“I believe [the plan] has very significant academic applications for all the campus and little, if any, demonstrated financial savings,” said Dianne Hoff, president of Faculty Senate. Hoff said other campuses, faculty members, administrators and students have all contacted her expressing their concerns about the plan.

The response to the chancellor’s restructuring plan outlines three problems the faculty has with the plan and four requirements the University of Maine System must adopt before UMaine’s faculty will support it. The faculty response states that the UMS charter “calls for ‘oversight’ of centralized functions,” but not that the system office should run these functions on campuses. In the opinion of the faculty, centralization does not save money.

The response’s third critique states, “[centralization] adds a level of bureaucracy that slows efficiency and adds costs,” and helps to turn away new students. The UMaine faculty is concerned that many aspects of the plan are “proceeding before substantive input can be sought.”

“There are a number of issues, as you can imagine,” Hoff said.

The four steps demanded by the response say the faculty will only support the chancellor’s plan after the individual missions and functions of each campus are reaffirmed and duplication across the system is avoided. The response demands the system office’s centralization efforts do not move services to the office, but to a campus suited for the task; that the system office eliminate the “one vote” per campus method of decision making and “dramatically downsize” the system office.

The response states “proposed steps, such as those to centralize services at the system office are unacceptable, fiscally unjustifiable and will be opposed.”

Hoff said she heard concerns that people were already being laid off because of the system office’s restructuring.

Student Government Rep. Nathaniel Wildes said links of communication between the administration and the students are missing.

“[There is] a lot of concern from students that there’s been really no connection between the student opinion or even letting students know about it,” Wildes said.

During the senate session, some professors expressed worry about the system office’s plans for UMaine.

“They have a very low opinion of FirstClass . that would be one of the first things to go,” Sen. James McClymer said.

FirstClass is among several services the UMaine Faculty Senate is concerned about being affected by centralization.

“We’re not necessarily concerned that some of the services can’t be centralized, but if they’re already on campuses, we should be centralizing them, not the system office,” Hoff said.

The response was passed unanimously.

Also during the meeting, a resolution was passed to write to local and state politicians to suggest creating a new federally-funded university system designed to be economically green.

“We have letters ready to go out to other land grants and to other politicians in the area and in our state who might be able to help move this forward with the current administration,” Hoff said. “By working together, we might really put the brainpower of the country into stopping some of our energy issues.”

The motion passed unanimously.

The Faculty Senate also approved a resolution to “reluctantly” recommend the elimination of the undergraduate information science engineering program.

“Just about everyone on the committee believes this is a valuable program . and also very valuable to the state of Maine and the country,” said Sen. James Warhola, director of the Program Creation Review and Reorganization Committee.

The degree has suffered from low enrollment during the last four years, partly because its department decided to wait until after it received dual accreditation to promote it among students.

“Let’s say some hypothetical case where the administration starved a program and then assessed it as failing to strive . I hope that a future Faculty Senate would be very good watchdogs,” Sen. Daniel Belknap said.

The motion passed with one abstention and none against. The UMaine administration now has final say over the program’s future.

The rest of the Faculty Senate’s agenda was dismissed on account of heavy snowfall.

On a night where little debate took place, senate voted on an act that changed the Employment Policies of Student Government. The act amended the previous policy so students employed must have a 2.0 GPA cumulatively and in the semester immediately prior to employment.

Sen. Nicholas DeHaas voiced his concern that this would hinder first-year students or those who have taken a semester off. Vice President of Financial Affairs Justin Labonte alleviated his concerns by explaining the senate would use the most recent GPA in the event an employee was away for a semester.

The resolution also included a provision that abolished appeals of GPA based dismissal by Student Government employees. The resolution stated there was no proper or justified appeals process to do so, and that the President’s Cabinet did not have the authority to conduct such a procedure.

Two monetary allocations were discussed, the first for $1,400 to go to the College Republicans for a trip to Washington, D.C. The resolution passed with little discussion, but Sen. Nate Wildes encouraged the actions of the senate.

