Pomona College broke ground Saturday, October 10, on the new Center for Global Engagement (CGE), the largest capital project in its history. The Center is expected to offer a new model of liberal arts global learning—one designed for a world where the most important questions demand many ways of thinking.
More than 120 students, faculty, staff, trustees, alumni, families and friends attended the ceremony, led by Pomona College President G. Gabrielle Starr. Donning blue hard hats, College leaders put shovels in the ground to commemorate this monumental moment at the former site of the Oldenborg Center for Modern Languages and International Relations. And just as Oldenborg was the first of its kind, the CGE will offer a distinctive framework for global learning unlike any other in higher education nationwide.
The $125 million project, which is set to open its doors in fall 2028, will span 100,000 square feet, bringing academic, residential and community life together to create new opportunities for students, faculty, visiting scholars and partners from around the world to learn and exchange ideas across disciplines and borders.
“Our world needs people who choose curiosity over certainty, understanding over division and engagement over retreat,” President Starr said at the groundbreaking ceremony. “The Center for Global Engagement is our answer to that call—and our investment in generations of students who will graduate from Pomona prepared to meet the world with purpose.”
The groundbreaking follows the Board of Trustees’ approval of the project after the College secured $50 million in philanthropic commitments toward the cost of construction. Lead support includes $10 million gifts from Board of Trustees Chair Janet Inskeep Benton ’79 and Trustee Emeritus Ranney E. Draper ’60 and his late wife, Priscilla Draper, whose philanthropy will support key elements of the Center’s residential, garden and community spaces. The Board of Trustees’ and Trustee Emeriti support helped turn the College’s vision for the center into reality, with additional commitments totaling more than $36 million.
At a luncheon preceding the ceremony, President Starr offered special thanks to Benton and Draper for helping the College bring the project to fruition. She praised Benton for her “visionary leadership and generosity in championing the CGE from its earliest conception,” and thanked Draper, whom she called “our treasured friend,” for a lifetime of service to Pomona and its mission.
Designed by architecture firm Solomon Cordwell Buenz, the CGE will build on Oldenborg’s 60-year legacy of providing language immersion and international education to a new generation. Oldenborg, which had reached the end of its useful life, was demolished this summer to make way for the new state-of-the art building.
Designed to achieve LEED Gold certification, the Center will incorporate sustainable building practices, welcoming outdoor gathering spaces and innovative technologies. Additionally, rooftop solar arrays on the CGE will bring the number of campus buildings with such systems to 13. On-campus solar currently supplies about 3% of the College’s total electricity use and Pomona aims to increase that share to 10% by 2030.
The CGE’s impact will be measured not only by its physical footprint, but by the connections, experiences and opportunities it creates for students.
“The programming at the CGE will help bring the world to Pomona and Pomona to the world, creating opportunities every day for students to connect classroom learning with real-world experience, language, culture and community,” Assistant Vice President and Chief Global Officer Kara Godwin says.
For Sarah Owosina ’29, who addressed the crowd at the ceremony, the promise of the Center lies in what those connections will mean for the students who will one day call it home.
“I have found a real sense of community across the 5Cs, and I’m excited that the CGE will not only give our consortium a shared hub where community members from The Claremont Colleges can come together to meet the world, but will also be a place where we can continue the work right in the spaces they live,” says Owosina.
The CGE is a defining initiative of “Originals: The Campaign for Pomona College,” a $530 million fundraising campaign that publicly launched this weekend and is the most comprehensive in the College’s history.
Janet Inskeep Benton ’79: Building a Global Community
At the heart of Benton’s gift is a deep belief in the residential experience and its power to shape students’ lives. Benton said residence halls are more than places to live: They are where friendships form, perspectives broaden and conversations continue long after class ends. Her support will help build on Oldenborg’s legacy while creating new opportunities for students to engage across languages, cultures and lived experiences, making global understanding a part of everyday life at Pomona.
The Center for Global Engagement will house more than 200 students in nine immersive living-learning communities, including seven focused on language immersion led by language residents and two centered on global themes. In addition to creating space for 60 new residents on campus in its 60,000-square-foot residence hall, the Center will create opportunities for conversations started in technology-enabled classrooms and seminars to continue over meals, within residential communities and throughout the shared spaces that will bring the building to life, such as the Center’s dining forum and event venue.
“Pomona has always been a place where original ideas and original people come together in powerful ways,” Benton said. “The Center for Global Engagement represents the next chapter in that story—one that embraces our world and the promise it holds.”
Ranney E. Draper ’60: A Place for Connection
For Draper, support for the Center for Global Engagement is also a tribute to his beloved wife, Priscilla, who passed away in 2023. The couple’s gift will name the outdoor plaza at the center’s west entrance between Sumner Hall and the CGE. As the largest plaza on Pomona’s campus, the space reflects Priscilla’s love of gardens and her belief in the power of thoughtfully designed outdoor spaces to bring people together.
The gift also continues the family’s enduring relationship with Pomona that spans more than a century. Draper’s parents, Trustee Emeritus Ranney C. ’25 and Virginia ’26 Draper, were longtime champions of the College, and Draper carried that tradition forward through more than 25 years of service on the Board of Trustees and philanthropy that has helped shape Pomona’s campus and programs.
“The College’s founders set out to build a college in a garden, a place where the landscape would be part of the Pomona experience,” Draper said. “Priscilla loved gardens, too, because of the way they brought people together. It feels meaningful that her name will represent a space where students can gather, connect and make memories of their own.”