On Feb. 2, the board of trustees approved to change the name of the Human Environmental Sciences Department to the Connie D. McKinney Department of Human Sciences, Hospitality, and Design.

The beginning of construction for the Anderson College of Nursing building required the department to move earlier than planned.

The HES Department was previously at two different sites. Their first was in the basement of Floyd Hall. The second site on the university’s east campus on Tune Avenue.

The department began moving to their new facility, the Keystone Building, at 205 South Seminary Street at the beginning of spring 2017. The new building was completed enough to move locations.

The culinary arts and hospitality management students remain on the east campus, said Interim Department Chair Kendra McLain. They will not relocate to the new facility until completion of the project.

The Keystone building is currently in phase one of the three phases planned, said senior Administrative Assistant Courtney Cornelius.

McLain said the department has been working with a local architect firm, Lambert Ezell Durham, which allowed them to work closely together from the beginning to make the classrooms exactly what the students need.

“We have more space over here so we are able to do more things that we haven’t been able to do in the past,” McLain said. “Our nutrition students will do community outreach projects, and we have room to actually bring the community in here to do some of those classes. Whereas at Floyd, we did not have what we needed to be able to do that sort of thing.”

The front two classrooms are temporary, McLain said. Once the construction is complete, it will become a large event room that will allow the culinary art students to engage more with the community and students while gaining experience.

Junior Danielle Beall says she is excited to see this happen.

“The thing that makes me most excited about the move is that we finally have our own updated space instead of being in a basement,” she said. “I feel like the move was long overdue. We’ve been in an empty building since I’ve been here. Not many people knew we existed in the basement of Floyd.

Junior Kelly Grace Johnson said she is looking forward to the move.

“I’m most excited about the parking,” she said. “Since our new building is downtown we have more parking options. Having more parking allows me to leave later for class and still be on time.”

She said she also believes more students will be attracted to HES as a major because of the new building.

Senior Kevin Williams said he thinks the move is unfortunate because students will have to travel off campus for classes at the new location.