“I hope Student Government continues on its track of funding club development activities, such as what the College Republicans are doing,” Wildes said. “It’s a great benefit to the members of the club, and a great benefit to the UMaine community.”

The meeting saw four nominees for the Fair Elections Practices Commission chair present themselves before the senate. In the end, Sky Landry was voted in. There were two nominees for president pro tempore, Sen. Christina Soyden and Sen. Ben Goodman. Soyden, who led the meeting last week in Vice President Ross Wolland’s absence, was voted to the position.

In addition to the allocation to the College Republicans, an allocation for $1,390 passed and was given to the UMaine Forensics Society. Another allocation by the Executive Budgetary Committee included $250 to the Nontraditional Students Association.

Let’s put this in a historical perspective. Every communication device, for the most part, was intended to help citizens become informed and engaged in their world. Each of these failed. The TV allows us to watch “True Life” and “Sex and the City;” films are now a vehicle for “Dumb and Dumber.” The Internet has – well, we have JuicyCampus.

The University of Maine has its own JuicyCampus page. I’d say ours leads the pack, as it has a “who is the best teacher?” thread … followed by three different threads, all with the same subject: “Sluts.”

It’s a revolting site, that’s for sure. It is like roadkill – really bloody, still crawling while its tail and hind legs are smushed to the ground by tire treads – you can’t not look. It’s disgusting and terrible. What’s worse is you’re probably on it, and your angry ex probably detailed the exact inflammations of your last three herpes outbreaks. But, JuicyCampus has its place.

Is this an issue of free speech? JuicyCampus thinks so. The “About us” section states that its mission is to enable “online anonymous free speech on college campuses.” It adds, “today it is a forum where college students discuss the topics that interest them most, and in the manner that they deem most appropriate.”

Is it libelous? Of course. People are listed by full name and campus with the juicy gossip attached. Unless every bit of information is true, which is tough to prove in the case of “douche bags,” it’s absolutely defamatory. I could not find one lawsuit against the site or any of its anonymous posters – though the site could be subpoenaed and forced to give the IP addresses of specific posters. The free speech argument is difficult or impossible to make when the speech is pure libel.

JuicyCampus is not the most useful outlet for desirable information. The information is undesirable. But if people think it is so terrible, and if they do not want the outlet to exist, why do they keep looking?

The real issue is common decency. As the mission states, “in the manner [students] deem most appropriate.” It’s easy to say that the site is unfair to its victims and encourages pure malice among peers. And of course, it is. The main tab says “gossip” – the purpose isn’t hidden. What it comes down to is, people should be acting like humans, and not bashing others to a bloody pulp … like roadkill.

Heather Steeves is news editor for The Maine Campus.

Report of a fight outside Androscoggin Hall brought officers to the front of the building at 10:25 p.m. on Jan. 25. A small crowd surrounded two intoxicated males who were yelling at each other. The officers separated the two and gave them disorderly conduct warnings. One lived off campus and was given a ride home by police. They told him if he returned, he would be arrested for trespassing.

Snow fight!

Officers responded to a report of a fight on Rangeley Road in front of the Public Safety Building at 1:58 a.m. on Jan. 25. Upon arrival, officers found several people wrestling and jumping in the snow bank. They were all friends. There was no apparent fight.

Runaway fighters

Police received a report of a fight in progress outside the Phi Eta Kappa fraternity at 10:59 p.m. on Jan. 23. Officers responded, but found no evidence of a fight.

Galling guest

Police responded to the fourth floor of Cumberland Hall to confront an intoxicated male who was yelling and trying to start fights at 12:52 a.m. on Jan. 24. The male was visiting a resident in the building. Police reunited him with his friend and allowed him to stay the night. Nevertheless, he was given a disorderly conduct warning and was warned that if he continued to disturb the residents, he would be arrested.

Lock it up!

Theft continues to be a problem at the Student Recreation Center. A student left a $110 dark blue Samsung Glyde cell phone in clothing in an unlocked locker from 4:30 to 6 p.m. on Jan. 26, and returned to find it missing.

