Empowering Community:
“A Beneficial Proposal for The City College of New York Student Center”
Fig.1: Image of the proposed Curry and Rice Foundation’s student center
11/04/24
The Curry and Rice Foundation:
Ryan Zaman
Rehman Rohan
Nathan Myo
Abdullah Altamir
Introduction:
Imagine a thriving student center that is the center of student life at The City College of New York, where innovation, teamwork, and community all come together. There has never been a more urgent need for a dedicated student center as we negotiate the changing terrain of higher education. In addition to offering a warm environment for socializing and academic assistance, our planned student center would help our student body feel like they belong. By funding this project, we can improve college life overall, encourage student involvement, and develop future leaders who are prepared to change the world.
The results from the survey very much supports the idea that students want a thriving center. For example, most of the results the people interviewed were mainly in the strongly agree choice. People really liked the idea of a training gym, basketball courts, and a swimming pool. Please refer to the appendix for more information.
Fig 2. Graph for primary survey findings.
There have been multiple and prominent studies that also recommend a student center because it is very beneficial for students. For example, many students believed that even after the covid 19 pandemic, students still wanted to remain in college due to a sense of belonging created from involvement in recreation center activities (Miller & Croft, 2022). This demonstrates that with a prospering student center, it can encourage students to use it more and can even be a factor to gain more students in general.
Action Plan:
Introduction: Our student center will consist of 3 floors, including a basement and a roof. These floors will have multiple necessities when it comes to a thriving student center. The student center will be located at the open portion of the south side of campus’s grassy lawn.
Basement: The basement will mainly be the area of the physical activities including a gym, basketball court, and a swimming pool. These facilities will have one set of locker rooms available for male and female students with showers.
Fig. 3: Floorplan for the Basement
First Floor: This floor will be where the main entrance and lobby of the student will be. The lobby will include a help desk, some seating, and charging stations. This floor will be a massive student lounge area with lots of seating for students to socialize or just work privately.
Fig. 4: Floorplan for the first floor
Second Floor: College can be very tiring and restless, so going out of campus to get food might not help that. This floor is dedicated to serving food to the students with a whole food court and some cafes, so they can be fueled up for classes or to study.
Fig.5: Floorplan for second floor cafeteria(not to scale)
Third Floor: The third floor will consist of gaming rooms, a library, and a computer lab. The gaming room will consist of consoles, TVs, and gaming computers. Special events like tournaments. will even be held in the gaming rooms for special prizes. The computer lab and library is mainly a place where students can go and study.
Fig. 6: Floorplan for the third floor
Roof: The roof is going to be meant for scenery and a place where a student can go and enjoy nature. It will consist of plants, a greenhouse, benches, and fences for safety purposes.
Fig. 7 : Floorplan for the roof
Timeline for Gantt chart
Fig. 8: Our timetable for construction
Costs and Benefits:
Costs: The chart below displays the sections of the student center and the cost to make them.
| Area of Student Center | Cost (U.S Dollars) |
| Building | $60,000,000 |
| Swimming Pool | $400,000 |
| Basketball Court | $60,000 |
| Food Court | $450,000 |
| Library | $112,000 |
| Game Room | $25,000 |
| Computer Lab | $120,000 |
| First Floor Lounge | $250,000 |
| Gym | $275,000 |
| Seating | $20,000 |
| Greenhouse | $11,000 |
Total cost of everything: $61,723,000
Fig. 9: Total budget for Student Center
Benefits: The total costs of our student center here at CCNY is $61,723,000. This price is worth it because our student center consists of everything a student could ever wish for in a college student center. The whole building will cost 60 million but the size and space will make it worth it. The athletic facilities can encourage students to be more active and improve skills. The game room can be a place where students can connect through their favorite games and create sportsmanship amongst themselves. With all these benefits, making this student center is one hundred percent worth it.
Our Team – Curry and Rice foundation
We at the Curry and Rice foundation have 4 promising workers with even more promising bios.
- Abdullah Altamir is a Second-Year Computer Science student at CCNY. He is from the Bronx, NY. He’s hoping to eventually become a software engineer, possessing qualities such as being hardworking, helpful and productive. As of now, he is currently working as a Mathematics Tutor at CCNY. Some skills that he possesses are being able to code in Python and C++, being able to tutor Calculus I, II, and III, and being able to communicate proficiently with team members. Some interests that he has are biking, playing basketball, and playing video games.
