Minutes before midnight on the last day of the 2006 legislative session, lawmakers finalized $46.75 million for a much-anticipated library at the Orem school's campus.

The funding is the largest single appropriation in UVSC's history and marks a critical step in the school's climb toward university status.

"We haven't had a lot bigger news than that at UVSC," Val Hale, the school's assistant vice president for external affairs, said Monday. "You can't be a university without a good library."

The 180,000-square-foot Digital Learning Center will be the largest facility on campus when finished in spring 2009. It will be built just east of the Liberal Arts Building.

UVSC officials are wasting no time. They already have sent out bids for design and construction.

Groundbreaking is slated for this fall.

Until then, the school will be busy raising the final $1.25 million for the $48 million building.

"This facility will really move us up in a different league," UVSC President William Sederburg said. "It will change the whole nature of the campus."

School brass have been pushing for library funding since Sederburg arrived three years ago.

Officials said the current library is built for 8,000 students - the college's full-time enrollment is 15,000 - and is smaller than those at several area high schools. UVSC students joke the real library is the Hall of Flags, a major hallway in the administration building.

Senior social work major Traci Dunstan, 22, of Payson, chooses to study in the noisy Sorensen Student Center rather than trek to the undersized library.

"I've been to four different colleges, and I've spent a lot more time in their libraries," Dunstan said. "[UVSC's library] is just out of the way."

The new library will boast 60 group-study rooms and a commons area with 140 computers. The massive building will dwarf even UVSC's 140,000-square-foot McKay Events Center and will gobble up a large portion of parking stalls.

To offset the parking loss, UVSC officials plan to build another lot at the north end of campus.

Freshman Bradley Epgood, 19, of American Fork, hopes the new library is done before he finishes school so he can leave his makeshift study spot in the Hall of Flags.

"If it's a lot bigger, it could maybe help bring more people to UVSC," Epgood said. "You need more students to become a university."

thollingshead@sltrib.com