At 7:45 p.m. on Jan. 25, a student returned from working out and his and found $30 and his LG Voyager cell phone had been taken from an unlocked locker. The cases are under investigation.

Gas in the Union

Police responded to a fire alarm at the Memorial Union at 6:13 a.m. on Jan. 26. An employee pulled the alarm after smelling propane in the building. Orono Fire Department conducted an air quality check and was unable to find anything unusual.

Well-done

An alarm activation in Patch Hall brought police to a first-floor apartment at 7:35 p.m. on Jan 25. Burnt food was the cause.

Pointless prank

A fire alarm was pulled on the fourth floor of Oxford Hall at 1:03 a.m. on Jan. 25. Public Safety and Orono Fire Department determined that there was no reason for the pull-station to be activated and labeled the act “malicious.” The case is under investigation.

Carsick

An officer patrolling Munson Road noticed several subjects gathered around a car parked on the south side of Beta Theta Pi fraternity at 12:10 a.m. on Jan. 25. The passenger-side door was open and a female sitting in the seat appeared to be falling out of the vehicle. The officer found the 19-year-old female to be intoxicated and incoherent. She was transported to the hospital for alcohol poisoning.

Stealing permits in the cold

A student reported a stolen resident parking decal at 2:57 p.m. on Jan. 24. The decal was taken from his unlocked vehicle parked in the Hilltop Lot sometime during the previous week. The case is under investigation.

McLemore comes to us all the way from San Diego, Cal., a place he accurately describes as “the polar opposite” of Maine.

“I always wanted to go to school on the East coast,” McLemore said. “I’m from the city in San Diego so I wanted something rural. All of a sudden Maine popped up and I thought, what better place?”

His logic may be hard to follow for someone who has had their pipes freeze one too many times in harsh Maine winters, but for him, it’s just a change of scenery: “You know, I border Mexico and Maine borders Canada,” McLemore said, “so I just thought it would be a great experience to come here for four years.”

This experience is lost on many potential students and student-athletes who wouldn’t consider coming to Maine for fear that they will be sent home for winter break on a Popsicle stick.

McLemore’s dismissiveness of the winter is refreshing to hear in a place where threats by friends and relatives pack up and move to Florida are as pervasive as the cold.

“It’s just something you get used to,” he said “As long as you have the right material – clothes, coats and boots, you’re good.” A smile crossed his face as he added, “but I did learn the hard way. I only had sneakers and shorts for the first month when I got here.”

That kind of get-up could make walking through the mall in a blizzard a veritable nightmare, but when he steps on the basketball court those sneakers are all he needs to pursue his dream.

McLemore’s basketball aspirations began when he was four years old and his father, his biggest basketball influence, put a ball into his hands. From there he climbed from one level of competition to another, until it became clear that basketball could be more than just a game for him.

“I first knew when I hit eighth grade and went into high school,” McLemore recalls. “I started playing varsity as a freshman and I realized that talents can take you further than just playing in the back yard … you can go play college ball and get a free education so I really honed in and focused up.”

His hard work rewarded him both on and off the court. His skills earned him national recognition by scouts and a leading role in Scripps Ranch High Schools first-ever Division II championship in his senior year.

“It was a great experience for me. My school was never known for basketball,” McLemore said. “I feel like I really grew as a person through that senior year.”

That growth has served him well so far while playing for the Black Bears.

McLemore came into a lineup that returned five guards-three of them starters-and added four more to the 2008-2009 recruiting class. The prospects of him having a major contribution in what seemed a less-than-ideal situation appeared slim, but those prospects soon changed. By the time tip-off came for UMaine’s first game, McLemore had already earned himself a spot in the starting lineup.

He responded by leading the team with 24 points in 30 minutes in a victory, exceeding all expectations – perhaps even his own.

“Our first game, I was just really surprised. I came out and scored 24 points, but I was like, what is going on here?” McLemore recalled. “The first game I was just totally shocked … but the games now I just go out and I’m playing with the guys.”

