Skip to Content

Stanford Business magazine

 

Dean's Column

Why We Need a New Campus

By Robert L. Joss

Dean Robert JossWhen I am out talking with alumni about our new curriculum and plans for a new campus, whether I’m in New York or Palo Alto, some of you have asked me, “Why do we need a new campus?” I’ve noticed that often those questioners who are past their 25th reunion (like me) wonder, “Didn’t we just build a new campus?” That “new” building went up in 1966 and is now more than 40 years old. It never anticipated the program changes we will launch this September. Indeed, the new campus is essential to enabling our new MBA curriculum and our academic vision for the future.

Shortly after I arrived as dean in 1999, the Business School, in consultation with alumni, made a strategic decision to remain small in student body size, high in faculty and student quality, and supportive of the intimate, collaborative culture that has been a hallmark of a Stanford MBA education. The new curriculum—with more seminars, more advising, more global engagement, and a stronger leadership component for developing teamwork—builds on the advantages of our small size. For example, a required Critical Analytical Thinking seminar for all incoming students will meet in groups of only 16. More multidisciplinary classes that bring engineering, medical, law, education, and business students together to share in creating a project will require flexible classrooms with moveable seats where teamwork can take place. This is vastly different from the amphitheater-style classroom experience you and I had here.

We currently have only 5 single-level classrooms with moveable chairs. By contrast, the new curriculum requires 19. We currently have only 8 breakout study rooms; the new campus will have 48 to enable group work and leadership coaching. And we will have a 600-person auditorium that can seat more than one complete class of 375 MBAs, compared to Bishop, which seats only 324. We will gain 81,000 square feet. More important than the size of the space will be its flexibility, which will allow us to adapt to the way we teach and learn today and give us the ability to modify facilities in the future. We also will make greater use of indoor-outdoor spaces to foster collaboration among students and faculty and across the university.

Some people have asked, “Why not renovate?” We considered that first, but the building is entirely poured concrete and hemmed in on four sides by roads, buildings, or non-buildable sites. It was not possible to make renovations cost effective, if at all.

While buildings are not the most important factor in the School’s success, we lag far behind our peer institutions in the quality of our facilities. We hear this from prospective students and faculty who are concerned about our classrooms, technology, faculty offices, student facilities, and community gathering places. Harvard Business School has built a new student center (Spangler) and completely renovated Baker Library in the past few years. Wharton opened a new building in 2002. Chicago GSB opened a new campus in 2004, and MIT and Columbia are working on plans for new campuses or major additions. A recent peer accreditation review put our academic program at the top, but our facilities at the bottom.

As we build these new facilities across the street from the architecturally beautiful Schwab Residential Center for MBAs and executives (completed in 1997), we will be creating a new integrated campus for living and learning. We also want to take a leadership role in energy conservation by building a green campus and incorporating environmentally responsible elements. We are working toward LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification at the highest level and are seeking funding to help defray the investments required for the qualification.

Some of you also have asked: “Hasn’t Phil Knight already paid for the new campus?” Phil made a hugely generous $100 million down payment, which represents 36 percent of the cost. Our goal is to have $275 million of commitments (we currently are at $123 million) by June 2008, which will enable us to break ground. With luck and your support, we hope to move in by fall 2010.

There is one other question I get all the time: “What will happen to the ‘birds,’? This refers to the 1961 sculpture, the Flame Birds, which, many of you will recall, graces our courtyard. The new campus will have a town square, an outdoor gathering place. I don’t know yet where sculpture will land, but it will be in a place specially thought out.