After 35 years of teaching in Reavis Hall, English professor John V. Knapp may finally be able to teach in comfort.

Knapp has often sent requests to building officials, asking them to turn on the air conditioning Sunday afternoon instead of Monday morning due to the uncomfortable heat.

But now, Reavis and Watson Hall are experiencing a face-lift: dual-pane, energy-saving windows will replace the old single-pane windows that were built with the structures. The new windows come with a $3.15 million price tag, but officials say the cost of the windows will be less than the money saved through increased heating and cooling efficiency.

That increased insulation will also help with comfort for students and teachers in both buildings.

“Reavis Hall is notoriously cold in the winter and hot in the summer,” Knapp said. “Reavis is an old building and I’m surprised they’re changing the infrastructure. I’m very pleased that they’re putting in the new windows. I assume this will be a much more pleasant place to work.”

Work is underway on Watson and expected to be complete by the first week of August. After Watson is complete, the windows in Reavis will be replaced by the first week of September.

NIU’s director of materials management, Ken Pugh, described the contract with Energy Systems Group of Itasca, Ill. as a performance contract, not a regular project.

“We’re not paying the contractors up front,” said Pugh, who is in charge of the project. “It’s spread over ten years and there’s an audit to make sure the energy savings is worth the cost.”

On Monday, junior journalism major Mei Li and her English 110 classmates sought out a fan to alleviate the heat on the third floor of Reavis.

“In my English room, it is unbearable because they turn off the A.C. over the weekend,” Li said on Monday, when the temperature reached 94 degrees. “Today people were falling asleep in class because we were so tired because of the heat. It made us so sleepy, we really didn’t pay attention.”

Students and staff that frequent Reavis and Watson will be pleased with the more comfortable temperatures in both buildings; the project also will save the university money, Pugh said.

“There’s no real comparison between these new windows and the old ones,” Pugh said. “The old ones were not operable, so there wasn’t much choice.”