Whether that means effortlessly dropping in a three coming off a screen, locking down his defender, or finishing on a dazzling drive like the one that sent the game against UNH into overtime on Jan. 19, McLemore has made it clear that he has what it takes to succeed at the Division I level.

But success is not only measured on the court. McLemore knows that he has a chance to open a lot of doors for himself in the next four years and plans to open as many as he can.

“I haven’t signed a major yet,” McLemore said, “but my main goal is to get my degree and to keep improving myself. I’ve always liked sports medicine or sports psychology. I don’t have it quite narrowed down yet, but if I could play basketball overseas, that would be great. If not then something will come up.”

If his determination on the court is any indication, when something does come up Gerald McLemore will surely be ready. Whether that means continuing to play basketball or continuing his education, the enigmatic young man from Southern California will brush off defenders, just like he does winter in Maine.

Beta Theta Pi brother Joel Martin, along with 35 other Beta brothers, expressed his happiness for SAE.

“It’s great for them to be seen as a fraternity. I hope the brotherhood will grow and be stronger,” Martin Said

SAE President Tim Schriver spoke about the process of reinstatement and shared the story of the phoenix, which is told to pledging brothers. The process began through a series of meetings with Director of Campus Activities and Events Gustavo Burkett and Robert Dana, vice president of student affairs. Both brothers and alumni of the chapter were in communication with the dean’s office and compiled a document that was more than 100 pages long, which outlined the logistics of the chapter.

Dana commented on the potential SAE has for UMaine. He said Greek Life is a “commitment to somebody other than yourself,” and SAE is in a unique situation where recognizing and using this new potential can benefit itself and UMaine as a whole. He ended by stating that it is their commitment to “restore SAE to pre-eminence.”

Owen Foss, a brother of SAE, is enthusiastic about the recognition.

“When I joined, we were not a part of the Greek system. We were always unrecognized, but now it’s completely different,” he said.

Foss and his brothers have high hopes for philanthropic activities and other Greek Life events.

Former Student Body President Bill Pomerleau is the vice president of SAE and helped bring the fraternity back to recognition.

“The burden has been substantial but everyone has added something to it,” he said.

Burkett also commented on the reinstatement of SAE. “I’m happy to see them back,” he said. “We’ve been working for a few months, and it’s been a process.”

Pomerleau commented on the experience that brought them to the point of reinstallment, “At long last, after all the roads had been crossed, the bridges burned and rebuilt, we’re back. It’s good to be home.”

It was beer. I spat it out, repulsed and mad as hell.

A few years later, I either snuck or was graciously granted a sip of Sea Dog Blueberry Ale from a relative.

My immediate reaction was, “Wait, beer can be good?”

Beer, coffee and the opposite sex: I’m not sure how we go from hating these things as youngsters to writing columns about them as adults, but I concede that they’re each magnetizing forces from youth to maturity.

When Ben Franklin said, “Beer is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy,” he didn’t begin with “beer and wine and spirits” or simply “alcohol.” Beer is a culturally permeating force, and I’m going to take a stab at explaining why.

It’s the most accessible of alcoholic beverages. There is no way to classify who drinks Sam Adams or Budweiser, Guinness or Geary’s. For every college first-year drinking a Natty Ice on a Friday night, there’s a crazy uncle bringing a 30-rack to a family reunion. For every flannel-donning hipster chugging a PBR, there’s a tough-as-nails biker couple toasting two tallboys at a diner on Route 66. And for every old Englishman sipping a Samuel Smith Oatmeal Stout at a pub in Yorkshire, there’s an American 20-something trying to track down their first bottle.

And there’s still room for beer connoisseurs and elitists. There are multi-hundred dollar single bottles to scout out – see Sam Adams’ Utopias, the world’s most alcoholic beer, hovering around 25 percent alcohol by volume – or brews crafted in small batches just once a year.

