Carnegie Mellon University

Dear Pittsburgh Students, 

The Task Force on the CMU Experience wants your help in making the CMU campus a better place.

As you’ll recall, last October, I wrote to you about the Task Force’s efforts to enhance the campus infrastructure and provide the kind of spaces that help you to collaborate, create, or just relax.  

Today, I am pleased to announce the inaugural CMU UPLift Challenge. During this pilot phase of the UPLift Challenge, we invite students, faculty, and staff to submit their ideas for experimental and temporary campus infrastructure projects, renovations, or installations, anywhere on the Pittsburgh campus. We are looking for projects that are modest in scope, but ambitious in imagination. A faculty-staff-student committee will select the best ideas, which the university will fund at up to $20,000 per project, and execute. I invite you to read more about this effort and submit an application with your ideas by April 28.

The Task Force has already embraced the idea that small, creative placemaking projects can make a big difference, identifying a number of shared spaces for renovation. Upgrades to two of these so-called “nooks” — one in Wean Hall and one in the College of Fine Arts building — will take place over the next several months. Working with University Advancement, and in partnership with the Andrew Carnegie Society, we will undertake a fundraising initiative to help build momentum behind this work. 

Of course, small-scale placemaking is just one small part of the strategic and sustained effort to enhance the CMU Experience. Even as we work on these projects, the university continues to push forward on historic infrastructure projects such as the Tepper Quadrangle and a new health and wellness center. We are renovating classrooms, reforming academic policies, expanding mental health care, and building the “One CMU” spirit. We will continue to update you as new initiatives move forward. 

I look forward to receiving your cool, creative and community-focused projects for improving the Pittsburgh campus!

Warm regards,

Farnam Jahanian
Provost and Chief Academic Officer