President Vaughn announced via global email that Stadium has been renamed to Morsani Hall. Philanthropists’ Frank and Carol Morsani, according to the email, made a multi-million dollar donation to UT.
For current students however, it’s still a habit to call the dining and residence hall Stadium.
“I prefer Stadium, because it sounds better…even though we’ll call it Morsani Hall now, it doesn’t fit in my opinion,” says junior music major Markus Zakaria.
Students say that it’s just a force-of-habit to call the building Stadium.
“It’s easier to say Stadium instead of whomever Morsani Hall,” said sophomore performing arts major, Jeff Dyal. “[The name change] does not bother me, I just refuse to call it anything else than Stadium because that is how it was when I came here.”
“I understand that the school has to change the name of the building due to the generous donation made for the building,” says senior advertising and public relations major Adam Gomes. “So it’s only courteous to name the building after them. Do I still call Stadium, Stadium? Yes. I lived in that building for two years and I’ve been calling it Stadium since 2009.”
Junior education major Kaylee Nonnemacher works in the Admissions Office and forgets to call Stadium by its new name on campus tours.
“I gave a tour the other day and kept calling it Stadium and didn’t remember to correct myself and apologize to my group for saying the wrong thing until I was leaving,” said Nonnemacher. “But as soon as I get used to that I’m sure that’s the only time I’ll really ever call it Morsani because in my opinion, it will always be Stadium.”
Some students wonder why Resident Hall 7 didn’t take the name Morsani.
“I know a lot of people were asking why the new building didn’t just get named Morsani Hall, says Nonnemaker, “but if what I’ve heard is correct, it would take a $10 million donation to get your name on that one so the Morsanis may have donated a few million, but it might not have been enough so they just took Stadium instead since every other building already has a donor name on it.”
Incoming freshmen will know the building only as Morsani Hall, but for current students, it seems that the name Stadium will stick.
Other major buildings in the Tampa Bay area, such as a theater- in the Straz Center for Performing Arts, the University of South Florida College of Medicine and an exhibition hall at the Salvador Dali museum have been named after the Morsanis.
Vicky Cirello can be reached at victoria.cirello@spartans.ut.edu