Wine and spirits, on the other hand, leave a huge gap in the middle: The partiers pounding shots of cheap liquor and concocting shabby mixes with soda or Kool-Aid versus the classy types sipping scotch or tequila in a tumbler with a couple ice cubes. With wine, partiers – again – killing $8 bottles versus extravagant types buying $500 selections at dinner. Yes, I’ve seen one singular person, a college kid, sip liquor delicately, and I’ve met others who defy these stereotypes. Casual cocktail fans do exist, but the disparity between people getting sloshed and snobs nursing their astronomically-priced drinks is huge.

Not so with beer. There’s room for snobbery, but it doesn’t dominate. The person who plunks down $5 for a Dogfish Head at a bar can rib the $1 Bud drinker all they want, but the common denominator remains: They’re drinking beer.

All alcohol-imbued beverages have merit, but beer is the master. There’s a reason Abraham Lincoln said, “I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts, and beer.”

Smart fella.

Golden flax melodies weave through every track of “Merriweather.” “In The Flowers” opens the album with seeming hesitance, and almost-muffled vocals before it rips into courageous thumping beats while sustaining the richness of the opening. This flows quietly but expectedly into “My Girls,” which delivers the narrative of a father’s desire to be able to provide for his daughters, combining over-the-fields harmonic vocals with a growing, throbbing electronic backdrop.

At times, the Collective seems to return to some of its ethereal, noise-wash roots, but not necessarily to their benefit. Certain tracks fail to reach their peaks they seem to build toward, particularly “Daily Routine,” “Guys Eyes” and “Taste,” which causes the middle of the album to bottom out. However, as the album moves closer to its finish, the excitement builds again. “Lion In A Coma” opens with a didgeridoo pulse that permeates the song and propels it forward, stopping only to allow Tare’s pitch-perfect vocals to soar over the top. The complex sounds and driving vocals of “Lion” make it my favorite of the album, and the benign “No More Runnin’” is a tasteful, dreamy choice to follow it up. “Merriweather Post Pavilion” closes out with “Brother Sport,” a jaunty ride and a stunning combination of folk sensibilities, electronic thrust and the Collective’s standard noise ecstasy.

“Merriweather Post Pavilion” is not like the Collective’s previous work, and it is wrong to expect as much. However, it is also unlike just about anything you have probably heard before. While at times Animal Collective could have done more to keep the listener’s interest, this small setback does little to diminish the overwhelming sense of invention, musicality and positivity they convey with their new disc.

Overall, this is a wonderful, golden-hued album for the open-minded listener. Plus, the cover is an optical illusion that toys pleasantly with the mind. Grade: A-

“There’s one thing I haven’t done, but I’m dying to do,” Tavi says in his video application on YouTube. The camera pans from a computer screen to his face as he finishes the sentence with a boyish smile: “See the world.”

STA, the world’s largest student travel organization, according to their Web site, will hire two interns to document their daily travels with video, blogs, podcasts and music. Spanning the summer of 2009, the itinerary, available on worldtravelerintern.com, will take the interns across Europe, Asia, Eastern Africa and Australia.

Other applicants’ far-reaching travels intimidated Tavi at first. The sustainable agriculture junior has only ventured as far outside the U.S. as Quebec, Canada.

“I’ve had some great adventures without ever traveling far,” he says in his video. He lists experiences like spending a summer on an island doing seabird conservation, managing a student-run sustainable agriculture community farm called the Black Bear Food Guild, and whetting his appetite for global citizenry by being a resident assistant in Estabrooke Hall, largely occupied by international students.

The first stage of the application requires a video less than three minutes long and a written portion. A YouTube search for “STA World Traveler Intern 2009″ on Jan. 28 found 43 results.

The “Help Tavi become a 2009 World Travel Intern!” Facebook group has 215 members. His video has more than 900 views.

Tavi aimed for the video to show “not just who I am, but ‘this is my place, this is my culture,’ and trying to weave the two together,” he said in an interview. The clip integrates Tavi’s qualifications and lifestyle into a travel narrative format, with the bulk filmed on a visit to Presque Isle, detailing his first snowmobiling trip.

Tavi and his friend Ryan Lockhart, a UMaine graduate who also appears in the video, performed the video’s soundtrack together on guitar and violin.

