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•🧑🎓 Who: Northwest Florida State College, The Jay Odom Group, College President Mel Ponder, Regina Samy
•🏗️ What: Ribbon-cutting ceremony for the college’s first-ever residence hall
•⏳ When: Sunset on the day of the event, with long-term plans for more dorms if demand increases
•📍 Where: Northwest Florida State College, Niceville, Florida
•💡 Why: To provide on-campus housing for students, enhance campus life, and support college growth
The sun silhouetted the new three-story dorms at Northwest Florida State College as the winter sun took its early leave from campus.
Sunset, at 5:36 PM in Niceville, left just enough time for the ribbon-cutting ceremony to open the school’s first-ever residence hall before night overtook the three-tone brick structure with multiple peaks on the hall, which sits just inside the campus gates on College Boulevard.
“Our board saw fit years back to create the vision statement of our institution,” Northwest Florida State College President Mel Ponder reflected as he spoke to the several hundred people who celebrated the ribbon cutting together, “the first three words are ‘To transform lives.’ But we love to see people coming, one way to leave another way, inspired, full of hope.”
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Residents step inside the foyer of the new building and are welcomed by an open common area at the opening of the building. From there, they can walk down a hallway or take the elevator up to their dorm rooms on the first or second floors.
The third floor features a game room area complete with a vista that includes the woods to the west of campus and the roof of the Mattie Kelly Arts Center. It also has various board games, ping pong, and a retro-style arcade.
The rooms have snug layouts that give students a place to sleep, a desk for studying, and a closet. Each room is closed off from the rest of the students’ rooms in their suite.
Living in the dorms will cost students roughly $7,000 a semester, according to Regina Samy, the Executive Director of Resident Housing and Campus Living for Raider Village at Northwest Florida State College at the Jay Odom Group.
The rooms inside the dorms are split up into suites which can house either two or four students per unit.
At full capacity with all paying renters – The Odom Group stands to bring in a little more than $1.3 Million per semester on the project. Our report in 2023 explained the project was financed with a $10 million loan – $5 million from the Northwest Florida State College Foundation and another $5 million from the Community Bank of Mississippi.
The Jay Odom Group owns the building, which is built on land leased from the College.
Odom, who attended Northwest Florida State College back in the day, says his company expects to begin construction on a second, smaller dorm facility when this one is at or near capacity.
“This is a passion project of mine. I went to school here when I was only a freshman,” Odom said, “and to get the opportunity to be asked to come back and build the first on-campus housing for Northwest Florida State College was an honor and a privilege.”
Odom added that if the first two dorms succeed, the school and his company can work together to build even more student housing because the school has land earmarked for that purpose.
