Hudson Valley Community College is opening a new STEM building in Malta.
With the help of smoke machines and confetti cannons, college officials cut the ribbon on a state-of-the-art STEM Education Center in Saratoga County.
The $17.5 million, two-story facility at the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority’s Saratoga Technology and Energy Park is an expansion of the college’s North Campus in Malta.
Congressman Paul Tonko of New York’s 20th District says it took collaboration to get to Thursday’s opening since breaking ground two years ago.
"We’re celebrating and showcasing the confluence of private sector, public sector, government, academia. And when those forces come together with a vision. You know, we have a lot of talk about infrastructure, building with equipment and furniture and technology—absolutely essential. But the human infrastructure, honing the skills, enabling those people either in the trades or in research or in engineering or technology, or nursing, or healthcare, allowing them the preparatory work honing those skills as they go down the pathway of their careers is essential,” said Tonko.
The project was supported by a $2.5 million Empire State Development grant, with a $6 million contribution from the State University of New York, $1.5 million from Saratoga County, and funding from GlobalFoundries and the Hearst Foundation.
HVCC North Executive Dean Jonathan Ashdown says the school wants to better serve students in Saratoga County.
“We do have TEC-SMART and there's a little bit of curriculum in there. We do some more stuff on the skilled trades and tech side. How do we better serve the healthcare workers? How do we better serve some of the other skilled trades that maybe we don't serve in TEC-SMART? So, this building really enables that, and also, in the healthcare field, all the state-of-the-art science labs, those are all foundational to so many, not only healthcare, but also science and engineering fields, whether you're talking environmental science, biological sciences, biotechnology, in addition to all the semiconductor industry that we support right here in Malta,” said Ashdown.
Ashdown says the expansion of the northern campus will be a vital resource for the region.
“There's so much opportunity out there is what we always hear from our industry partners. Even GlobalFoundries, for example, has process technician and maintenance technician roles available today. But it's just a matter of getting these students in, getting them trained, getting them out there in the workforce. So, a lot of our—you know, whether it’s an apprenticeship program, or whether it’s a certificate or degree program they’re all primed to get them in here, get them the training they need, get them out there contributing to the workforce and the economy,” said Ashdown.
HVCC says the building will serve more than 1,000 students every year across 30 associate degree and certificate programs.
“If you want to take a look we have this really cool tool called the Anatomage Table so come on back,” said HVCC instructor Margaret Liberti.
On the second floor, Anatomy and Physiology Professor Margaret Liberti is showing off a digital examination table comes pre-loaded with a handful of cadavers ready for mess-free dissection and examination.
She pulls up a scan of Carla.
“This is her heart and it’s actually taking up the whole left thoracic cavity in her chest, that’s the thoracic cavity. And the heart should be much, much smaller—about half of that size. So do you see all of this? So she had a diseased liver, she had a goiter, and she had an enlarged heart,” said Liberti.
Liberti says students will benefit from using the table over a model or diagram.
“So this allows them to examine the differences in a body. Because not everone’s large intestine is going to be in the same location. There’s a lot of different thigs that’s going to change that location. And so it allows students to see what a human body actually looks like and not a perfect model,” said Liberti.
According to HVCC, its main campus in Troy enrolls almost 20,000 students in credit and non-credit courses across its Business, Liberal Arts, Health Sciences, and STEM schools.
