News
November 2011
A Building to Take Us into the Next Century
View from Rennebohm Hall - Full Resolution (Rendering: Kahler Slater) "We've created a building that's incredibly functional and versatile. The design—with the latest technologies, learning spaces, and responsiveness to the environment—will make the UW and Wisconsin proud. The Wisconsin Idea can thrive here."
Mark VanderWoude, assistant dean for facilities and planning at the UW–Madison School of Nursing, stands over his desk, flipping pages of blueprints for the new $52 million five-story School of Nursing building. Construction begins in May of 2012, with completion slated for fall of 2014.
VanderWoude and the school have been trying to get a free-standing nursing school built for nearly thirty years. With private donations from alumni and the community reaching more than $14 million, the building campaign focused on securing two-thirds state funding for the project. The final piece of the puzzle fit into place this past March in a series of last-minute maneuvers that guaranteed public funding in Governor Scott Walker's 2011–2013 budget. This ensured that there would be money to finish the architectural design, and construction could begin next year.
Now, after dozens of faculty and staff committee meetings to consider all aspects of the building's design, and meetings with the Kahler Slater architectural firm, UW–Madison architects, and state project managers, a near-final plan has emerged. By all accounts, this stunning educational facility will set a new standard for nursing school facilities as it merges the best of new technologies with the best of new teaching methods.
"The School of Nursing has been invisible on the campus for a long time," says architect Julie Grove, UW–Madison project manager for the nursing building project. "It's been tucked away in the Clinical Science Center without a strong identity, which is a tragedy, given its top-tier status.
Atrium Interior View - Full Resolution (Rendering: Kahler Slater) "It's important to realize what an outstanding research program we have here on our campus and that, by virtue of this new larger facility, the school will be able to educate additional nurses and researchers to benefit not only our state, but our nation and the world. We believe that this facility will support an already-great program and enable it to grow to its highest potential," Grove says.
"The new facility will allow the school to increase the number of students that we can educate well beyond the initial thirty percent growth that we're proposing right now," says Dean Katharyn May. "Given that the state and nation will need significantly more nurses prepared for careers in practice, education, and research over the next fifteen to twenty years, the school will be expected to respond, and this facility will allow for that growth. And it's not just about more classrooms; it's about having very different types of classrooms using emerging technologies to allow for more efficient and effective teaching and learning.
"This is a 'one hundred-year building,' which means that, over time, it will remain flexible enough to allow future faculty to meet the changing needs of the profession and their students," May adds. "It will allow the UW–Madison School of Nursing to continue to lead as it has always led—by creating new knowledge to improve care, by preparing new leaders to meet health care system challenges, and by educating the next generation of nurses who understand that the power of new knowledge and new technologies can help them improve safety and quality while preserving the humane core of nursing care."
The building's main entrance—a strong façade of stone and glass—faces northwest. Entering the building at ground level speaks to what Kahler Slater intended to achieve: the "wow factor!"
"You walk into an atrium that is two stories high," says VanderWoude. "It opens up into a beautiful area that looks out over a courtyard and green space. In fact, you'll be able to appreciate this green landscape from almost anywhere on the building's first floor."
To the left of the atrium is a three hundred-seat auditorium; to its right is the Academic Programs suite, highly visible and right across from the student space. Lockers, lounges, showers, and the coffee kiosk are right off the main space. A fireplace is situated on the south side of the atrium.
First Floor Plan - Full Resolution (Rendering: Kahler Slater) "We actually modified first-floor plans so that graduate students will have their own 'home,' based on what we saw in the School of Education building," VanderWoude adds. "This should work well for students who do not have office space up in our research pods."
The ground-floor classrooms incorporate modern technology for new types of teaching. Two 180-person active learning classrooms are planned for this floor. The active learning classroom (ALC) allows for groups of three students working together on a computer at tables for nine, or three groups per table, all with networked computers and guided by an instructor. There are also two new "Learn Lab" environments—yet another innovative, technology-enhanced style of teaching and learning where students can work in groups of five with one computer at the table or move around the room for multi-student interaction.
A large multi-purpose room for events and presentations also occupies the first floor. The Interaction Lab—interview space with a living-room atmosphere—will support faculty conducting research with participating agencies and families.
"As you walk up an atrium stairway," says VanderWoude, "you're presented with a stunning display of technology. The innovative Center for Technology-Enhanced Nursing [CTEN], which replicates a hospital environment, includes simulated hospital units and a skills lab for physical assessment. A cluster of rooms built to replicate patient exam rooms re-creates the patient's clinic experience."
Another area of CTEN on the second floor is what has been dubbed "The Apartment," a simulated home environment that looks like a typical apartment. It will be wired to communicate and transfer "resident" data between the school and the Living Environments Lab (LEL), which is located at the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery. The LEL is directed by Patricia Flatley Brennan, PhD, RN, FAAN, FACMI, the Lillian S. Moehlman-Bascom Professor of Nursing and Industrial Engineering.
"We have the space designed and wired for future simulation," says VanderWoude. "Whatever may happen, we won't have to tear down walls as technology evolves."
The second floor will also have spaces for instructional technology so that IT staff can access and easily support the classrooms in this space. There will also be discussion and breakout rooms, as well as multipurpose study rooms for students. At the center of this configured space is a glass-enclosed conference room described as the "jewel box."
The third and fourth floors, says VanderWoude, "will be flexible and fluid enough to allow for expansion, depending on the flow of research funding." These floors will contain office space and the majority of thirty total research suites, or 'pods,' placed throughout the building. There will also be interview rooms with video capture for both in-person and remote interviews and faculty and staff office space. The third floor will have a lunch room that opens onto a walkout garden and green space.
The fifth floor has space to accommodate special events; it is also home to the Signe Skott Cooper and Hilda Scott Historical Suite. According to Vander- Woude, this floor will also support more staff and business services, file storage, the Continuing Education in Nursing and the Nursing Research and Sponsored Programs units, the Dean's Administrative Suite, and the Board of Visitors Conference Room.
"I am excited about what we're going to be able to do with the building—addressing the myriad needs we have. We're not going to have to 'make do' anymore," says VanderWoude.
"The detail in designing a building is pretty astounding," he explains. We've been meeting constantly with people all over campus just to mine information about things we may not have considered—for example, where to put the roof anchors so that a maintenance crew can swing down to wash the windows.
"We're building something that will serve the State of Wisconsin for the next century," says Vander- Woude. "The North Wing is only two stories high, but built to go five, so if we need to expand in fifteen or fifty years, we can. You have to think of everything now—not in three years or ten. We are making every effort to do it right the first time."