April 12, 2006 — The University of Virginia School of Nursing broke ground Saturday, April 8, for the $12 million Claude Moore Nursing Education Building. “I’m glad after all these years of construction in this precinct, that this is going to be our construction,” saidJeanette Lancaster, Sadie Heath Cabaniss Professor of Nursing and dean of the School of Nursing. “This is our mud and we are proud of it.” Facing a steady drizzle, University officials turned overthe first shovelfuls of dirt under a tent as onlookers huddled under umbrellas or sat in a tent set up for donors, dignitaries and members of the Board of Visitors. Among the first to dig in the loosened dirt were Lancaster; U.Va. President John T. Casteen III; Jim Roberts, president ofthe Thomas Foundation and former chairman of the nursing school’s advisory board; Lucien L. Bass III, currentchairman of the advisory board; and Cindi Colyer Allen, president of the nursing alumni association. The new building will provide large, flexibly designed classrooms equipped with cutting-edge instructional technologies;a Student Life Center; computer kiosks placed strategicallythroughout the building (instead of a single computer lab); conference rooms; and offices for administrators, faculty,staff and graduate students. The new facility will be completely adapted to the latest innovations in wireless telecommunications,and an open staircase will connect all floors, reinforcingthe values of health promotion central to the nursing profession. “It used to be the infrastructure of a classroom building was bricks and mortar,” Casteen said. “Now the backbone of the building is electronic.” In January, the Claude Moore Charitable Foundation donateda $5 million challenge grant to the School of Nursing toward its new four-story, 32,000-square-foot building which willbe across 15th Street from the school’s current homein McLeod Hall. Moore was a 1916 graduate of the University’s medical school and his foundation has donated generouslyto U.Va. The Claude Moore Nursing Education Building will help the School of Nursing to expand its enrollment by up to 25 percent, a significant boost in helping to address thenation’s critical nursing shortage. “This is very exciting,” said Allen. “The School of Nursing is providing the best education available in the country, and this will help it realize its potentialto educate more nurses who are needed in the commonwealth and across the country.” “This is the culmination of a long, hard journey,which will help shape the future of nursing,” Bass said. The work does not stop with the Moore building. Once thenursing school has moved its operations across the street, renovation will start on McLeod Hall, which was built in 1972. These renovations will allow for significant expansion for clinical simulation labs, nursing research centers and for the nursing history center. Contact:
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