Minnesota Carlson Celebrates Transformed Building, Newly Named Marilyn C. Nelson Hall
Tuesday, September 8, 2026
This school year, Minnesota Carlson welcomes back students, faculty and staff to a reimagined building — newly named Marilyn C. Nelson Hall — following the completion of the fully donor-funded $40M Connecting Carlson project. This comes after almost two years of construction, which modernized the nearly 30-year-old facility to meet today’s business needs.
The building’s new name honors prominent business leader Marilyn Carlson Nelson, the former CEO of Carlson Companies, who provided the lead gift for Connecting Carlson. The project transformed core spaces — 70,000 square feet total — to elevate hands-on learning, promote collaboration and engage with the community.
Nelson Hall is the first building on the University of Minnesota’s Twin Cities campus named solely for a female philanthropist — and one of the only flagship business school buildings in the country named exclusively for a female industry leader. Having built her career during a period when few women held leadership positions, Carlson Nelson hopes to inspire the next generation of business leaders.
“If there's any single message I want my name on this building to say is that women faculty and students belong here,” says Carlson Nelson. “It's become a little trite to say, ‘If you can see it, you can be it.’ But the fact is that it still holds true. I hope that when they see the name, students will be curious about who I was and what I stood for.”
By The Numbers
Modernized Spaces
Connecting Carlson included a transformed Glenn & Kay Hasse Atrium, a reimagined John & Annette Whaley Auditorium, and two new dedicated hands-on learning spaces — the Glaser Family Experiential Learning Suite (home of the Carlson Enterprises) and the Srilata Zaheer Experiential Learning Lab (housing the Carlson Analytics Lab).
Inside the Glaser Family Suite are four labs — the Wells Fargo Financial Markets Lab, Laura & David Newinski Consulting Enterprise Lab, Nystrom Family Brand Enterprise Lab, and the Mark & Diane Gorder Ventures Enterprise Lab, as well as the Dr. James Cross Carlson Enterprise Shared Space. Additionally, the Bjornnes Family Suite now houses the Gary S. Holmes Center for Entrepreneurship.
The revitalized Hasse Atrium offers increased room for visitor seating and collaboration due to the removal of the central staircase. A new LED media wall (one of the largest in a U.S. academic building) atop the fixed, accessible Sit Investment Stage centers the space as the new living room of the school. A new feature switchback staircase extends from the lower level to the second level, allowing for seamless access to the Hanson Hall skyway. An infill on the first level around the staircase added 965 square feet, while the second level expanded by approximately 2,600 square feet for a new common area and a walkway that completes a full circulation loop around the atrium.
A new retractable wall unites the Hasse Atrium and the Whaley Auditorium, allowing for greater connectivity and easier flow during events. The auditorium was transformed with new tiered table seating designed with collaboration in mind and received lighting and audio/visual technology upgrades.
New common spaces, called academic homes, provide more options for gathering and networking. On the first floor, this includes the Kileen Family Academic Home, the Renae Welder Academic Home, and the Hubers Family Academic Home, with the Military Veterans Academic Home on the second floor and the Brian K. Gerhardson Academic Home on the lower level. Overall, Connecting Carlson increases square footage dedicated to common spaces by 166%.
The lower level also added two active learning classrooms — the Chris & Amy Koch Classroom and the Doug & Peg Schmalz Classroom. There are now also 30 updated or newly created breakout rooms and study spaces throughout the building. Among them are the Harold and Cindi Goldfine Meeting Room, Jody Gunderson Meeting Room, Alpha Kappa Psi Meeting Room, George Reiling Meeting Room, Gopher Cofer Collab Meeting Room, Steven (Dr. H) Huchendorf Family Meeting Room, Chuck & Liz Mooty Family Meeting Room, Craig and Jessica Schmidt Family Meeting Room, and Snedeker Family Meeting Room.
A Continued Legacy
The revitalized school builds upon the legacy of the Carlson family and Minnesota Carlson. In 1986, a gift from family patriarch Curt Carlson — Carlson Nelson’s father — renamed the University of Minnesota’s business school as the Carlson School of Management. Decades later, that connection remains inextricably linked.
“It’s incredibly meaningful for the school to have its ongoing connection to the vision and legacy that Curt had,” says Dean Jamie Prenkert. “This latest milestone only strengthens those ties as we enter a new era of learning and scholarship at Minnesota Carlson.”
JE Dunn Construction led the construction, and BWBR led the architectural design.
Fully Donor-Funded
A network of passionate supporters helped make the Connecting Carlson project a reality. Minnesota Carlson extends special thanks to the following:
- Jodi Billy
- Norm, ’72 BSB, and Conni Bjornnes
- Mary Pat Blake, ’77 BSB
- John, ’97 MBA, and Kristin Bruellman
- Heidi Capozzi, ’98 MHRIR
- Carlson Family Foundation
- Marilyn Carlson Nelson
- Tim, ’92 MBA, and Jodi Cofer
- James Cross, ’69 BSB, ’79 MBA, ’84 PhD
- Mark, ’83 BSB, and Jill Feriancek
- Brian Gerhardson, ’86 BSB
- The Glaser Family — Ken Glaser, ’42 BSB, Chip Glaser, ’75 BSB, and KC Glaser, ’05 BSB, ’16 MBA
- Harold Goldfine, ’68 BSB
- Mark, ’83 MBA, and Diane Gorder
- Nicole Graves, ’97 MHRIR
- Jody Gunderson, ’86 BSB
- Lili Hall
- Glenn, ’63 BSB, and Kay Hasse
- Mike Hoffman, ’02 MBA
- David Holtze, ’80 BSB
- David, ’65 BSB, ’70 MBA, and Shirley Hubers
- Steve Huchendorf
- Ben Irby, ’10 MBA
- David Katkov, ’79 BSB, ’89 MBA, and Patricia Wyffels, ’92 MHRIR
- Kate Kelly, ’86 MBA
- Jill Kidwell
- The Kileen Family — Mary Mooty Kileen, ’88 BSB, ’93 MBA, and Tom Kileen, ’88 BSB, ’91 MBA
- Chris, ’92 MBA, and Amy Koch
- Tim LaLonde, ’86 BSB
- Richard Lee, ’77 BSB, ’79 MBA
- Kathy Marinello
- Catherine Mathis, ’75 BSB, ’79 MBA
- Chuck Mooty, ’83 BSB, ’84 MBA
- Bennett Morgan, ’87 MBA
- Jeff Mudge, ’94 MBA
- Laura, ’94 MBT, and David Newinski
- Judd, ‘96 BSB, and Melinda Nystrom
- Rick Olson, ’10 MBA
- Tom, ‘71 BSB, and Meredith Olson
- Dick, ’76 BSB, and Nancy, ’77 BSB, Perrine
- George Reiling, ’74 BSB
- Peter Rottier, ’99 BSB
- Bill, ’60 BSB, and Susan Sands
- Doug, ’67 BSB, and Peg Schmalz
- Kathy Schmidlkofer, ’97 MBA
- Craig, ’03 BSB, and Jessica Schmidt
- Gary Semmer, ’76 BSB
- Sit Investment Associates
- Bill, ’69 BSB, ’72 MBA, and Karen Snedeker
- Tom Staggs, ’82 BSB
- John, ’00 BSB, Tamara Stern
- Bill, ’72 MBA, and Judy Walter
- Renae Welder, ’93 BSB, ’96 JD
- John, ’74 BSB, and Annette Whaley
Building photography by Dan Gunderson and Pat Vasquez-Cunningham