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BY CLAUDIA SEIXAS

In print | March 8, 2007

Construction has begun on David Kemp Hall, a 29,000 square foot dormitory with an environmentally sustainable design consisting of single and double rooms, including bi-level lofts. David Kemp hall will be inaugurated as Alice Paul’s companion residence hall in the fall of 2008, housing 75 students of various class years.

David Kemp Hall will be situated between Mertz and Alice Paul. The latter will share a newly landscaped courtyard with the new “New Dorm.” The dorm’s initial construction costs have been shouldered by Giles K. Kemp ’72 and Barbara Guss Kemp, who pledged $10 million to the Meaning of Swarthmore Campaign in May 2006, $7 million of which was earmarked for completion of the “New Dorm” project.

Kemp’s gift to the college is the largest single pledge to support the project. Dan West, Vice President of Alumni, Development, and Public Relations said that construction of the new residence hall is being heavily subsidized by Kemp’s generosity. “I’m so grateful to Gil Kemp for doing this. It’s very characteristic of all of his giving,” West said.

Kemp opted to name the building after his grandfather David Kemp, whom he credits as the inspiration for his career, success and philanthropy. “It’s a lovely thing for him to do,” West said of the gesture.

Vice President of Facilities and Management Stu Hain said that the preliminary phase of construction is well underway. “In this first month we’ll protect the site and set up the trailers,” Hain said. After the site is certified by an outside inspection, workers will begin to install the foundation, although construction at the ground level and above will not begin until students leave campus at the end of the spring semester. “We won’t start building anything until everyone goes home [for the summer]. By the fall we’ll be up two or three stories and by winter break, it’ll look like a complete building,” Hain said.

While Alice Paul and David Kemp Halls were conceived as a pair of buildings to be built simultaneously, the actual construction of David Kemp had to be delayed. West said, “We originally planned to build twice as many beds [as Alice Paul now has], but we didn’t have the funds, so we proceeded to build the first phase and deferred the second phase until we could raise more money to complete the campaign,” Hain said.

The new building is slated for completion in April 2008. “It should take about 13 months to build,” Hain said. Swarthmore is still actively seeking a total of about $6.8 million in donations to sustain an endowment for the construction and general maintenance of David Kemp Hall. W.S. Cumby & Sons, the company that managed the construction of Alice Paul, was also contracted to oversee the construction of David Kemp Hall.

Architects at William Rawn Associates have incorporated sustainable materials and technology into the design of the building, similar to their work with Alice Paul Hall, which boasts energy-saving strategies like natural day-lighting, a vegetative “green” roof, low flow water saving fixtures, high efficiency glazing, low levels of indoor air pollution and VOCs (volatile organic compounds) as well as a 92% rate of construction waste recycling.

“Alice Paul and [David Kemp Hall] were designed together to meet the LEED certificate standards for a ‘green’ building in 2002,” Hain said. Although the standards to which buildings must adhere in order to attain Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification as a green building are continually evolving, the architects have not revised the building plan since its original conception in 2002, according to Hain. While Alice Paul’s green roof is not currently open to students, Hain said that Facilities hopes to install a similar green roof on David Kemp Hall that students will be able to access.

The 75 dorm rooms that will compose David Kemp are intended to improve and update on-campus housing for students. “We’re doing this not because we plan to increase enrollment of the college, but because we need to provide more and better living conditions for our students,” West said. The housing crunch was particularly pronounced this year, as the Housing Office scrambled to accommodate the unusually high number of students opting to live on-campus, including those who chose not to study abroad this spring. Lounges, computer spaces and study areas were converted into dorm rooms, and more people were assigned to certain rooms than these spaces were originally intended to accommodate.

Housing Coordinator Liz Derickson ’01 said that the addition of 75 new rooms will help to alleviate these problems. "We plan for the spaces in David Kemp Hall to allow us to use Mary Lyon basement as overflow housing, to decommission the Lodges as student housing because of structural deterioration and to convert some triples and doubles into doubles and singles, including Parrish fourth triples and small Pittenger and Palmer doubles.

“We know that the Lodges are a particularly beloved housing option for students, and look forward to more conversations with students about this aspect of long-range housing planning,” Derickson said of the possibility of reinstating the Lodges pending future renovations.

The construction will inevitably create disruptions in the day-to-day routines of many students, particularly residents of Alice Paul and Mertz, the two dorms adjacent to the building site. According to Hain, “There certainly will be some noise and dust. And the back-up alarms for the construction vehicles sound a lot like alarm clocks.” The construction team is aware of the impact of their work on students, and they plan to make a conscious effort to minimize these negative effects.

Senior Project Manager Mike Boyd said, “We’ve incorporated all the important dates for students, such as the finals period, into their construction schedule in order to be sensitive to the needs of the students.” Also, a bulk of the construction will be completed over the summer to minimize disruptions.

Derickson said that Housing will be working closely with students, RAs and the construction team in order to minimize the impact on residents in Alice Paul and Mertz. “We plan [to] give residents weekly updates on upcoming activities and respond to students’ individual and collective concerns. We plan to have a meeting with residents of both dorms shortly after spring break, and are eager to respond to any questions that students have before that time,” Derickson said.

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