SMU Breaks Ground on Business School Expansion

Officials from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, gathered on Friday, May 6, to celebrate a groundbreaking ceremony for a $140-million expansion and renovation of its business school. The project is set to expand the footprint of the Cox School of Business by more than 30 percent, according to local news, and will connect four new buildings with the school’s existing facilities.

The project is scheduled to include the renovation of about 157,000 square feet from three existing campus structures: the Joseph M. Wylie Fincher Building, the Trammell Crow Building and the Cary M. Maguire Building. The buildings will undergo structural demolition, and all roofing systems will be removed. The buildings’ exterior stone and brick façades will remain in place wherever possible, according to the university website.

The project will also entail about 63,000 square feet of expansion to existing buildings and underground connecting spaces. One side of the Fincher building will extend to connect with the Crow and Maguire buildings, while separate additions will be added to the Crow and Maguire buildings, also.

Construction is scheduled to take about two years. The renovated and expanded facilities will be called the David B. Miller Business Quadrangle.

“We are retooling the Cox School to create a more collaborative environment—to give students and faculty easier access to collaborate, to gather and share ideas and gain inspiration from one another,” said Matthew B. Myers, Dean of the Cox School of Business. “We will offer students more opportunity to obtain their business education in a ‘9 to 9’ environment, meaning they’ll come to classes, stay for lunch or dinner, work together with other students and their professors, and remain connected with and at Cox all day long. In short, our improved facilities will nurture an environment that will lead to a richer learning experience and a lifetime of connections. This really marks a new era for the Cox School.”

The university is partnering with Rogers-O’Brien Construction for construction and GFF Architects for architecture and design.

About the Author

Matt Jones is senior editor of Spaces4Learning. He can be reached at mjones@1105media.com.

Featured

  • University of Connecticut Upgrades Basketball Facility’s AV Systems

    The University of Connecticut recently partnered with Metinteractive to upgrade the AV systems of the Gampel Pavilion basketball facility on its campus in Mansfield, Conn., according to a news release.

  • University of Kentucky Integrates New Cleaning Technology

    The University of Kentucky in Lexington, Ky., recently installed a new cleaning system designed to improve cooling efficiency on campus, according to a news release. The Facilities Management’s Utilities and Energy Management Unit installed new chiller tubes into two of the chillers at the university’s Central Utility Plant.

  • Fort Collins to Convert 1980s Office Park into Junior High School

    The Liberty Common School, a charter-public school in Fort Collins, Colo., recently broke ground on an adaptive reuse project that will convert an 1980s-era office park into a 45,000-square-foot junior high school for seventh- and eighth-grade students, according to a news release.

  • Mesa West Capital Provides Loan to Refinance University of Georgia Residence Complex

    Mesa West Capital recently announced that it has provided a $133.9-million, short-term, first mortgage loan to developer LV Collective (“LV”) to refinance a student housing complex near the University of Georgia, according to a news release. Rambler Athens, a 750-bed residence hall adjacent to the campus, was completed in August 2024.