Construction on new engineering building to begin in November on Notre Dame Avenue

By:	Dennis Brown
Date:	February 6, 2007

At its winter meeting on campus Feb. 2, the Board of Trustees of the University of Notre Dame approved the construction of a $69.4 million building for the College of Engineering.

To be located on the current site of the University Club on Notre Dame Avenue, the 142,000-square-foot facility will house a nano technology research center, the University’s new Energy Center, an 11,800-square-foot semiconductor processing and device fabrication clean room, and an undergraduate interdisciplinary learning center.

The new building will be called Stinson-Remick Hall in honor of principal benefactors Kenneth and Ann Stinson and Jack and Mary Ann Remick. Stinson is a 1964 Notre Dame graduate and a member of the Board of Trustees. Jack Remick, a 1959 graduate, is a member of the University’s advisory council for the College of Engineering, and a recent gift from Mary Ann Remick created an endowment for visiting fellows in Notre Dame’s Center for Ethics and Culture.

The learning center will be named in honor of major benefactors Ted and Tracy McCourtney. A 1960 Notre Dame graduate, Ted McCourtney is a member of the Board of Trustees.

The new building, which is similar in size to the nearby DeBartolo Center for the Performing Arts, has been fully funded by the three major benefactors and 45 additional donors. Construction is expected to begin in November and completed by late 2009 or early 2010.

“This wonderful new facility will address multiple needs in our College of Engineering – providing much needed space for our emerging research in nano technology and energy, and enhancing the interdisciplinary experiences of our undergraduates,” said Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., president of Notre Dame. “We are grateful to the Stinsons, Remicks and McCourtneys for their extraordinary generosity, as well as to all of the other benefactors who have made this project a reality.”

Researchers in Notre Dame’s Center for Nano Science and Technology explore new device concepts and associated architectures that are enabled by novel phenomena on the nanometer scale. Established in 1999, the center is under the direction of Wolfgang Porod, Frank M. Freimann Professor of Electrical Engineering.

The Notre Dame Energy Center was created in 2005 under the direction of Joan Brennecke, Keating-Crawford Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. Faculty members associated with the center are united in developing new energy technology to meet a compelling national and international challenge.

The interdisciplinary learning center will be nearly four times the size of the current center established in Cushing Hall. The center provides undergraduate students with a blend of computer work stations, library resources and laboratory space.

The semiconductor processing and device fabrication clean room will be the first such facility at Notre Dame.

The University Club was founded in 1958 and offers food and beverage service to members. University officials informed the club’s board in 2004 of the need to vacate the current site to prepare room for a new engineering facility.

“The University Club is an important part of campus life at Notre Dame,” said John Affleck-Graves, executive vice president. “The administration of the University has been in discussions with the club’s board to seek another location, and we will continue to work on a solution."

Among the options proposed by University officials is relocating the club in what currently is Greenfield’s International Café in the Hesburgh Center on Notre Dame Avenue.