With its Herbert H. and Grace A. Dow College of Health Professions facility, Central Michigan University intended to bring state-of-the-art science education to the center of the state. The 28,000-student public university drew from lessons in healthcare and applied Steelcase knowledge of workplace and learning environments to create a facility that helped CMU earn national recognition for setting "a new benchmark for modern science teaching." Central Michigan University
The Klaus Advanced Computing Building brought together faculty, students and staff from three different buildings and two different colleges at the university. A Workspace Futures team from Steelcase observed the university's then current laboratories, faculty and grad student offices, student lounges, and studied the various interactions taking place in those spaces. Students and faculty alike were greatly impressed with the newly created environments for work and learning. Georgia Institute of Technology
Hobart and William Smith Colleges saw an opportunity in a small space in the 120-year-old Demarest Hall. The space was available, and no one else wanted to use it. The solution? The space would be developed into a new learning center where every person on campus could learn how to use the colleges' new enterprise software system. Steelcase helped transform the old building into a brilliant, technologically advanced LearnLab. Hobart and William Smith Colleges
Mount Royal College of Calgary, Canada, wanted to test the idea that a workplace layout should not be governed by job titles. Throughout the 90s, the college's International Education (IE) department had grown rapidly, with people squeezed into every space available-in different buildings, even different campuses. Steelcase worked closely with the college's architect Kasian Interior Design and Architecture and the college to identify the strategic intent of the space and uncover perceptions of the organization's health and dynamics. Mount Royal College
Northern Arizona University's College of Business wanted to differentiate itself from other business schools "by creating a sense of community between faculty, staff and students," says Dean Mason Gerety." The university looked to Steelcase, IDEO (a Steelcase partner and worldwide leader in innovation and design) and Carter Burgess Architects for help. The result was an environment created in mind with the student in the middle, built with everything they would need around them. Northern Arizona University
As a college education becomes increasingly important in a knowledge economy, and increasingly expensive too, students are questioning everything that goes on in the classroom: If the information being presented is so important, why is it so hard to read the screen? If we're supposed to work in teams, why can't our group have a place to meet? Why is it easier to share information on Facebook than with people in my class? Why do they tell us to think outside the box, then put us in a classroom that's…a box? Colleges are responding, and it's not just the big research universities. Inspired approaches to learning and teaching are coming from institutions like Ohlone College, a community college in San Francisco's East Bay area. Ohlone College
Consistently ranked among top business schools in the nation, the University of Connecticut had aspirations to create an experiential learning environment for its graduate business studies, a place to consolidate several programs at one site, and an advanced learning facility unlike any other in the country: part college, part research lab, part working business. "Before this building, our facilities were ranked seventh in the country," said Rich Dino, Associate Dean for Graduate Programs, "Now, we believe we’re number one." University of Connecticut
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