally Thomas contributed $7 million. Jim Thomas, a Pembroke native and Los Angles developer of office properties, is a longtime UNCP supporter. A scholarship, an auditorium in Old Main and the Entrepreneurship Hub bear his name.
Chancellor Cummings thanked the Thomas family for their “unwavering support.”
“Jim Thomas is the man that the Los Angeles Times said built the Los Angeles skyline, but I believe his greatest legacy is right here in your hometown,” Cummings said.
Business students also are excited about the future at UNCP’s School of Business.
Third-year Accounting major Sarah Knepper is a transfer student from Fayetteville Technical Community College and a veteran who served two tours in Iraq. She praised the university for being student-centered.
“It’s not easy transferring in the middle of your studies,” Knepper said. “A friend and active duty soldier was transferred to Fort Stewart in Georgia just a few classes short of graduation, but the business faculty worked it out so she could finish.”
Knepper will graduate before the new facility is ready for classes, but Alexandria Rickard, a freshman from Monroe, will finish her studies there.
“I am very, very excited about this building,” Rickard said. “The infrastructure makes a huge difference.”
Rickard came to UNCP in the first wave of recruits lured by $500 per semester tuition in a program called NC Promise. The freshman said it was critical in her decision to come to UNCP.
NC Promise added 700 students to UNCP’s enrollment and more are expected next fall. New apartments are currently under construction and more are on the drawing board.
Design plans for the School of Business were completed by architectural firms SfL+a, and GLAVE and Holmes. Metcon Construction Company, of Pembroke, is the general contractor.
