TERRE HAUTE — Logan Rassel will complete her final year at Indiana State University as part of a history-making group that is the first to live in a new, $25 million residence hall.
On Wednesday, she moved into Reeve Hall, the first new residence hall to be constructed on ISU’s campus in more than 40 years. Eight sororities will live in the complex, which consists of two buildings, each separated into four units for small-group housing.
The townhouse style housing is four stories high and centrally located on campus, near the Student Recreation Center, Cunningham Library and Hulman Memorial Student Union.
Rassel, the president of Alpha Omicron Pi sorority, is looking forward to a new year, her last at ISU, in new accommodations. “We have almost our entire sorority living here,” she said. She believes the new residence hall will help with recruiting.
“The rooms are bigger, the meeting spaces are bigger,” she said. Most sororities previously were housed in Lincoln Quad.
The new residential complex “is a symbol of our Greek community at ISU growing as a whole,” said Rassel, who is from Valparaiso, but whose parents are Terre Haute natives. Her grandfather, Herm Rassel, operated a downtown clothing store on Wabash Avenue.
Planning for the Reeve Hall complex, which contains 360 beds and 128,256 square feet of space, has been a collaborative effort between Residential Life and fraternity/sorority life, according to ISU President Dan Bradley.
“Our goal is to increase the participation in Greek life, and this new facility should help make that possible,” Bradley said.
A mix of double and single rooms — totaling 45 beds — is contained in each housing unit or pod.
The first floor of each four-story pod contains a kitchenette, laundry facility, TV/lounge area, office, presidential suite and multi-purpose meeting room or “chapter” room. Each building unit also has access to a terrace.
Reeve Hall is the first new residence hall construction on ISU’s campus since Lincoln Quad in 1969. It is being funded through a combination of housing reserves and the issuance of long-term debt; debt service is paid by the housing system.
The new housing is important for Greek life on campus, Rassel said. “It shows we’re stepping up as a community. … ISU is supporting us by making this new housing,” she said.
Megan Schumacher, a senior and Alpha Omicron Pi member, lives on the fourth floor of the sorority’s unit and has her own room and private bath. “It’s awesome,” she said. “We’re the first people to live here.”
Rassel lives on the ground floor in a “Presidential Suite,” a single room with private bath, and while it’s more costly, she applied for and received a scholarship through the sorority’s national headquarters that covers most of the costs.
Jessica Robinson, ISU associate director of residential life, said that the university conducted focus groups before building Reeve. Sorority members wanted to be housed together, but they also wanted a variety of rooms and a meeting space.
Housing options in Reeve include both double and single rooms with community bathrooms as well as double and single rooms with in-room bathrooms.