Kirk Building Opens to Generally Positive Feedback

The Kirk Building’s opening after major renovations was completed with mostly positive feedback from the campus. The building is now home to the Career Center, Student Health Center, Counseling Services, Student Access and Disability Services, Center for Academic Excellence, the Writing Center and the Communication Lab.

The building now houses the Student Health Center and Counseling Services together on the third floor. Kaylynn Leaver, clinic supervisor for the Truman State University branch of Complete Family Medicine, thinks the combined centers will allow for better flow of patient care when students enter the floor.

The structure of the building has been a positive for patient care at the University, especially since the Disability Services and the Career Center are located nearby and interactions between the three centers might be helpful for students’ health and wellbeing. However, an issue arises with the fact that only one elevator exists in the building.

“One elevator in the building does pose a little bit of a challenge, especially if you enter from, like, the south door and you have an injury just trying to get to the elevator on the north side,” Leaver said. “I do think that having one elevator is just a little bit of challenge here.”

Aside from this issue, the move to the building is something that has been positively regarded. Leaver said the staff were satisfied with how the floor turned out, especially since more of the space in the floor has a purpose. The McKinney Center was bigger, but apparently had more unused storage space. The clinics now also have newer equipment like exam tables and will be getting a new medical system, Epic. 

The Student Health Center and Counseling Services aren’t the only group that are happy with the move to Kirk Building. The Career Center, previously located downstairs in the Student Union Building, is now located on the first floor at Kirk Building and also seems to be pleased with the shift. 

However, the Career Center only started moving their stuff into the building early March and had to rely a lot on the supervisor, Joel Brumfield, and student staff members that were still on campus over break. The quick turnaround to move into the building presented itself to be a slight inconvenience. 

That being said, the shift is still believed to be a beneficial change for the center and for students. Willow Reese, employee relations intern at the Career Center, said the move will help the Career Center to showcase their resources to students to impact them positively.

“I think being in such a, like, open and visible place now, it’s going to be easier for students to be able to be like, ‘Yeah, I know where that is.’ Reese said. People can easily access it, so they don’t necessarily have to go out of their way to find us.,” Reese said. 

This idea of accessibility is a sentiment that the students also seem to share. Kenzie Boekhoff, senior communication disorders major, thinks having several of these student-related centers being located in the middle of campus will make the resources more accessible.

According to Truman Today, the renovations on Kirk Building were done to create a central location for student success. This is so students can be assisted by multiple departments, located in the same building.

“With the Writing Center, Health Clinic and Counseling Center all in the same building … it could really help reduce any hesitation or stigma and encourage more people to take advantage of the support available,” Boekhoff said.

As of now, the Center for Academic Excellence and Tutoring Services have yet to shift into the office but plan to during mid-April. The building is also set to have online workforce development outreach programs, rural telehealth counseling and academic outreach workshops during the fall.