Latest Reports

Active learning, collaborative spaces, real-world connections, a purposeful focus on “soft skills,” and a grounding in liberal arts and sciences all combine in Jefferson’s Nexus Learning approach to develop and support work-ready graduates. “Nexus Learning is based on a suite of strategies that ensures our graduates are prepared to succeed in their professions or graduate school,” says Jeffrey Ashley, PhD, chemistry professor and director of the Center for Teaching Innovation and Nexus Learning at Jefferson (Philadelphia University + Thomas Jefferson University). Nexus Learning appears to be on target in this mission, with 97 percent of undergraduates working in their disciplines or accepted to graduate school within four months of graduation.

The College of Engineering, one of 15 colleges and schools at Cornell University, has 21 percent of the undergraduate population, 32 percent of the graduate population, and 10 percent of the square footage of the campus. As part of the college master plan, Upson Hall, originally built in the 1950s, and one of the largest buildings on the engineering quad, was in line for modernization. The plan called for improving energy efficiency, providing student and faculty collaborative space, and creating wet, hybrid, nano-, bio-, and chemical engineering labs. Since the building is well-located and structurally sound, with good floor-to-floor heights for labs, the decision was to renovate the existing structure, rather than undertake new construction. The project, a complete gut and renovation of the 160,000-gsf building, scheduled in two approximately year-long phases, was completed in August 2017.

Purdue University’s new 178,000-sf Wilmeth Active Learning Center (WALC) contains seven different types of classrooms that are so integrated into the Library of Engineering and Science that “at times, you almost can’t tell the difference between them,” says Nanette Andersson, director of library facilities. The design was borne of years of study into the effectiveness of active learning and the kinds of spaces that best support it. The result is a facility that is utilized nearly 24 hours a day.

To support its cutting-edge research in self-operated machines, the Center for Autonomous Systems and Technologies (CAST) at California Institute of Technology (Caltech) is equipped with several groundbreaking capabilities that set it apart from other engineering research facilities. At the top of the list are a drone testing arena capable of mimicking a full gamut of real-world weather conditions, and a zero-gravity-simulating space lab whose epoxy resin floor has been ground and polished to a final flatness of 0.003 of an inch. Three CAST components—the aerodrome, assembly lab, and the Space Robotics Controls Laboratory (SRCL)—are located in the 1940s-era Kármán building, originally constructed for wartime hydrodynamics research. Working with CO Architects and Matt Construction, Pasadena-based Caltech renovated the bunker-like building to create new types of spaces for cross-campus collaborations in the expanding field of autonomous drones, robots, and satellites, with a focus on practical applications in science, industry, and medicine.

The new Campus Crossroads at the University of Notre Dame is the largest construction project in the school’s 175-year history. The project, which was four years in the making, consists of three new adjacent buildings anchored to the south, east, and west sides of the iconic 87-year-old stadium. The overarching goal was to integrate academic and student life into the game day experience at a facility that previously had been used for only eight days a year—for football games and commencement. The addition of 800,000 sf of new facilities transformed it into a year-round center of athletics, academics, and student life, with classroom, research, fitness, digital media, performance, meeting, event, and hospitality space.