Founders Hall | Campus Improvements

Project Overview

UIW’s Founders Hall is an expansive nine-story building on a 10-acre property that has transformed the Broadway Campus and expanded its footprint by 20 percent. The property, which includes a 500-car parking garage and a 380,000 square-foot building, was acquired in 2019 and subsequently named for University founders, the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word. Currently undergoing a careful renovation project that preserves its historic significance of the mid-century constructed building, Founders Hall will serve as a hub of innovative academic programing as home to the School of Media and Design and the School of Science, Mathematics and Engineering, and an intersection of global scholarship and thought leadership via International Affairs and the Liza and Jack Lewis Center of the Americas. It will also house the Student Health Center and UIW Police Department in addition to select offices, classrooms, meeting spaces and spiritual spaces.

A Historic Building. An Innovative Future.

Vision and Major Themes

What is the Vision for Founders Hall?

Founders Hall will extend UIW’s reach, strengthening our local and global connections, elevating our ability to form and transform students, and welcoming all community members to a beautiful, spiritual place that honors the legacy of UIW’s founders, celebrates diversity, respects our sacred ecological surroundings, and inspires us to reach new levels of teaching, learning, understanding and justice.

Innovation

Founders Hall will inspire innovation in architecture as well as activity, providing an open and exciting space able to meet the university’s future needs for teaching, learning, collaboration and service.  Flexible architecture will adapt to changing needs for physical space for future innovations.  Founders Hall will host UIW’s most forward-thinking and innovative projects, initiatives and teaching approaches.

Spirituality and Sacredness

Founders Hall provides a creative and sacred space where each person is free to become his/her best self through shared spirituality, worship and dialogue while honoring others’ diverse spiritualities and identities, both personal and communal.

Formation and Transformation

Founders Hall will become a living and learning space where UIW students, alumni, faculty and community members will learn, congregate and socialize to grow, be challenged to generate alternative solutions and give back to their community. Founders Hall will invite all members and partners of the UIW community to be enriched, transformed and called to act for the common good.

International and Intercultural

Founders Hall will be intentional in strengthening the international and intercultural foundation of our university, helping all members of our community to thrive in an increasingly diverse global society, inviting strangers to become friends, promoting the dignity and rights of all, and encouraging a respectful engagement in civic life.

One Word

Founders Hall will be an engaging gateway that unifies and integrates CCVI’s historic mission with all elements and locations of our complex institution.  We broaden our ministry by linking countries, cultures, and people in the shared goals of expanding our knowledge, understanding, and peace.

Timeline

2024: Demolition complete; build back phase begins; crosswalk and entrances under design review
2023: Offices occupying Founders Hall relocate to other spaces; demolition underway; architects progress on construction drafts
2022: Joeris General Contractor and Lake|Flato architectural firm selected for Founders Hall project; demolition plans developed
2021: Founders Hall vision and major themes established; AGCM selected as project managers; parking lot and garage opened; swing spaces open for Innovation and Technology, Human Resources, Payroll and other offices; feasibility study underway
2020: Property officially named Founders Hall and UIW seal installed
2019: Property at 4119 Broadway acquired and Lewis Center announced as anchor tenant; first philanthropic gift announced

UIW Receives Transformative Gift of $5 Million

The University of the Incarnate Word (UIW) is proud to announce that it has received a pledge of $5 million to support the development and renovation of Founders Hall. The transformative pledge comes to UIW from the Elma Dill Russell Spencer Foundation, managed by the family of Jack Lewis III, former chair of the UIW Board of Trustees and longtime supporter of the University.

Read the News Story

Headquarters of the Lewis Center of the Americas

The first program to be announced at Founders Hall was the innovative Liza and Jack Lewis Center of the Americas. The Lewis Center serves as a central resource for information and analysis on critical issues of common concern, bringing people together to exchange views, build expertise, expand business opportunities and develop policy options.

Read about the Lewis Center