Denmark, SC (WLTX) - Voorhees College in Denmark will be expanding its campus by adding a $3 million Student Living-Learning Center.
The college broke ground on the facility on Wednesday morning. President Dr. Cleveland Sellers Jr. says they researched what was missing and came up with the center.
"We needed to have additional activities on our campus for our students because they're in an area where there are not a lot of amenities and there are not a lot of other activities that they can actually go to if they were in an urban setting," said Dr. Sellers.
The center will feature a bowling alley, movie theater, offices and apartment style suites for 30 students.
Student Government Association President Diamond Willingham was among the group celebrating the accomplishment. She says it's the talk of the campus.
"It's going to be pretty exciting for us to stay up late and socialize in a bowling alley or movie theater Some things that some of us haven't been able to do since we've been away from home," said Willingham.
She also says many are wondering how they're going to select the students lucky enough to get one of the new apartments.
"It's limited spacing so people are kind of antsy about how they're going to decide who gets to live there because it's only going to be 30 students that get to live there," said Willingham. "So everyone's really talking about that aspect of it!"
President Sellers says the building is made possible by the HBCU Federal Capital Program. With some big-name colleges not far away, the school hopes the new offerings will not only attract new students, but keep the ones they have.
"We think that it will afford us the opportunity to retain even more students by having space available and having a new facade on the campus creates a lot of excitement," said Dr. Sellers.
600 students are currently students at Voorhees College, but administrators have a goal of making it 700 in the near future. Willingham says this project makes that a possibility.
"Opening fall of 2016 it'll be something else to add to our repertoire to say hey, we have this here.,This is why you should come here." said Willingham.
The project is expected to be completed in August of 2016.
