Brigham Young University campus

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Coordinates: 40°15′2.3″N 111°38′57.36″W / 40.250639, -111.6492667

The main campus of Brigham Young University sits on approximately 560 acres (2.3 km²) nestled at the base of the Wasatch Mountains and includes 311 buildings.^[1] The buildings feature a wide variety of architectural styles, each building being built in the style of its time.^[2] The grounds and landscaping of the campus won first place in 2005 in America in Bloom's campus division.^[3][4] Furthermore, views of the Wasatch Mountains, (including Mount Timpanogos) can be seen from the campus.^[1] BYU's Harold B. Lee Library, which The Princeton Review ranked as the #1 "Great College Library" in 2004,^[5] has approximately 8½ million items in its collections, contains 98 miles (158 km) of shelving, and can seat 4,600 people.^[6] The Spencer W. Kimball Tower is home to several of the university's departments and programs and is the tallest building in Provo, Utah.^[7][8] Furthermore, BYU's Marriott Center, used as a basketball arena, can seat over 22,000 and is one of the largest on-campus arenas in the nation.^[9]

[edit] Museums

Museum of Art north entrance

The campus is home to several museums containing exhibits from many different fields of study. BYU's Museum of Art, for example, is one of the largest and most attended art museums in the Mountain West. This Museum aids in academic pursuits of students at BYU via research and study of the artworks in its collection. The Museum is also open to the general public and provides educational programming.^[10] The Museum of Peoples and Cultures is a museum of archaeology and ethnology. It focuses on native cultures and artifacts of the Great Basin, American Southwest, Mesoamerica, Peru, and Polynesia. Home to more than 40,000 artifacts and 50,000 photographs, it documents BYU's archaeological research.^[11] The Earth Science Museum was built in 1976 to display the many fossils found by BYU's Dr. James A. Jensen. It holds many artifacts from the Jurassic Period (210-140 million years ago), and is one the top five collections in the world of fossils from that time period. It has been featured in magazines, newspapers, and on television internationally. The museum receives about 25,000 visitors every year.^[12][13] The Monte L. Bean Life Science Museum was formed in 1978. It features several forms of plant and animal life on display and available for research by students and scholars.^[14]

The campus also houses several performing arts facilities. The de Jong Concert Hall seats 1282 people and is named for Gerrit de Jong Jr. The Pardoe Theatre is named for T. Earl and Kathryn Pardoe. Students use its stage in a variety of theatre experiments, as well as for Pardoe Series performances. It seats 500 people, and has quite a large stage with a proscenium opening of 19 by 55 feet (17 m).^[15] The Margetts Theatre was named for Philip N. Margetts, a prominent Utah theatre figure. A smaller, black box theater, it allows a variety of seating and staging formats. It seats 125, and measures 30 by 50 feet (15 m).^[15] The Nelke Theatre, named for one of BYU's first drama teachers, is used largely for instruction in experimental theater. It seats 280.^[15]

[edit] Student housing

One of the earliest student dormitories at BYU, Allen Hall, named for Ray Eugene Allen and his wife Inez Knight, was built in 1938. Originally it was a men's dormitory, but during World War II, a large influx of female students caused the university to make it a women's dorm. In 1962, the building ceased to be a student dormitory altogether, and was used as temporary housing for missionaries while the Church's Language Training Mission was under construction.^[16] The success of Allen Hall led to immediate plans for another dormitory, Amanda Knight Hall, named for the wife of Jesse Knight. This served as a home for female students until it was also turned over to the Language Training Mission.^[17]

Foreign Language Student Residence, where students commit to speak only their foreign language of study.

Heritage Halls is a twelve-building housing complex on campus which offers apartment-style living. Six of the buildings were built in 1952, and the other six in 1954. The halls received their collective name through a contest among residents. Each of the separate buildings is named after a notable Latter-day Saint woman. Originally, these halls housed only female residents. Today, however, the halls house both male and female students, divided by gender into separate buildings. Each building has ten units capable of housing six people each.^[18][19] Construction of Helaman Halls followed soon after, with the first five buildings completed in 1958, and three more added by 1970.^[20] The Halls recently underwent a 12 year renovation spanning 1991 and through 2003.^[21] In 1965, BYU completed construction of Deseret Towers. "DT", as it is called by students, originally consisted of five towers, with a sixth (V Hall) added in 1969, and a seventh (W Hall) in the late seventies. The Towers were capable of housing over 2000 students. In December 2006, V and W Hall were torn down. The others followed in 2008 with demolition being completed in May 2008.^[22][23][24]

Wymount Terrace Student Family Housing.

In 1946, during the postwar BYU growth, President McDonald purchased forty-eight buildings from a nearby Air Force station in order to house students. These buildings were called Wymount Village, and housed both married and single students until 1962.^[25] Wymount Village was replaced by Wymount Terrace in that year, intended solely for students with young families. The 24 building complex contains a total of 462 apartments of varying sizes.^[26] Another complex originally intended for families was Wyview Park. At first, Wyview was a trailer park,^[27] but in 1996 it was razed and rebuilt into an apartment complex.^[28] In 2006, the complex began housing single students as well, in order to counteract loss of singles' housing in other areas.^[29]

A unique form of housing on campus is found in the Foreign Language Student Residence (FLSR) complex. The twenty-five apartments in this complex provide housing for students in foreign languages. Residents of these apartments agree to speak only their apartment's assigned language during the school year while in the apartment. This immersion experience is available in nine languages, and students are accompanied by a native resident throughout the year to enhance the experience.^[30]

Helaman Halls is served by a central cafeteria called the Cannon Center.^[19] Branches of the BYU Creamery provide basic food and general grocery products for students living in Heritage Halls, Wymount, Wyview, and the FLSR. The store, begun in 1949, has become a BYU tradition and is frequented by visitors to the university and members of the community, as well as students.^[31] It was the first on-campus full-time service grocery store in the country.^[32]

[edit] BYU Salt Lake Center

BYU also has an extension campus, the BYU Salt Lake Center in Salt Lake City, which began in 1959.^[33] On 20 August 2007, the Salt Lake Center moved to a new Campus located on Salt Lake's West Temple street. The campus now occupies three floors of the Triad Center, and has a total of 28 classrooms.^[34] Admitted BYU students may register for classes the same way as with any class on the main Provo campus. Also, with proper clearance, non-admitted students may also register for classes.^[35] However, while these credits can be applied at BYU or transferred to other universities, registration does not constitute admittance to BYU.^[35] The Salt Lake Center has some advantages over the Provo Campus, with its tendency toward smaller class sizes. Previous to the move, most classes were held in the evening, and the curriculum was limited in size. Changes are underway to expand class offerings and times.^[36]

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