The Oakland University (OU) is set to build a new residence hall to house 750 students, OU's board of trustees voted on Monday. They approved the schematic designs for the Southern Student Housing Complex and the new building is scheduled to be ready by August 2018.

The new  residence hall will cover around  290,000-square-foot space and its expected cost is $78 million. It will have the capacity of  750 beds and also includes  dining options and academic spaces as well. At present, the university has 2,700 beds for on-campus students, but that is insufficient.

The OU's board of trustees also voted to approve the proposed housing schematics and authorize contracts for the seven-story Southern Student Housing Complex.

University COO,  Scott Kunselman, said that, "It's important to think about both these projects in tandem, as to how they serve students.The South Housing complex has just over half of its total space devoted to bedrooms. The rest is stores, lounges, classrooms, dining space and more. And it's the combination those facilities that really satisfies our facility demand."

"Traditionally, most students originated from a two-county region, Oakland and Macomb, while we can now we have at least one student from just about every county in Michigan, changing our needs," he said.

Also read: Michigan officials consider policies on LGBTQ Students

Nandini