A crowd joined together Friday at the construction site located off the Pedestrian to celebrate the upcoming construction of Georgia Southern University’s new interdisciplinary building.

Speakers at the ground turning ceremony included President Jaimie Hebert, Provost Jean Bartels and Student Government Association vice president, Valencia Warren.

“This building is not just a sign of our growth. It’s also a representation of our values,” said Hebert.

The new $33.6 million building will be 110,000 square feet and its design will follow the materials and architectural style that have been established on campus.

It is designed to be an interdisciplinary classroom building that is flexible in nature and will serve as a home for disciplines such as:

• Interior design
• Fashion merchandising and apparel design
• Child and family development
• Recreation nutrition of food science
• History
• Foreign languages
• International studies

“It’s going to provide…state-of-the-art classroom technology in terms of audiovisual equipment technology and other tools specific to the disciplines that will be housed here,” said Bartels.

“This shows me that the hard work taking place behind closed doors is being recognized and causing students to fall deeper in love with our institution,” Warren said on behalf of the student body.

The set time for the completion of the project is in 16 months.

GS intends to move students to move into the building June of 2018.