Queens College is planning to give its outdated TV studio a $1.5 million facelift, officials said.
It will be the studio’s first major renovation in more than 50 years, when the campus’s King Hall building was first constructed.
“Everything in there is going to be new. Everything that you see or touch in there is going to be replaced. That’s our goal,” said Dave Gosine, the college’s director of facilities, design, construction and management.
About 260 media study students currently use the space to get hands-on training in directing and producing television shows, and creating plays and productions.
But the oldest equipment dates back to the 1980s, according to Gosine and Youwei Sun, the studio’s chief engineer.
The school has even donated three outdated pieces to the Museum of Moving Image, Sun said.
The project will make the 3,200-square-foot studio a handicapped-accessible, state-of-the-art facility, with updated digital technology and a new lighting system, comparable to “just about any TV studio out there,” Gosine said.
“This is a teaching facility. We’re making it more functional, more useable,” he said, adding that there is currently a lot of unused space. “You could have bigger sets, do bigger scenes.”
And it will all be managed by the hands of students.
“The real purpose of this project is to position our students to walk out of here and be marketable from day one,” Gosine said. “At the end of the day, we want them to get employed and go on to have great careers.”
The estimated $1.5 million project will be paid for by city and state funds. It is currently in its bidding phase and is expected to be completed in fall 2015.
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