Jerrod KingeryColorado State University (CSU) is looking to transform the future of engineering education with its new academic building.
The 165,000-square-foot Don and Susie Law Engineering Future Technologies Building will sit in the heart of the CSU campus and feature classrooms, laboratories and other innovation spaces that will focus on how artificial intelligence (AI) and other digital technology will shape engineering and related fields for years to come.
The funding for the new facility was kickstarted in 2020 by a $10 million donation from the building’s namesakes, CSU alumni Don and Susie Law, who have long worked to strengthen the engineering experience at the university.
Student fees contributed another $50 million to the project, which the Walter Scott Family Foundation has pledged to match.
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“The Law Building will be a transformational addition to the CSU campus. It will place our engineering programs among the very best in the country,” says CSU President Amy Parsons. “Don and Susie saw the need for just such a building at CSU years ago, and we would not be moving forward with this project without their tremendous vision. Our stalwart supporters at the Scott Family Foundation have always believed in CSU and, more importantly, believed in our students. And our students made an impressive commitment not for themselves, but to ensure that future Rams benefit from a state-of-the-art learning environment.”
Some features of the new facility will include:
- Artificial Intelligence Makerspace, which will combine the makerspace concept with a broad selection of AI technologies, resources and systems. This space will enable teams of students to create AI models for engineered systems and will support the growing curriculum in Engineering AI.
- Digital and Physical Prototyping Lab, which will allow students to apply the fundamentals they have learned in the classroom to transform their ideas into working prototypes and products.
- Experiential Learning Laboratories, which will enable students, faculty and industrial partners to apply classroom fundamentals to real-world engineered systems.
CSU leadership anticipates the new facility will also spur an increase in total research expenditures on campus, allowing for the enrollment of up to 700 more engineering students by the year 2032. It will also house the forthcoming Construction Engineering degree program.
The university says the Law Building will also eventually anchor a “technology quadrangle” to be built on campus in the coming decade, envisioned as a combination of new buildings and open spaces, linking researchers and students working together on AI and other digital technologies with partners in the university’s College of Natural Sciences and Warner College of Natural Resources.
Government Market News has reached out to officials at CSU for a timeline on construction of the new building. We will update this story when they respond to our request.
Photo courtesy Colorado State University
