The new College of Education building, which opens today, may be the most sustainable building on campus.
The building will be dedicated with a ceremony today at 4:45 p.m. The building will provide six classrooms; it has solar panels, recycled carpet and water-efficient landscaping.
“I think particularly here in New Mexico we just have so few resources here in terms of water, vegetation — those kinds of things,” said College of Education associate professor Arlie Woodrum. “As small of a carbon footprint we can make here is very, very important.”
Diane Gwinn, administrator for the College of Education, said the building took more than a year to build, and should be open for summer classes.
Gwinn said the building will soon receive a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design rating that determines its sustainability. LEED Certified is the lowest rating, and LEED Platinum is the best. Gwinn said there is a possibility the building will receive a LEED Platinum rating — higher than any other building on campus.
“I think it’s a place to have a sense of pride in,” she said. “It’s been a long time since the College of Education has had anything that was new.”
Each classroom offers new technologies, including whiteboards that use Bluetooth technology so students can write without markers, Gwinn said. Each desk has outlets for laptops, and students can project their personal computer screen in front of the entire class without leaving their desks.
“I think it’s going to help our students when they get to the schools they’re going to ultimately end up teaching in,” she said. “They’ll have the knowledge and tools they need to be an even better teacher.”
Four of the classrooms are called “simulated classrooms” because they are set up the same way an elementary or middle school class would be, she said. This is the first time COE students will practice in that type of environment, she said.
“It really helps them learn how to set up their classroom,” Gwinn said.
There is also a 64-person lecture hall and an educational diagnostic lab, which allows students to observe how teachers administer tests to children.
“It’s used by our faculty in educational specialties where they do evaluations of children who have autism or severe mental retardation,” Gwinn said.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
Woodrum said the new building is a welcome addition to the COE.
“For us in education, we’ve always had far too few classrooms,” he said.
Woodrum said he teaches in an old dorm building that has poor heating and cooling and few technological teaching aids. In the fall, he is teaching a class of 30 doctorate students, which would be impossible in his current classroom.
“The new classrooms are big enough to accommodate larger groups of students,” he said.
Woodrum said the building is also an accomplishment because colleges of education have traditionally been underfunded.
“Schools of education across the country are usually the colleges last on the list of getting stuff,” he said. “Colleges of engineering, law or medicine are always at the top of the list because they’re perceived to be these fancy professions. They’re usually the ones who get this stuff first, so this is a big move for us.”
