New digs greet OCC

COSTA MESA — Salina Wakim won’t have to think twice about wearing dark-colored clothes when she teaches at Orange Coast College this year.

The anthropology instructor, who is leading classes in Native American and comparative cultures this fall, frequently had to mind chalk dust in the past. But when Wakim returned to campus on Monday, she was met by a state-of-the-art classroom — complete with new floors and ceiling, an overhead projection system and a white board in front.

“The chalk was just really messy,” she said. “You had to be careful not to lean up against it, or you’d walk away all covered in white.”

Over the last three months, OCC embarked on its biggest classroom renovation in history. Using money from the $370-million Measure C construction bond, which voters passed in 2002, construction crews went through a number of campus buildings — including social science, home economics and music — and finally pulled them out of the 20th Century.

When students returned to class for the fall semester on Monday, many of them saw a different campus than they had a few months ago.

“It’s dramatic,” said Heather Hamaker, 21, of Huntington Beach, standing outside a classroom in the social science building. “It’s a lot brighter and easier to walk into than the older ones.”

Added Matt Kelley, 23, of Costa Mesa: “It’s amazing, the lack of graffiti inside the room.”

On May 28, the last day of the spring semester, the construction crews began work on their summer projects. Some of the improvements were exterior as well as interior; at a number of spots around the campus, landscapers planted new trees.

It was indoors, however, that OCC saw its biggest changes. Crews rearranged parts of the music classrooms, removing worn-out chairs from the front rows and replacing them with more intact ones from the back. The home economics building is awaiting new operable windows this week to help cross breezes go through.

In the social science building, administrators also reoriented the classrooms, turning desks away from the door so students wouldn’t be distracted by pedestrians outside. Adjustable thermostats and new ventilation systems were installed in the classrooms to allow circulated air to reach all the desks.

“If you look at the system now, we’ve got supply and demand distributed around the room,” said Frank Fonseca, construction facilities manager at the campus. “It used to be all in the center.”