“He’s got a real enthusiasm for trying to tell stories,” said Eric Gallandt, associate professor of weed ecology and management at UMaine. Gallandt first met Tavi in a course in the fall of 2007.

Gallandt called Tavi “a gregarious sort” and said he embodies “the local, rural Maine kid with an opportunity to go do some fantastic things.”

“He really puts everything he’s got into any topic he chooses to work on,” Gallandt said.

Gallandt’s favorite Tavi tale is when he dismissed a computer simulation for weed growth after Gallandt assigned it to his class.

“It was very funny how he immediately took this simple model and immediately just threw it away as such a gross oversimplification of the world,” Gallandt said. Tavi came back within a week with his own system – “the most complicated and involved set of boxes and arrows and loops” – and Gallandt could tell Tavi had spent night after night working on his model.

“He’s probably one of the most genuine people I’ve ever met,” said Lianne Lackey, a graduate student for higher education and one of Tavi’s former residents in Estabrooke Hall. “At first when I heard of Tavi I was like, ‘Who is this Tavi character?’”

Tavi, whose given name is David, grew up in Massachusetts with “a group of Davids,” he said. His family moved to Newburgh, Maine in 2000. A fiddler, he jammed with five Davids soon after moving. Yearning for something less popular, he discovered the name Tavi online, a Finnish variation of David, and adopted a title as unique as his character.

“He’s just open to anything and doesn’t worry about what other people think,” Lackey said, reciting a tale of the two wrestling in Estabrooke, where Lackey “kicked his butt.” Directly after, Tavi had no difficulty taking down a much larger opponent.

Student Stephanie Sosinski worked with Tavi on the Black Bear Food Guild and thought Tavi’s video was characteristic of him. She is confident in his chances at earning the position.

“Something I don’t find too often of people in general is the passion for whatever they’re doing,” Sosinski said.

For Tavi, the opportunity to communicate his adventure with photos and stories is one of the most exciting possibilities of the STA internship.

“The really important thing to me is that traveling is – it’s a way to learn both about yourself and about the world around you – taking the time to have the experiences that allow insight of any kind, whether it’s talking to a random stranger, whether it’s seeing something that lets you access a space of awe,” he said.

When asked what his biggest traveling dreams are, Tavi had a tough time whittling them down. Turkey, Israel and Patagonia are high on his list. Tavi is victim to seeing a gorgeous photo and being unable to rid the destination from his mind’s eye.

“There are pictures of places I’ve seen and they’ve really.” he drifts off for a moment before speaking of black limestone mountains rising starkly over fields of canola in Southeast Asia, ruminating as if he’s seen them in person.

Tavi has a reason for not exploring as much as he’d like. “I’ve got this really strong responsible streak; I almost bought a house last spring,” he said. He worries about cracking into his nest egg before leaving college. Tavi was unable to study abroad due to a demanding academic program, commitment juggling and a lack of time to investigate the available programs.

Tavi ventured west of the Appalachians for the first time on a recent five-day visit to California for an ecological farming conference. He enjoys allowing a journey to guide him, rather than controlling his explorations meticulously, and put this philosophy to the test on a “dry run” during his trip out west.

He also used his trip to delve into travel blogging, a crucial component of the STA position. Tavi’s blog – ramblingwejak.blogspot.com – allows readers to walk in his footsteps, facilitated by astute photography and animated writing.

The deadline for World Traveler applications is March 8. Twenty finalists will be selected on March 15. The top 10 will be asked to create a second video. Tavi shot footage during his California journey in hopes of using it to create his follow-up piece.

“You want a guy with the eyes of a pro photographer, a poet’s fondness for words, an unhealthy addiction for fresh air, who sees the world with new eyes every morning? I’m your man,” Tavi says in the video, deftly checking off each of the position’s qualifications.

“He’s so real and he doesn’t put up a front. You can’t help but like him,” Lackey said. Soon Tavi will know if STA feels the same way.

The renovation of Colvin Hall began in 1998 and ended in 2008 – $3 million dollars later and more than eight years past the original deadline. According to students and faculty, it was worth the wait.

