With construction already underway at the College of Lake County’s Lakeshore Campus in downtown Waukegan, the school is already looking at ways to engage with the outside community.
Ideas like a center for urban agriculture, as well giving students and community members places to confront crucial issues, were presented as part of a virtual community engagement session Monday.
Talking first about a $48 million expansion project already underway, including a new five-story building in downtown Waukegan, college President Lori Suddick spoke not only about how she hopes expansion will increase community engagement, but what happens next.
“It’s time to talk about 2.0 Waukegan,” she said. “What are we going to do outside our campus environment?”
Suddick said there are plans for a Center for Urban Agriculture to be created on open land, and in a currently unused building on the existing Waukegan campus. The project will cost between $4.5 million and $5 million. She hopes to come up with the money through fundraising.
“This addresses a real community issue,” Suddick said. “It will provide locally sourced food to address the food desert. We plan to work with multiple community partners to help us with this.”
Designed to be a sustainable agricultural facility year-round, she said along with providing food, it will enhance community health. It will also provide job training. internships, apprenticeships, academic credentials and entrepreneurial opportunities for youths, college students and the formerly incarcerated.
The project will also include healthy cooking classes. Suddick said the former Illinois Bell Telephone building currently owned by the college in downtown Waukegan will be renovated for both food growing and preparation. Produce will be grown both inside and out.
Jay Stephen, a media producer with offices in downtown Waukegan, was one of the community members attending the meeting. He expressed excitement about the growth possibilities for the area through the college.
“This is a good plan for the students and the public,” he said. “This is the most I have ever seen making this a place to be.”
Another new program Suddick and Lorri Scott, a legal studies professor at the college, introduced is Lancer Circles. It gives people the opportunity to sit together to discuss issues with a goal of bridging divergent points of view. There will be a variety of circles based on the needs of those involved.
Suddick said with the reaction both nationally and locally after the killing of George Floyd at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer in May and the wounding of Jacob Blake in nearby Kenosha, Wis., the need to deal with systemic racism became more acute.
Scott said each group will establish its own rules of engagement before they begin to share opinions and feelings. Dialogue, mutual respect and a commitment to listening is expected of everyone.
“We want to get people to express their biases as we work with community building on a road to justice,” Scott said. “We don’t want our school to keep our students repressed.”
Scott said people often have unconscious beliefs created by racism. They can be a perception of superiority or inferiority based on race, physical characteristics or place of origin.
Suddick also spent time talking about the new 62,692-square-foot, six-story building which will house a variety of functions. She focused on the top floor, which will be called the Eleanor Murkey Community Center.
Murkey spent 33 years at the college, including serving as an associate dean and dean between 1975 and 2008 when she retired. She became the school’s first African American dean in 1999.
The top floor, with views of Lake Michigan, will offer meeting space for both school and community events, Suddick said.
