Tour Guide

Tour

Start on any floor.

Ambassador Guide

Floor

Floor 1

11 stops

Stop 1: Front Entrance / Building Orientation
Immediately inside the main entrance
- Thunderbird was founded in Glendale, Arizona, in 1946, became part of Arizona State University in 2014–15, moved to Downtown Phoenix in 2018, and opened this Global Headquarters to students in 2021.
- The five-story Global Headquarters was designed as a technologically advanced global learning environment, with sustainability goals that included meeting at least LEED Gold standards.
- Accessibility and inclusive design were intentional parts of the building, and the headquarters later received City of Phoenix recognition for accessibility.
Next:Continue to the Founder’s Ring and Welcome Wall
Stop 2: Founder’s Ring
Front lobby
- The digital Founder’s Ring recognizes donors who have given $1 million or more to Thunderbird.
- It echoes Thunderbird’s original founding story, when Phoenix-area business leaders helped make the new school possible through their support.
- When Thunderbird moved into this Global Headquarters, alumni and supporters again contributed to help launch a new era for the school.
Stop 3: Welcome Wall
Front lobby
- The Welcome Wall says “Welcome” in many languages, including Arizona Native American languages.
- It pays tribute to the Welcome Wall at Thunderbird’s former Glendale campus.
- At the Glendale campus, visitors entered through a large carved wall and arch featuring “Welcome” in many languages, an important symbol for generations of Thunderbird students and alumni.
- The new Welcome Wall carries that tradition into the Downtown Phoenix campus.
Stop 4: Floor 1 Elevator Lobby / Building Story
First-floor elevator lobby
Pause here before moving into the first-floor learning spaces
- The building itself tells Thunderbird’s story through time.
- Floor 1 represents Thunderbird’s future-facing work. As visitors move upward, each floor moves roughly 15 years backward through the school’s history.
- Photography, artifacts, and portraits of Thunderbird presidents and deans throughout the building reflect the eras represented on each floor.
- The building also has a geographic layer: Floor 2 emphasizes Africa and the Middle East, Floor 3 Asia, and Floor 4 Latin America.
- By Floor 5, the tour has moved back toward Thunderbird’s founding years and the traditional heart of the school: the Pub.
- Grumpy Mule, located in the lobby area, is a casual place where students can grab coffee or tea, meet, and spend time between classes.
Stop 5: Global Forum
First-floor Global Forum
If possible, step into the Forum so guests can see the interactive globe and the room itself
- The Global Forum is one of Thunderbird’s main gathering spaces and hosts both internal and external events.
- Thunderbird uses it for regional nights, ceremonies, conferences, honor society events, and other school gatherings.
- It is also a popular venue for the broader Phoenix community and regularly hosts government leaders, consulates, community organizations, conferences, and external events.
- The space has also hosted milestone events such as graduations for Project DreamCatcher, Thunderbird’s program for Native American women entrepreneurs.
- The Forum includes an interactive LED globe, large flexible LED walls, an overhead circular LED ring that can be redesigned for individual events, and multi-camera broadcast capabilities.
- Glass airwalls on both sides can open the room to the outdoors for larger events and increased flow.
Stop 6: Experiential Learning Ecosystem
As guests leave the Global Forum and move toward the Innovation Lab
- The Global Forum is the Present stage of a larger experiential learning ecosystem on the first floor.
- The four connected stages are Imagine → Develop → Test → Present.
- The spaces are designed to move learners through a process: generating ideas, developing them with others, testing them in realistic scenarios, and presenting or defending the result.
- The sequence reinforces the first floor’s future-facing role in the building.
Stop 7: Innovation Lab
First-floor Innovation Lab
- The Innovation Lab is the first stage of the first-floor experiential learning ecosystem.
- It is a flexible, creative environment designed to encourage students to work together.
- Students use the space to explore global challenges, experiment with emerging ideas and AI, and develop early concepts.
- It also functions as a kind of Thunderbird student union space — a place where students can gather, work, and spend time together outside of formal class activity.
Stop 8: Thunderbird AI Hatchery
Innovation Lab
- The Thunderbird AI Hatchery is an emerging student-builder initiative where students learn to create useful, responsible AI-enabled solutions around real needs.
- It is both a learning environment and a project studio, where students work with faculty, staff, researchers, and partners to explore and prototype ideas.
- The Hatchery helps students become thoughtful AI builders without requiring a traditional technical background, emphasizing human judgment, domain knowledge, creativity, business thinking, design, and available technology.
- The Hatchery is still an active pilot, so its methods and operating model continue to evolve.
Stop 9: Collaborative Classroom + Immersive Global Simulation Lab
First-floor hallway beyond the Innovation Lab
- These spaces represent the next stages of the first-floor experiential learning ecosystem.
- In the Collaborative Classroom, learners turn promising ideas into more structured strategies through discussion, teamwork, and faculty guidance.
- The Immersive Global Simulation Lab is still being built.
- Once completed, it is intended to let students step into realistic global scenarios and experience the consequences of their decisions.
Stop 10: Oath of Honor
First-floor hallway near the collaborative learning spaces
- The signed document on the wall is Thunderbird’s Professional Oath of Honor.
- It was developed by students in 2004 as a professional ethics pledge for global business leaders, inspired by the idea of the Hippocratic Oath.
- Thunderbird formally adopted it in 2006, and students continue to recite it at commencement.
- The oath emphasizes honesty, integrity, respect for others, sustainable prosperity, opposition to corruption and exploitation, and personal responsibility.
Stop 11: Route to Floor 2
End of the Floor 1 route
- Before moving upstairs, ask guests whether they are comfortable taking the stairs.
- If stairs are comfortable, use the main stairs to Floor 2.
- If not, use the elevator.
- Continue following the guest’s mobility preference for the remainder of the tour.

Tour

Stop 1: Front Entrance / Building Orientation

Stop 2: Founder’s Ring

Stop 3: Welcome Wall

Stop 4: Floor 1 Elevator Lobby / Building Story

Stop 5: Global Forum

Stop 6: Experiential Learning Ecosystem

Stop 7: Innovation Lab

Stop 8: Thunderbird AI Hatchery

Stop 9: Collaborative Classroom + Immersive Global Simulation Lab

Stop 10: Oath of Honor

Stop 11: Route to Floor 2