“The move was important. A college needs a physical home. It can’t just exist in a virtual sense,” said Honors College Dean Charlie Slavin.

The original projected cost was $1.5 million, an amount the college expected to raise in one year. Everything was underestimated, according to Slavin. Building codes changed, some costs were overlooked and prices of construction materials rose after Hurricane Katrina.

Despite the setbacks, Colvin now has four floors: The first-floor Robert Thompson Center, the second and third-floor residence halls and the fourth-floor Oscar Remick Student Forum and Margaret Chase Smith Visiting Scholar Suite.

“It’s a really exciting space. I think the rooms came out great,” Slavin said.

In 1930, Colvin opened as a women’s dormitory, housing 48 students and a matron. The first floor included the matron’s suite, sunroom, dining room and bedrooms with walnut-finished furniture. The basement was divided into a kitchen, storage room, servants’ restroom and a laundry room with tubs. At that time, the building had a “modern touch,” and “homelike atmosphere” according to Jenny R. Hutchinson in the October 1930 issue of The Maine Alumnus.

From 1935 to 2001, Honors was only offered as a program at UMaine. It became an official college in 2002.

In the mid-to-late ’90s, typically 12 to 18 students graduated from the program each year. Now around 75 to 85 students graduate each year, according to Slavin.

In 1998, the program was looking for a new home and formed a planning committee to start laying out renovations of Colvin. By spring of 1999, honors students inhabited the second and third floors for the first time.

The original Robert Thomson Honors Center was a wooden modular design with three to four rooms built by students in 1975. In 2000 it was torn down, and the program officially moved into Colvin. From 2001 to 2003, the final touches to the first floor included lighting, ceramic tile floors and new cherry-stained furniture.

“I like the first floor with the piano. We use that a lot,” said first-year nursing student Alexandra Drummond, a Colvin resident.

In the first-floor library, students slept on dark leather couches or chatted in rocking chairs. Through a doorway, the thesis reading room has a full-wall bookcase that holds all of the college’s bound theses dating back to 1937.

In 2003, renovation of the basement included an all-purpose recreation room, television lounge, kitchen and an upgraded laundry room.

It wasn’t until September 2007 that UMaine President Robert Kennedy announced the Honors College received the last $2 million of funding through energy conservation measures, bonds and loans.

On the second and third floors, the bathrooms were completely renovated.

“They were old and 1930s-like,” Slavin said.

The quads were repainted; wood floors were installed, and the ceilings were lowered for the new wiring and lights. Throughout the construction, 98 percent of the building’s windows were replaced.

The fourth floor, formerly the attic, is the Oscar Remick Student Forum – a room for student use, small events and faculty meetings. The white walls reach up to an arched ceiling, punctuated by wooden beams and crossties. White boards, tan leather couches, 50 chairs and a fold up conference table complete the room.

“It’s just pretty. It’s clean and nice looking,” said first-year nursing student Abigail Bergeron, a resident of Colvin.

In the afternoon, four students sat at raised tables, situated in front of six large windows that look out toward the Memorial Union. Two students pored over nursing textbooks while the other two surfed the Internet on laptops.

“It’s given me an awesome place to work on my thesis,” said senior international affairs and French language student in the Honors Program Genevieve Poppe commutes three times a week to study in the Oscar Remick Student Forum.

On Inauguration day, the fourth floor was packed with people for the first celebration in the room.

The Margaret Chase Smith Visiting Scholar Suite is for visiting lecturers, available for the entire campus as long as the visitor agrees to meet with honors students during their stay, according to Slavin.

Thirty-five honors students live on the second and third floors, and members of the honors community are welcome to use the hall. Slavin calls Colvin the “physical hub of the college.” He said the inviting space contributes to building a community and he wishes to see more people using the hall.

Another renovation project is already on the horizon. The Honors College would like to renovate the basement and the fourth floor of Balentine Hall, according to Slavin. The project would take a considerable amount of money, and the idea is still in its infancy.