Cleone Peterson Eccles Alumni House:
A new place for alumni to call home
The U now boasts a Pac-12 caliber alumni house, and you can be a part of it!
Hundreds of loyal U alumni and friends are creating a lasting legacy by adding their names to the donor wall inside the spectacular new Cleone Peterson Eccles Alumni House. Please consider joining the growing list of dedicated and generous alumni who have given $1,000 or more to help make the transformation of the Alumni House a reality.
Send your gift today.
Why a bigger, better Alumni House was needed
Since 1980, the Alumni House—located at 155 S. Central Campus Drive—has been the on-campus home for students and the community. It is the headquarters for the U’s Alumni Association, which connects to more than 280,000 alumni worldwide through a variety of services:
- Raises some $800,000 each year in student scholarships
- Engages 18 national alumni chapters and 12 international alumni clubs
- Provides career coaching and professional development opportunities
- Runs The MUSS, the U’s famed 6,000-member student athletics fan club
- Organizes one of the largest annual food drives in the state for the Utah Food Bank
- Publishes Continuum magazine, a monthly e-newsletter, and email updates to alumni across the globe
The Alumni House serves as a meeting and gathering place, hosting more than 500 alumni, campus, and community events each year. It is the venue for awards ceremonies, conferences, campus orientations, service projects, MUSS ticket distribution, and wedding receptions. With a nearly 40 percent increase in the student population since 1980, entry into the Pac-12, and the U’s growing national and international reputation, the previous facility was no longer able to keep up with internal and external demands.
A major expansion and renovation is now complete, thanks to a $4 million lead gift from the Spencer F. and Cleone Peterson Eccles family, and the generous contributions of the O.C. Tanner Charitable Trust, Kem (BA’67 JD’70) and Carolyn (BS'69) Gardner, the Zeke (BA'50) and Kay (BS'51) Dumke family, the Sorenson Legacy Foundation, and Jeff (BS’80) and Helen Cardon.
The new facility is named in honor of Cleone Peterson Eccles BS’57, an active U alumna and benefactor, former vice president of the Alumni Association, and a 10-year member of the U’s Board of Trustees. In the 1970s, her husband, Spencer F. Eccles BS’56, led the successful campaign to raise funds for the original Alumni House. “This gift brings the ongoing, generous involvement of the Spence and Cleone Eccles family ‘full circle’ with our Alumni Association,” said former Alumni Association Executive Director M. John Ashton BS’66 JD’69, who worked alongside Cleone.