The University at Albany unveiled a new engineering building Tuesday — as a piece of city history is repurposed.
After years of planning, the former Albany High School building on Western Avenue is being upgraded to house the College of Nanotechnology, Science, and Engineering. At a ribbon cutting ceremony for the south wing, UAlbany President Dr. Havidán Rodríguez said Albany is at the center of technological and educational advances.
“CNSE is setting the stage for continued technological innovation to build state of the art research, workforce development, and a diversified workforce that will continue to propel us in the fields of semiconductor chip development and artificial intelligence, among others,” Rodríguez said.
The college plans to renovate the entire building by 2027. UAlbany’s Electrical and Computer Engineering and Computer Science programs will now be housed there, while Environmental and Sustainable Engineering will move to the main campus. Nanotech programs will remain at the uptown complex.
Dr. Michelle Grimm, Dean of the College of Nanotechnology, Science, and Engineering, says it gives UAlbany a way to give CNSE its own home.
“We were sharing spaces within ETEC, with the departments there, they were very nice to loan us that space. But now we have more space for labs, we have more space for teaching, we're no longer scurrying around going ‘where are we going to put our next new faculty member,’” Grimm said.
After the presentation, visitors were invited to wander through the finished space in the old high school. The building, finished in 1912, is four stories tall, each hallway lined with tile nearly to the ceilings. But inside the old building is new technology. The former gym is now a makerspace for 3D printing, and a visualization lab for data research is in the basement, along with several classrooms.
Dannielle Melendez is President of the Pine Hills Neighborhood Association. She says UAlbany sets the standard for collaboration between neighborhoods and educational institutions.
“We are particularly excited that the community groups like ourselves have been invited to utilize the university's beautiful meeting facilities. In addition to the physical spaces, we are excited to welcome the students, faculty and staff to our neighborhood. They bring vibrancy and life to our neighborhood, which makes it a wonderful place to live,” Melendez said.
Having started with the college in August 2022, Grimm says it’s hard to imagine so much progress would be made in two years.
“We will have renamed the college, brought our colleagues and students in nano back into the fold, quintupled our annual research expenditures, hired 13 new tenure track faculty and three teaching focused faculty, nearly doubled the enrollment of our master's program in computer science while increasing our overall college enrollment by almost 45 percent compared to fall ‘22,” Grimm said.
Congressman Paul Tonko, whose 20th District includes the new building, says, as an engineer, he finds the space is incredibly valuable as the Capital Region becomes a technology hub.
“We know semiconductors are essential components of countless consumer goods that we use each and every day, from cars and computers to phones and certainly coffee makers. Yet, America's share of global semiconductor production has plummeted in recent decades, falling from some 37 percent in the 1990s, down to just 12 percent,” Tonko said.
The Democrat has been a major proponent of the CHIPS and Science Act, which seeks to support domestic semiconductor research and manufacturing. He and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer have been advocating for the Capital Region to become the home of a national semiconductor technology center.
Assemblywoman Pat Fahy, a fellow Democrat from the 109th District, says the development is key especially given the closure of the nearby College of Saint Rose. Fahy chairs the Assembly’s Higher Education Committee and is proposing a new county-run development authority to take over the Saint Rose properties.
“We are working every day on that revitalization effort. And now with the Redevelopment Authority, and I'm looking at my friends, many friends from the neighborhood here. This will be so important in helping with those revitalization efforts,” Fahy said.
SUNY Chancellor Dr. John King says the efforts are part of a broader strategy by the state.
“We are building in New York a Silicon State, a comprehensive ecosystem of innovation and technology that will span the entire state and change the entire world.”
You can see photos of the new space in the gallery at the top of this article.
