By Lara Fominoff @LaraFominoff on Twitter

University of Lethbridge’s new Destination sciences building set to open in September

Feb 13, 2019 | 2:44 PM

LETHBRIDGE – About 100 construction workers are now putting the finishing touches on the 413,334 square foot Destination Building Project at the University of Lethbridge.

On Wednesday, Feb. 13, Environment Minister Shannon Phillips, MLA East Maria Fitzpatrick, along with students, media and university leaders toured the massive $248 million facility.

The building will feature a state of the art 250-seat lecture theatre, common labs, a set of “hanging classrooms,” a winter garden atrium that is heated by natural sunlight, and high efficiency equipment that will help meet certain environmental targets. Once committed, it will be 53 per cent more sustainable than the average science centre across the country.

There will also be science and medical equipment including an MRI that will be out on display to allow students to see how they work.

University President and Vice-Chancellor Michael Mahon says it’s a spectacular building.

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“We are so proud of the elements of the building that we really committed to from the get-go. One was insuring of course that the building met the needs of our students both at the undergraduate and graduate level. The second was really ensuring that the building was really a community building, so that it’s a building open to the K-12 community to the broader community of Lethbridge. We hope that there are families in here on a Saturday afternoon experiencing science on display.”

Mahon says there’s about $2 million in IT work to be completed over the next couple of months before anyone begins moving in.

“Starting in about April, we’ll start to begin to move laboratories, and so that’s a pretty complicated process,” says Mahon.

Some experiment that is currently in progress on other parts of the campus will need to be completed, while complicated equipment will also have to be moved.

By September, the building will house all undergraduate and graduate sciences including biology, biochemistry, chemistry, psychology, neurosciences and physics.

“And so, we will in essence, move all of the sciences that are presently in U-Hall, as well as all of the work that’s being done in CCBM, the Canadian Centre for Behavioral Neuroscience.”

The remaining space will be taken up by the growing health sciences faculty and other programs.

Ongoing funding for the building was also announced Wednesday, by the Environment Minister.

“We are announcing that there will be ‘lights-on’ funding for this facility in the amount of $1 million,” said Shannon Phillips.

Student Laura Bryan said the new building means a lot in terms of accessibility to those who have mobility issues, but also for undergraduate, high school and even younger students to have more accessibility to Professors and graduate students.

“So, there will be a lot of community groups that come in here, youngsters – who will really get to see what’s going on at the undergraduate level, and then they get to move on and see what’s going on with their master’s counterparts.

“It’s a really incredible space. It’s something that you dream of seeing. The architecture is amazing, the wood panelling is amazing, and it’s something I think the students will be proud to see on our campus.”

Indeed, Mahon hopes the new facility will attract not only local students, but those from across western Canada.

“Right now, we have 35 per cent of our students that come from Calgary. So, we’re already a significant draw for Calgary….and I think this building will continue to help us create what we call a ‘destination university’ for students from Calgary, from Edmonton, from southern B.C., from southern Saskatchewan who want to go away for school but want to come to a really strong science program. Certainly, this building will provide that.”

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