Higher Education

Indiana University of Pennsylvania is building a $30 million facility for the College of Humanities and Social Sciences. Designed by Astorino to foster interdisciplinary collaboration, the building will house the departments of English, journalism, political science, philosophy, history, religious studies, geography, and regional planning. The five-story, 126,505-sf facility will provide 31 classrooms, 120 faculty and administrative offices, laboratories, a 250-seat auditorium, eight conference rooms, a media room, and an atrium.

The University of Georgia is planning to build the $45 million Science Learning Center in Athens. The 122,500-sf facility will provide modern, flexible laboratories for undergraduate science instruction in the STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) disciplines. The building will house 33 teaching labs for chemistry, physics, biological sciences, and plant biology. Upon completion, the University is also planning a $10 million renovation to upgrade its existing science laboratories.

The University of Michigan has completed the second renovation phase of the Michigan Memorial Phoenix Laboratory in Ann Arbor. Designed by Lord Aeck Sargent, the $11.1 million project included construction of a 10,161-sf addition to house the University of Michigan Energy Institute and the creation of advanced laboratory space on the second floor of the existing building. The completed facility includes a 2,108-sf chemistry lab with 12 fume hoods, a 1,082-sf chemistry lab with two fume hoods, research offices, and an executive conference room.

The University of Wyoming began construction on the $50 million Michael B. Enzi STEM Facility in Laramie in January of 2014. The three-story, 100,000-sf facility will provide 32 teaching labs for chemistry, biology, organic chemistry, physics, mathematics, and computer science. The building will also include eight prep rooms, eight offices, a commons area, and an atmospheric sciences lab to support collaborative research with the NCAR-Wyoming Supercomputing Center in Cheyenne.

The University of South Florida broke ground on the $50 million USF Health Heart Institute in Tampa in December of 2013. The five-story, 100,000-sf facility will feature four core laboratories for basic and applied research, including regenerative medicine; pharmacology and drug discovery; bioinformatics and genomics; and integrative cell and organ physiology. The interdisciplinary project is created in partnership with Florida Hospital Pepin Heart Institute and is slated for completion in 2015.

Construction will begin in early 2014 on the $50 million Water Campus in Baton Rouge, La. The 30-acre development will provide research, engineering, and administrative facilities for government agencies, academic institutions, and industry partners. The first phase of construction will feature Louisianna State University's 50,000-sf River Modeling Center which will include a small scale representation of the lower Mississippi River.

Vanderbilt University is planning a four-story, 160,000-sf expansion of Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital in Nashville. The $84 million tower will provide one inpatient care floor, including a 36-bed pediatric ICU, and three floors of shell space. Construction will begin in 2015.
 

Auburn University began building the $20 million Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine (VCOM) in December of 2013. Located in the Auburn Research Park, the 90,400-sf facility will provide classrooms, laboratories, small group interaction areas, and a technology center. The general contractor for the project is Brasfield & Gorrie. Completion is expected by summer of 2015.

Located on the southern end of the Kaiser Permanente Fontana medical campus, the new 490,000-sf, seven-story teaching hospital and inpatient tower replaces an existing main hospital, some of which will be converted for outpatient use. With more than 500 physicians and 4,400 support staff serving more than 440,000 members, the 314-private-bed hospital includes a 28-private-bed neonatal intensive care unit and a 51-room emergency department.

The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston is designing a $42 million research facility to replace a building damaged by Hurricane Ike in 2008. The six-story, 93,000-sf project will provide laboratories, research support space, and mechanical areas. Construction is expected to begin by March of 2015 with completion following in summer of 2017.

Colby College is building the $18.6 million Davis Science Center in Waterville, Maine. Providing classrooms, computer labs, faculty offices, and research space, the 36,400-sf facility will house the departments of mathematics and statistics, computer science, and psychology. LEED sustainable design certification will be sought for the center, which will feature a robotics laboratory and a behavioral neuroscience research suite. Completion is expected in fall of 2014.

The University of Canterbury will begin construction in mid-2014 on the $212 million Regional Science and Innovation Centre in Christchurch, New Zealand. Providing technology-rich classrooms and laboratories to support progressive science pedagogies, the facility will accommodate a variety of learning modalities including small laboratory discovery groups, online instruction, and face-to-face teaching.

The New School will open its $372 million University Center in New York in January of 2014. The facility will act as an interdisciplinary hub for all of the university's programs. The 16-story, 375,000-sf building includes seven floors of academic space with dormitories on the remaining nine. Designed by Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, the facility will provide a 600-seat auditorium, flexible classrooms, lecture halls, learning studios, a library, student and faculty resource rooms, and an event café.

Trident Technical College will open a 90,000-sf science and nursing building in January of 2014 in North Charleston, S.C. The $30 million facility will feature a 291-seat tiered lecture hall that can be divided into smaller instructional spaces, as well as teaching labs, classrooms, a clinical simulation suite, and a nursing resource center. LEED Silver sustainable design certification will be sought for the building. The project team included design architect LS3P Associates and general contractor China Construction America.