Celebrating Our Remarkable Campus Transformation
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Our thriving, buzzing campus continues its transformation, enhancing UC San Diego’s presence as a premier destination for students, employees, health personnel, patients and community members. The university recently held four celebrations for student-centered projects across the campus. The improvements bring additional academic spaces, a major center dedicated to student support, below-market on-campus housing for students, thrillingly diverse dining options, art galleries and a glass blowing studio.
Ridge Walk North Living and Learning Neighborhood Groundbreaking
UC San Diego Chancellor Pradeep K. Khosla addressed a crowd gathered to celebrate the groundbreaking of Ridge Walk North Living and Learning Neighborhood last month. The project, scheduled to open in 2025, supports the university’s academic mission by providing updated administrative and teaching space for Thurgood Marshall College, the School of Global Policy and Strategy and the Department of Economics in the School of Social Sciences. The neighborhood includes 19 new classrooms and a 150-seat lecture hall for campus-wide academics as well as student dining, wellness programming, student support services, study lounges, co-working spaces and public realm improvements, such as outdoor gathering spaces and public art. Credit: Wonderstruck Photography
“These new spaces will continue to provide the capacity for community building and honoring Marshall’s values and history,” said Thurgood Marshall College Provost Leslie Carver at the event. “We are working with the design team on everything from placement of our historically important art to interior graphics in the residential buildings, which will help us to carry forward Marshall’s legacy of community and coalition building.” Credit: Wonderstruck Photography
Ridge Walk North Living and Learning Neighborhood will also provide below-market on-campus housing to 2,400 undergraduate students. This frees up housing in the local market, helps lighten traffic on adjacent roads and provides students with a live-learn college experience. Credit: Wonderstruck Photography
Triton Center Groundbreaking
UC San Diego community members came together with alumni, donors, friends and dignitaries to celebrate Triton Center, which is slated for completion in 2026. During the event, Chancellor Pradeep K. Khosla recognized and thanked the generous and dedicated supporters and partners who have helped make the project a reality. Speakers included UC Regent John A. Pérez and California Senate President pro Tempore Toni G. Atkins. Credit: Erik Jepsen UC San Diego
Triton Center is dedicated to expanded and centralized support for students at the heart of the UC San Diego campus. The Student Health and Well-Being Building will consolidate and expand access to health, mental health and well-being resources. The Student Success Building will feature an expansion of the Teaching + Learning Commons program and facilities for the Triton Transfer Hub, Global Initiatives and campus support and administration.
Two transfer students, Arleth Marisol Chavez-Rodriguez and Rei Perez Munoz, shared their experience with the Triton Transfer Hub and what Triton Center will bring students. “Triton Transfer Hub and Triton Center are, and will be, so important for students for exposure to different mindsets, cultures, lived experiences, in a vibrant, dynamic and diverse campus town square environment,” said Chavez-Rodriguez. “Access to these experiences and opportunities help us grow and succeed, help students realize they are not alone here.” Credit: Erik Jepsen UC San Diego
The project will also include an Alumni and Welcome Center, serving as a home away from home for our alumni as well as an engaging campus gateway for students, faculty, staff and visitors alike. A multipurpose building with a 500-person event space will provide space for celebration and connection. Triton Center also includes the Strauss Family Meta Gallery, the newest addition to the arts ecosystem at UC San Diego.
“Triton Center at UC San Diego is one of the most momentous and transformative projects in the history of our university,” said Pradeep K. Khosla. “Currently, UC San Diego is missing a clearly defined center, with our academic support services for students and faculty spread widely across campus. This project has been central to our long-range development plan, aligning all of our strategic goals with one comprehensive, fully integrated facility at the heart of campus, with student support as the main focus.” Credit: Wonderstruck Photography
Ventanas Grand Opening
Ventanas celebrated a grand opening after a significant renovation and update to its menu. The light-filled dining spot near Eleanor Roosevelt College now includes a full-service coffee house, empanadas and assorted hand pies made on-site and a new tandoor oven to prepare Indian cuisine. Credit: Erik Jepsen UC San Diego
The new menu also highlights dishes from the African diaspora. Housing, Dining and Hospitality worked with students, Black Resource Center leadership, Eleanor Roosevelt College and Seventh College leadership and celebrity chefs to develop the menu from the cuisines of Africa, the Caribbean, parts of South America and the American South. Examples include, poulet nyembwe from Gabon and poulet yassa from Senegal; callaloo and jerk chicken from the Caribbean and gumbo, okra, grits and black-eyed peas from the Americas. Credit: Erik Jepsen UC San Diego
Addressing the crowd, Kaitlyn Canizales, Chair of the Black Student Union and fourth-year Political Science and Sociology double major at Eleanor Roosevelt College said, “This focus on the cultures within the African and Black Diaspora tells Black students that they belong here.” Credit: Erik Jepsen UC San Diego
Pepper Canyon West Living Learning Neighborhood Topping Out
A large sign on one of the buildings in Pepper Canyon West Living and Learning Neighborhood announces, “halfway there,” marking the halfway point in a tower that reached its ultimate height this month. The campus community gathered to celebrate this milestone, contributing their signatures to a beam in the tower. Credit: Matt Hansen UC San Diego
When it opens in the fall of 2024, Pepper Canyon West Living and Learning Neighborhood will provide much-needed housing for 1,300 undergraduate students. Adjacent to the Central Campus station of the UC San Diego Blue Line trolley, Pepper Canyon West features single-occupancy rooms in two 22- and 23-story towers connected to five-story buildings with outdoor terrace seating. The project also includes retail, open spaces in two large courtyards and access to canyon trails. Credit: Matt Hansen UC San Diego
“In less than a year, we will have a breathtaking living and learning neighborhood dedicated to the needs of our upper-division and transfer students here at UC San Diego,” said Associate Vice Chancellor of Housing, Dining and Hospitality Hemlata Jhaveri to guests gathered at the project site. “Thank you, all, for your unwavering support of our Tritons!” Credit: Matt Hansen UC San Diego
Learn more about UC San Diego’s physical, cultural and intellectual transformation.
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