By GREGORY ZELLER //
Hofstra University is digging in, literally, on a high-profile plan to meet the growing regional demand for young scientists and healthcare professionals.
The Hempstead-based university has broken ground on its new $75 million Science and Innovation Center, a state-of-the-art, 75,000-square-foot facility designed to produce skilled engineers, nurses and other practitioners of cutting-edge applied sciences.
Stocked with modern laboratories and simulation facilities, the LEED-certified center will be “shared” by the Fred DeMatteis School of Engineering and Applied Science and the newly expanded Hofstra Northwell School of Nursing and Physician Assistant Studies.
It will rise on the southeast quadrant of the Hofstra campus, near the Leo A. Guthart Hall for Innovation and Discovery, a key component of the university’s Frank G. Zarb School of Business. Guthart Hall, which opened in 2019 and was renamed last month in honor of longtime university trustee Guthart, houses the Institute of Innovation and Entrepreneurship, formerly known as Hofstra’s Center for Entrepreneurship.
In addition to training future Hofstra graduates, Guthart Hall and the new Science and Innovation Center will create a major-league business-incubation platform that “accelerates startups and partners with entrepreneurs, furthering economic growth in the region,” according to Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s office.
Stuart Rabinowitz: Partners in high places.
“This state-of-the-art facility … represents an investment in the innovative technology and professional workforce that will better prepare New York State for the public-health challenges of the future,” the governor said at Thursday’s groundbreaking ceremony. “As we emerge from the global pandemic … we must fully recognize the critical role cutting-edge science and skilled healthcare professionals played in fighting COVID-19.”
Albany clearly recognizes this – in fact, Cuomo’s administration was all-in on Hofstra’s ambitious plan even before the pandemic shifted the socioeconomic playing field.
The Empire State Development Corp., the state’s main economic-development engine, awarded Hofstra a $25 million grant in 2015 to support the Science and Innovation Center; in 2019, the university secured a further $2 million through the ninth round of the annual Regional Economic Development Council competition, earmarked for a high-tech nursing laboratory – including patient-care simulators, clinical teaching rooms and a host of equipment for teaching science, technology, engineering and mathematics – inside the new facility.
Hofstra University President Stuart Rabinowitz, co-chairman of the Long Island Regional Economic Development Council that earned that $2 million award in 2019, credited Albany with getting those shovels in the ground.
“Thanks to New York State’s partnership, Hofstra’s Science and Innovation Center will bring scholarship together with simulation and practical applications in engineering, applied science and nursing practice,” Rabinowitz said Thursday. “This building is designed with students, faculty and the professions in mind, to allow them access to facilities and equipment that takes learning to the next level.
See you in September (2023): Construction of the new Science and Innovation Center is scheduled to take two years.
“[It] will prepare future professionals in advanced science and health professions to meet the challenges of the next century.”
The new facility is designed by New York City-based architects HLW International and Woodbury-based planners Cameron Engineering & Associates. The construction phase – managed by NYC-based builders Structure Tone – is projected to last two full years, according to Hofstra.
It will be well worth the wait, said Eric Gertler, the ESDC’s acting commissioner/president and CEO-designate, who noted that New York already “boasts the Northeast’s highest number of STEM graduates,” thanks largely to Hofstra and its ongoing partnership with Northwell Health.
“We are proud of our continued support for Hofstra University,” Gertler said in a statement. “This new center will continue to educate a highly skilled workforce that will help New York State build back better and build on Long Island’s strengths as a tech and life-sciences hub.”
