High-Tech Complex Coming to LLU
By Stephen Wall, San Bernardino County Sun, Calif.
Feb. 6–LOMA LINDA — The universe of new technology is coming to Loma Linda University.
Construction is starting on a nearly $65 million learning complex with state-of-the-art classrooms and labs on the north side of the campus near the corner of Anderson and Stewart streets.
The so-called Centennial Complex will open the door to a new realm of possibilities for medical, dental, nursing and public-health students, university officials say.
“It will transform the way teachers teach and students learn,” said Albin Grohar, the university’s executive director of advancement.
Crews have begun laying the foundation for the four-story, 151,000-square-foot building that is expected to open in spring 2009.
The building is needed to accommodate an expected increase in student enrollment from 4,000 today to 5,000 in 2010, Grohar said.
“We’re very tight on classrooms at the moment,” said Councilman Floyd Petersen, who teaches statistics at the university. “This is going to make it easier to schedule classrooms and provide more laboratory space.”
The name of the complex commemorates the 100th anniversary of the university, which was founded in 1905.
The classrooms will allow students to connect to the Internet via wireless laptops.
With their computers, students can access and download information that instructors put on large screens such as the latest research data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
If they can’t attend a class, it will be recorded on a DVD or CD-ROM, enabling students to watch the lecture on their computers from anywhere.
The classrooms also will provide opportunities for global learning.
Students and faculty will be able to communicate via satellite with a clinic or hospital in a far corner of the world.
Loma Linda University coordinates, administers and manages health-education and public-health programs in 60 countries around the world.
“Educational programs can be transmitted electronically, so that minimizes the number of times that faculty have to go to Afghanistan, China, Russia, Peru or hospital sites in Africa,” Grohar said.
The Centennial Complex also will feature a new Anatomy Pavilion to replace the 1936 facility built to accommodate only 100 students.
The pavilion will have 100 workstations equipped with computer screens that display high-resolution images of anatomical structures and dissection techniques. Each station can accommodate three to six students.
The complex also will have four amphitheaters, an educational-technology center and a simulation laboratory with exam rooms for students to diagnose and treat mock patients.
Khaled Bahjri, who teaches biostatistics and is studying for a doctorate in public health, applauded the construction of the new complex.
“These will be very high-tech classrooms,” said Bahjri, who is from Yemen. “I’m looking forward to providing more distance learning to students in the U.S. and overseas.”
—–
To see more of the San Bernardino County Sun, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.sbsun.com.
Copyright (c) 2007, San Bernardino County Sun, Calif.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.
For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.