Divinity School Begins Drive For $6.8 Million Improvements

The Divinity School is embarking on a $6.8 million fund-raising drive to finance a new dormitory, library extension, and additions to its teaching and scholarship resources.

The campaign will be long-range in scope, and intends to raise the money strictly from private sources over the next several years.

"It's part of the overall University push for new gains and advances in terms of equipment and building," Samuel Howard Miller, Dean of the Faculty of Divinity, said yesterday.

The money will come from friends of the Divinity School, as part of their annual giving efforts, Mrs. Elinor B. Thompson, Administrative Assistant to the Dean, said yesterday.

The new dormitory will cost $1.5 million. It is planned as a north wing to Andover Hall and will house about 50 students. The building will also contain two seminary rooms, an apartment for visiting professors, a refectory, a music and art room, plus rooms set aside for a bookstore and recreational activities.

Twenty-two Divinity School students now live in the main body of Andover Hall, which is primarily used for administrative and faculty offices. The new dormitory will make Andover Hall available for only these offices.

"A lot of us are making do with offices in the basement, including me," Mrs. Thompson said. "For nine years, I've been like a mole. It will be better when I move upstairs."

The projected library extension will be located in two additional stories on the current Divinity School library off the south end of Andover Hal.

The Divinity School hopes to use $1.5 million of the funds raised for an endowment to the Merrill Fellows program. This program allows ministers who have served in parishes for five years or more to return to the Divinity School for a full semester or two.

Five hundred thousand dollars is designated for the establishment of a chair in counselling. The rest of the money will be set aside as scholarship endowments for the Bachelor of Divinity degree and higher degrees, and for use in obtaining additional acquisitions for the expanded library.