Self Hall Improvements Enhance Mississippi College School of Business

Self Hall’s transformation began in 2007 and major improvements to the headquarters of Mississippi College’s School of Business continue well into the new academic year.

Coming next on the multi-million dollar Self Hall makeover list will be a new student lobby. The lobby on the ground floor will contain study space, and spots for students to drink coffee, relax and watch TVs streaming real time information from the markets as well as cable business news channels.

A generous gift from successful Mississippi Delta businessman Aven Whittington, former Staplcotn’s board chairman, is making the student lobby a reality. The lobby will be named in honor of Whittington’s mother, Anna Ward Aven, Mississippi College’s only female graduate in 1909. The Whittington residence hall and Aven Hall on the Clinton campus are named in honor of the family, longtime MC supporters.

Mississippi College officials say they are planning a special event in 2012 to unveil the lobby and formally thank Whittington, a 93-year-old Princeton University graduate, leader in the state’s agribusiness world and a member  of the MC Board of Trustees for many years.

It’s a case of icing on the cake for Self Hall that’s in the final stages of an extraordinary facelift over the past four years.

Combined with the long list of construction projects and other changes in the building, business students are taking advantage of the very latest technology to make for a great Mississippi College education. “We really want to transform the School of Business,” says Marcelo Eduardo, the business dean.

Whether he’s touching on the highlights in his school’s alumni magazine or visiting with graduates returning to their alma mater in Clinton, Eduardo is always delighted to share the good news about his school’s home along College Street.

“It is exciting for us to share all the wonderful things that are taking place in Self Hall and all the ways in which we are striving to uphold the amazing legacy that makes Mississippi College and its School of Business the wonderful institution that it is,” Eduardo says.

He’s always thankful to the many donors who have given so generously to enable the Self Hall projects to move forward. The response from “our alumni and friends was tremendous,” the business dean said. “Through your generosity, we have been able to transform our classrooms into state-of-the art learning centers equipped with the latest teaching technologies.”

Eduardo sees the fruits of the positive changes that benefit students every day. He continues to teach finance courses at Self Hall.

Other building enhancements at Self Hall for the 2011-2012 academic year will soon be on the way. MC’s School of Business is also updating its teaching lab for accounting information systems, and other management information systems courses to be equipped with the latest hardware and teaching software.

Other improvements for Self Hall will include finalizing first floor renovations by adding new flooring and lighting throughout this level.

Eduardo says the remarkable series of enhancements starting four years ago included modernizing eight classrooms, the foyer and all corridors to represent the biggest makeover in the building’s history. And that’s really saying something. Self Hall’s roots date back to the early 1960s.

The extensive work to one of the heavily used buildings on the Clinton campus included a financial services classroom that features a ticker streaming up to the minute financial news from foreign exchange and stock markets.

Upgrades of its Ed Trehern lecture hall have made it a perfect location to welcome an all-star roster of speakers like former Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, former U.S. Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott  and magazine publisher Steve Forbes. Huckabee, now host of a popular weekend show on Fox News, and Forbes, were also among the headliners at MC’s annual spring scholarship banquets that have raised more than $1 million since 2008.

The lengthy list of Self Hall projects included ceremonies to name an MC accounting classroom in April 2010 after Tony Huffman, the owner of Flowood-based Huffman & Company, CPA, P.A. and the late Terrell E. Wise, the founder of Wise Construction Company. Other parts of the 46-year-old building featuring new technology have been named in honor of Mississippi businessman J.L. Holloway, for his outstanding support of the School of Business.

While some of the major changes at Self Hall have been announced, School of Business leaders say they are hard at work on several other key projects to modernize the Mississippi College building serving undergraduates and graduate students. As for any further details, stay tuned.