Contact Todd Cohen, University Relations, (785) 864-8858.
LAWRENCE--The University of Kansas will dedicate two new buildings on campus -- the Margaret Amini Scholarship Hall and the KU Child Care Center -- on Saturday, September 9. The public and media are invited.
KU Child Care Center
(New home for the Hilltop Child Development Program)
9 a.m. It is located on Irving Hill Road, south of the Burge student union and west of Anschutz Sports Pavilion. Inclement weather location: Frontier Room, Burge student union.
Chancellor Robert Hemenway will preside over the dedication ceremony, which will feature remarks by Channette Kirby, representative of the February Sisters, a group of more than 70 women protesters who took control of a campus building in February 1972 to demand better services for women. Hilltop Child Development Center opened six months later in the Wesley Building.
Hilltop moved out of the Wesley Building and into its new $3.3 million, 18,000-square-foot center last month. The program serves up to 212 children of KU students and employees. About two-thirds of the funding for the new center came from a $4 child-care fee assessed to all KU students. Center funds and revenue bonds issued by KU primarily provided the remainder.
Margaret Amini Scholarship Hall
2 p.m. It is located in the 1300 block of Louisiana Street, a block east of Jayhawk Boulevard. The street is a one-way, northbond streeet and must be entered from 14th Street. Inclement weather location: Alderson Auditorium, Kansas Union.
Chancellor Robert Hemenway will preside over the ceremony, which will be attended by Margaret Wenski Amini. Scholarship hall residents will lead tours of the four-story, 16,600-square foot building after the ceremony. The hall is KU's 10th scholarship hall and fifth for women.
Koli "K.K." and Margaret Amini, KU alumni from San Antonio, provided $1.5 million for the construction of the new hall -- an architectural twin of and adjacent to K.K. Amini Hall, 1318 Louisiana. The K.K. Amini Hall, which opened in 1992, is a men's residence. The Aminis contributed $2.5 million for the two halls. Margaret Amini, a Kansas City, Kan., native, received a bachelor's degree in journalism in 1946. K.K. Amini received a bachelor's degree in petroleum engineering in 1949 and was a resident of KU's Battenfeld Scholarship Hall, 1425 Alumni Place.
Architectural note: The halls stand on the former site of the Roofe and Crozier family homes. A large, arched window unit from the Roofe home was installed between the foyer and living room in K.K. Amini Hall. The arched form is repeated in the exterior window and entry designs at K.K. Amini Hall. A trio of leaded and beveled glass windows salvaged from the Crozier home have been hung in an oak divider between the living room and foyer at Margaret Amini Hall, and the architects have chosen to use similar window and entry designs throughout the Margaret Amini Hall design.