1. The goals of these three agencies are both similar and different. Each strives to serve a particular group of society, whether public or private. The ARC, Grainger Engineering Library, and Chicago's Midtown Tennis Club all offer their own forms of recreation and leisure in order to suit the people they serve. Since both are found on campus, ARC and Grainger offer recreation services to students pursuing education here at the University of Illinois. Their goals are to offer leisure as cocurricular enrichment, maintain campus control and morale, enhance the school's imagine, and contribute to student development. ARC offers recreational sport activities, such as intramurals and fitness, while Grainger is more suited as a place to rest and relax in a quiet environment. Although Midtown is similar to the ARC in that they specialize in sports recreation, the tennis club's objective is primarily to serve its paying members and provide them with personalized instruction as well as quality service.
2. Funding for these leisure delivery systems varies by agency. Since the ARC can be found on campus, it is funded through the university along with other university facilities. The Grainger Engineering Library, being named after William Grainger, also receives private funds through The Grainger Foundation Inc. as well as through the University. The University's source for gathering its funds include both government funding and tuition fees paid for by students. On the other hand, Midtown Tennis Club is maintained through the membership and programs fees paid by its members. The money generated is either used to somehow improve the facilities or to pay the employees working there as tennis instructors or personal trainers. Despite the different methods of funding, each agency puts forth a tremendous amount of effort into using the money to improve the quality of service it provides to its users.
3. The Activity and Recreation Center was renovated in 2005 to create a better enriched environment for its users. It opened primarily to serve students and faculty members; however, it is not restricted to just students. Community members can benefit from the variety of programs that it offers. Similar to the ARC, the Grainger Engineering Library was also built to serve students and more generally, the public. Unlike both of these two agencies, the Midtown Tennis Club is a private membership organization, thus it is open to individual members only. However, more public members have begun to join the club to specialize in tennis and experience it as a fun way to spend their time.
4. The ARC is one of the largest campus recreation centers in the country. It offers a wide range of programs that differs from other campus recreation programs. Its programs can be adventurous and aquatic; there are climbing adventures, club sports, group fitness, and personal training. From physical exercise to social events such as cooking classes, the ARC has helped the community members to achieve physical wellness and serves as a communication and leisure center for its participants. It is a good place for students to come and exercise and at the same time relax with friends together.
The Grainger Library is one of the largest engineering libraries in the nation. With lots of tables and cubicles, students on campus most likely will be able to find a seat at the Grainger Library easier in comparison with other libraries. Also, with numerous amounts of books, magazines, scientific journals available at the Grainger Library, students can gain easy access to information for their research. Some services provided are the Digital Library,flexible hours of operation, and the enhanced technology. The Digital Library assists students to find virtually anything for any project in the most efficient manner. The 24-hour operation helps students to work in a productive setting especially during the final exam week. Lastly, the enhanced technology keeps the internet flying at the speed of light and replacing dated hardware, hence bringing faster computing power to publicly-accessible computers in the library. These are only some of the helpful programs that are unique and help serve the community better.
The Midtown Tennis Club provides its members with courts and instruction, as well as structured league play. It was created to provide the best available tennis instruction as well as offer world-class tennis services. The club has even patented their own method of teaching called “Tennis in No Time”, which has introduced a variety of new players to tennis, most of whom are now members themselves. This is the link to the "Tennis in No Time" (Midtown's Copyrighted Teaching method) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X-CizLQPepg. What differs from other tennis clubs is that Midtown not only serves all those that play tennis, but it also offers fitness opportunities, social events, and child supervision for all its members. Such opportunities include its variety of facilities like cardiovascular and strength equipment, a sauna, a whirlpool, cafe, and a pro shop.
5. Grainger Engineering Library first opened in 1994, and it has since remained the most state of the art and versatile facility on campus. One of the biggest strengths that Grainger boasts as a leisure service provider is the size of its facility. With its high ceilings and large worktables, Grainger provides ample space for up to 1,200 patrons, and is ideal for studying, research, group work, computer lab work, or merely taking some time to relax. As the largest Engineering library in the nation, Grainger proves its strength of its large range of accessible resources available for students, faculty, and the public. It hosts 350,000 volumes of library materials and is capable of supporting 1000 networked computer connections. The weakness of Grainger is its location. It is not located on the Main quad so it puts students that are not engineering majors and that do not live on the northeast side of campus at a disadvantage, in terms of accessibility.
The ARC opened its doors to the public in 2008 and it has since boasted many strengths as a leisure service provider. The greatest strength of the ARC is the wide range of amenities that it offers. The ARC offers a huge variety of programs including adventure programs, aquatics, a climbing wall, club and intramural sports, group fitness, personal training programs, and a Health & Wellness center. With such a wide range of services available, the ARC offers something for anyone looking for fitness or leisure. Another strength of the ARC is its large facility. With several gyms, 2 olympic sized pools, racquetball courts, basketball courts, personal fitness studios, and even a rock climbing wall- the ARC is such a large facility that it is capable of holding numerous patrons and there is seldom a time that one must wait in line for a machine. A weakness of the ARC is its ability to retain its sanitation and to follow the health code, since it cannot clean after each and every patron who uses a machine. Especially with the outbreak of the Swine flu, it would be difficult to ensure that patrons are properly disinfecting machines after use, and in general, to ensure that the facility is sanitary.
The Midtown Tennis Club was created to provide the best available tennis instruction. Its strength is that it offers a large facility- the world’s largest indoor tennis facility- with 18 indoor tennis courts. Another strong point of the facility is that it offered renowned tennis instruction which coordinates tennis lessons with personal training.
6. The Grainger Engineering Library's objective is to provide an outstanding library facility with ample accommodations and a wide range of resources for its patrons to increase productivity and efficiency. Grainger undoubtedly accomplishes this objective both through its facility and also through its available library materials and resources. An example of Grainger’s excellence is the simple fact that if you ask any student on campus where their favorite place to study is- they will undoubtedly reply, “Grainger.” It has a well-known reputation for being the best library facility on campus, not to mention its national ranking, which is a clear indication that it has more than followed through with its objective.
The goal of the ARC is to provide a state-of-the art fitness facility for students, faculty, and residents of the U of I and Champaign-Urbana communities. With the array of amenities and accommodations that it offers to guests and patrons, it is easy to see that the ARC has succeeded in its goal of being a state-of-the art facility. The best example of its success is the fact that it with four floors and 340,000 square feet- the ARC is one of the largest campus facilities in the nation. The variety of programs and activities that are available at the ARC prove that it has gone above and beyond its overall goal.
The Midtown Tennis Club definitely fulfills its objective of providing the best available tennis instruction and offering world-class tennis services. Through the wide range of amenities that it offers its members including private instruction, personal training, high-quality tennis courts, and a pro shop it is undoubtedly a state of the art tennis facility. The best example of its fulfillment of its objective of providing superb tennis instruction is the 18 indoor tennis courts that it offers to its members. In doing so- it is the largest indoor facility in the world. Another example of its fulfillment would be the success of its patented method of teaching tennis which is called Tennis in No Time. It is clear that the Midtown Tennis Club strives to be the best tennis facility and clearly it has accomplished this.
After researching the Grainger Engineering Library, ARC, and Midtown Tennis Club we have gained a much better understanding of how they compare and contrast to each other. One can see the similarities and differences, that were discussed in lecture, of the way these agencies meet their goals, generate funds, target users, are unique, and their overall strengths and weaknesses after completing this assignment. These three facilities go above and beyond what one would label a library, rec center, and tennis court. These services deliver leisure on all levels so that everyone is indeed satisfied.
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