After nearly two years of waiting, UCA’s geography department is on the cusp of moving back into their own space in Burdick Hall.
According to Associate Vice President for Facilities Kevin Carter, Burdick Hall is a few weeks from completion.
Carter said the hall has received new “mechanical and electrical systems, new paint, flooring, lighting, bathrooms and furniture.”
“We also upgraded the fire sprinkler system and added new [Americans with Disabilities Act] accessibility features,” Carter said.
Geography Department chair Dr. Stephen O’Connell said “this is an opportunity to put us back on the map, both figuratively and literally.
“It’s an opportunity for our program to absorb some of the spaces prior to the fire,” O’Connell said. “This is an opportunity to reimagine those spaces.”
In May of 2022, an electric fire forced UCA geography out of Burdick Hall – scattering faculty, students and classes across Lewis Science Center.
O’Connell said the timeline for Burdick Hall was ever-evolving with deadlines being pushed farther and farther back with every new update.
“We’re geographers and one of the things we do in geography is understand the importance of place,” O’Connell said. “Why identification with place really matters. We were turned into refugees for an unknown period of time.”
Despite the “refugee” status, O’Connell said the timing of fire – during Spring exams – made the transition to Lewis smoother.
“We rarely teach a lot of in-person classes during the summer,” O’Connell said. “We didn’t need spaces for the summer.”
Since there were no lab spaces in Burdick, the geography department had also previously used labs in Lewis and the Conway Corp Center for Sciences for research.
But as the opening of Burdick Hall grows nearer, O’Connell said the geography department is “really excited” about moving into the new facility.
O’Connell said the fire presented an opportunity for the department to “create a foundation going forward” with an improved Burdick.
“We’re going to have to grow into them, but we have spaces that are designated as lab spaces,” O’Connell said. “We’ve got lab cabinetry and furniture and equipment that will help set us on a trajectory to use those spaces in a way we hadn’t been able to before.”
Outside of work from the university and faculty members, O’Connell said geography students have played a crucial role in both the immediate aftermath of the fire and recovery process thereafter.
“We had a couple of students who really were family in the department,” O’Connell said. “They came out, helped us move stuff. It was an all hands on deck event.”
O’Connell said only a handful of students who had taken classes at Burdick Hall before the fire remain in the program.
“They are really excited to see the things that were changed and how we are going to reimagine those spaces,” O’Connell said.
The geography department does not plan on fully using Burdick Hall until January, but they do plan slowly moving back in over the course of the fall semester.
O’Connell said geography students, including those graduating in December, are “looking forward to the opportunity to put their imprint on [Burdick] as the first group of students to actually use the space.”
For the department moving forward, the greatest opportunity is the reimagining and improvement of its Geography Information Systems.
“This was an opportunity to reimagine it and look for opportunities to establish connections to local industry and the GIS world at large,” O’Connell said.
O’Connell said most geography students work within the ever-changing field of computer mapping and the new space would be a chance to “put our best foot forward and meet the future needs of our students.”
With the department’s UCA centennial coming up in 2027, O’Connell said a new Burdick Hall represents the first part of that celebration.
“Moving back, reestablishing what geography means to the campus and Central Arkansas as a region – this is an opportunity to really showcase that,” O’Connell said.