- Ryan Zaman is a First-Year student working towards computer science. Ryan is from Queens, NY. He recently started his first year of college and will be a class of 2028 graduate. He was born here in New York. Right now Ryan is a full time college student and works a part time job over the weekend as a file clerk. He is honest, respectful, and cooperative. He can work well in groups and manage them. He can take criticism and use it to improve the quality of my work or assignments. Ryan has coded some games back in high school and can relearn the code. He likes to go on walks, spend time with his cats, and learn about new things, especially events going on around my area and the world.
- Nathan Myo, is currently a second-year student aiming to study Architecture at The City College of New York. He was born in Jamaica, Queens, and raised firstly in the Upper West Side of Manhattan, then in Woodside, Queens after moving there with his family in 2009. He still currently resides there to this day. As a little kid, Nathan primarily attended Catholic schools until he reached the 6th grade, where he moved to attend a non-Catholic
charter school until attending public schools for my high school years. He went to the High School for Applied Communications for solely my 9th grade year, then transferred out to the Academy for Careers in Television and Film starting in his 10th grade year up until my graduation last June. Starting in the summer two years ago, Nathan began to pick up summer jobs to make some money while free during his breaks from school. In both the summers of 2022 and last year, he worked for this women’s clothing/shoe store near my area in Astoria, Queens. After the end of last summer though, he did not work until April of this year, when he began working my first actual non-seasonal job at a Best Buy downtown at 23rd Street and 6th Avenue.
- Rehman Rohan is a second year mechanical engineering student at CCNY. He immigrated from Bangladesh at an early age and grew up in the Bronx, NY. Being a national honors society student in high school where he developed skills in leadership and communication. Here at CCNY he has worked in many labs for his university physics and engineering classes gaining skills in teamwork and problem-solving. As of now Rehman is currently a full time student who privately tutors students in his neighborhood from time to time. In his free time he likes to play video games, work out, and hang out with family and friends.
Conclusion:
Our student center will include three storeys, as well as a roof and a basement. There will be multiple necessities for a successful student center on these floors. The basement consists of a gym, swimming pool, and a basketball court. All are meant for CCNY athletics. The first floor is mainly the lobby with a few coaches where students can lounge. The second floor is the cafeteria. The third floor is the main entertainment room consisting of computers, video games, and tournaments. Finally the roof is a sceneric place for students to unwind and enjoy nature. For the future, Curry and Rice Foundation hopes to add more equipment to the facility if more and more students use it. We hope to also expand the facility for easier accessibility and more space for students. With this student center, The City College of New York can experience even greater success and attract more students to attend.
References:
Miller, J. J., & Croft, J. C. (2022). The influence of university recreation centers on student return and retention during COVID-19. Recreational Sports Journal, 46(2), 131–140. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9047664/
Appendix:
Survey Results:
| Options | Strongly Disagree(1) | Disagree(2) | Neutral(3) | Agree(4) | Strongly Agree(5) |
| Put in A Training Gym | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 11 |
| Put in Basketball Courts | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 8 |
| Put in Swimming Pool | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 10 |
| Put in a Main lounge | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 11 |
| Put in a Cafe | 0 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 9 |
| Put in more Food Options | 0 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 9 |
| Put in a Gaming Lounge | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 11 |
Fig. 10: Full survey results
| Student Center Construction TImeline | ||||
| Tasks | Start Date | Days Needed | Completion | Adjusted Length |
| Preparing Our Site for Construction | 6/6/2025 | 60 | 8/6/2025 | 61 |
| Building our Center’s Flooring and Foundation | 8/9/2025 | 120 | 1/9/2026 | 153 |
| Installing the Exterior Items | 1/11/2026 | 90 | 5/11/2026 | 120 |
| Prepping the Wiring and Plumbing | 5/13/2026 | 150 | 10/13/2026 | 153 |
| Completing the Interior Design | 10/15/2026 | 90 | 1/15/2027 | 92 |
| Final Inspections and Overview | 1/17/2027 | 30 | 2/17/2027 | 31 |
| Opening of our Center | 2/19/2027 | 1 | 2/19/2027 | 0 |
Fig. 11: Another Gantt chart
