According to Student Center and Event Services Director Amy Schulz, the modern mission statement of the UCI Student Center is “to enrich the student experience by offering an inclusive space designed for interaction, learning and engagement.”
Schulz has worked on campus for 35 years. As an Anteater alumnus, she takes great pride in UC Irvine and its students.
“Our goal is to make the Student Center a welcoming and safe place for all students,” Schulz told New University via email.
This idea of a student center — a central social spot for the growing student body — dates back to the earliest days of the university.
According to the UCI Libraries’ Anteater Chronicles, a committee built “to strategize the building of such a center” formed as early as 1967. Four student referendums in the early ‘70s detailed funding for the center’s construction but failed to meet voter turnout requirements. The fifth referendum in 1975 carried the proposal.
The “Recommendations for the Operation of the University Center” report hit the administration’s desk in fall 1978. It planned in detail for the future management of the center — dubbed the “University Center” until the late ‘80s — as well as a connected bookstore and food court.
That report, and countless other documents of the Student Center’s development, are preserved in Langson Library’s University Archives Vertical Files collection 1960-2007 — Box 16 contains the University Center records (1978-87), while Box 14 holds the early Student Center (1989-2005).
The center’s early planners grappled with varied considerations to design a well-functioning and welcoming center. The report’s sections range from questions of student employment to the various parameters of including pinball machines in the center; would they be strange, loud or lucrative? No, manageable and yes, suggests the report.
Quarterly newsletters on the construction’s progress started in winter 1979, keeping students up-to-date.
A note from 1980’s SPOP told incoming first-years that “[the University Center] is entirely student-funded, and as a result will provide a variety of programs and services to please any student.”
Those incoming students could look forward to taking part in the center’s grand opening that winter quarter with five days of celebration during January 1981 — including a scavenger hunt, a lookalike contest, and various cultural events, as contemporary flyers advertise.
The University Center of 1981 may be smaller than 2025’s Student Center, but its core services remain familiar.
In the early ‘80s, the Sound Connection music lounge contained records for student use, and the Sidepocket room offered pool, table games and electronic games like “Asteroids” and “Space Invaders.”
The University Center grew with the times, changing with the needs of the students. The first ATM arrived on campus in 1984. Around the same time, a computer store appeared in the center’s directory, followed shortly by the Clone Factory, a copy and design store. Today, The Hill sells electronics, UPS prints posters and the ATM hasn’t changed much.
“Technology has changed how we work and how students learn and interact,” Schulz said.“At one time, students were required to come to our office in person to meet with our team to plan their events. Now we have an online request system called UCI Eventive.”
While the center’s services did not change much, its name did.
“If students pay for the ‘University Center,’ why isn’t it called the ‘Student Center’?” queried one 1989 flyer.
Between 1989 and 1991, the University Center transformed into the Student Center through a period of massive expansion and rebranding.
Need food between classes? ‘Eaters, the center’s food court in the ‘90s, may have lacked the modern mainstays of Subway, Starbucks and Panda Express but, in their place, offered Togo’s, Cornerstone Cafe and Kwong’s Express. The Zot-N-Go convenience store and the Anthill Pub & Grille are both mentioned during this expansion and still operate 35 years later.
P.V. Cues replaced the Sidepocket game room but featured billiards, board games and “Street Fighter II.” The UCTV Lounge played films and shows, the Quiet Lounge offered a place for studying, and another lounge housed, well, general lounging.
The Student Center’s hallmarks fulfill the same purposes — some, like the Information Desk, the conference rooms and the ASUCI offices, even bear the same name as the ‘90s — but their methods have expanded and changed.
The Mac Lab and arcade game tournaments sowed the seeds that would become the modern Student Center’s Esports Arena, founded 2016; “Space Invaders” became “Street Fighter II” became “Valorant.”
The same deliberations from the center’s earliest days on students’ needs reappear in contemporary considerations for the accessibility of the Commuter Lounge and the Meditation Space — the center’s most recent expansions.
With the fall quarter approaching, Schulz looks forward to this year’s fifth annual Zot Quest and hopes to continue growing UCI’s Esports program.
“The student center is and will always be the heart of the campus,” Schulz said.
John Trytten is a Features Intern for the summer 2025 quarter. He can be reached at tryttenj@uci.edu.
Edited by Peyton Arthur and Annabelle Aguirre