Columbia to Start Construction of New Nursing School

Columbia University announced plans to build a new home for the Columbia University School of Nursing, the oldest nursing school in the nation. The new seven-story building will be located on an existing parking lot at the corner of West 168th Street and Audubon Avenue, at the east end of the Medical Center campus. Construction on the 68,000-square-foot building will begin in late 2014.

The soaring lobby will be clad in transparent glass, offering passersby clear views in to a set of scissoring, staircases that extend upward to the seventh floor, where there is a green-roofed terrace.

The terrace flows into a penthouse that contains a student lounge and an informal event space.

The new building will provide space for research, a sunlit atrium and two-floor medical simulation center. The building will also have a café, rooftop terrace and event space.

The architecture firm FXFOWLE won the project in a competition. The university requested a three-story building of 65,000 square feet for the site, however, a taller, skinnier building was proposed that would leave half the site for future development, while resulting in a lower-cost, more efficient construction. The project will seek LEED Silver certification.

"Future leaders in nursing require technology and facilities that enable them to learn and master the skills that are needed every day in clinical practice and research," said Dr. Lee Goldman, Vice President for Health and Biomedical Sciences.

The simulation center will include model health care settings like a mock in-patient room, exam room, critical care unit, and an operating room.

See Columbia Schoolof Nursing-Building the Future.pdf

Three clinical teaching labs will have six beds and 14 exam tables where students can practice their skills on lifelike mannequins.

The school will also be less than a block away from Washington Heights' first hotel, a 40,000 square-foot, 11-story building at 514 West 168th Street, which is expected to be completed in 2014.

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