The Emerson Center at Edison Community College earns state and national recognition for its “green” features

Facility trains more nurses to help offset shortage of RN’s

Constructed one year ago, the 34,000 square foot Emerson Center at Edison Community College has grown the main campus in Piqua to help meet critical job market needs for the regional health care industry.

At the same time, this Regional Center for Excellence has “raised the bar for community college architecture to new heights,” according to a national panel of experts who represent architectural services used by schools and universities.

In fact, the Center has been recognized by the US Green Building Council as a LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Certified building which optimizes performance well beyond building codes producing significant energy and financial savings.

The national American Institute of Architects (AIA) said that Edison’s new facility is “at the forefront of the green building movement,” which estimates that approximately one-third of the energy used today is consumed by buildings.

The Collaborative Inc., an architectural firm in Toledo, designed the Emerson Center, the college’s first expansion since construction of the Conference and Student Center in 1994.

In honoring Edison for its cutting-edge building innovation, the national AIA group described the Emerson Center as one of the country’s most unique, new campus structures “that combines sustainable design and energy conservation dimensions with comfortable, attractive, and practical places for students to meet and learn.”

Brent Adkins, director of facilities at Edison and project manager for the Emerson Center construction, said that among the engaging areas for students are “a cybercafe, which features a suspended “cloud” ceiling and glass walls on the west and south, plus a technology and data-rich library/learning center, which has a clerestory upper section also allowing for entry of natural light.”

He detailed that greater than 100 computer stations are available in this portion of the Center, more than doubling the capacity in the previous library and internet café.

In addition, the health science center, which occupies the west end of the new building, features several tech-smart classrooms designed primarily for use by students in the expanding nursing program.

In May, the nursing graduation class swelled to 57, the largest total in the program’s 28-year history.

Further growth in the coming academic year will boost annual admissions to more than 100 incoming students split between fall and spring.

This associate degree course of study produces more than 70 percent of the practicing RN’s (registered nurses) in the upper Miami Valley.

However, labor market research shows that over the next dozen years Ohio will experience a 30 percent shortfall of qualified RN’s.

“Education and training are keys to the physical and economic well-being of residents in the upper Miami Valley,” said Edison President Dr. Kenneth A. Yowell.

“To match the urgent need for many more nurses and other health care professionals, Edison must be able to prepare more students.”

Space vacated by the nursing program on the main campus has allowed for the introduction of health science programs in phlebotomy, medical assisting, and medical laboratory technology. Technical courses in physical therapy assisting will be offered for the first time in January.

When considering new learning opportunities and new ways to help keep the region vibrant, “Edison first listened to community leaders,” said Yowell, the college president for 20 years. “Edison then planned, listened some more, and then modified its plans.”

The end result was an extremely functional and beautiful facility developed through partnerships with business, industry, health care providers, and many other organizations and individual donors.

Emerson Climate Technologies, based in Sidney, provided the single largest gift of $1-million to The Campaign for Edison Community College. Wayne Hospital in Greenville, Wilson Memorial Hospital in Sidney, and the Upper Valley Medical Center in Troy provided a combined gift of $1-million to launch the campaign.

“Institutions of higher education are in a unique position to be leaders on the long journey to secure a balanced and sustainable future,” Yowell said.

“As the shapers of students’ minds, they can lead by

exhibiting institutional behaviors that the students will one day emulate in their own careers.”

With the addition of the new Emerson Center, “Edison has utilized its potential to be a laboratory for innovation and learning,” he said.

Adkins noted that among the building’s “green” features are automated building controls, a light-reflecting cool roof, an overhang for seasonal shading, and Trombe walls to collect solar energy. He added that vegetated swales mitigate parking lot runoff and that unabsorbed water drains to ponds for evaporation and settlement of heavy impurities.

The Emerson Center’s carefully executed “green” strategies and dynamic design have earned regional, state and national awards from the:

• Toledo Society, American Institute of Architects (AIA)
• Ohio Society, American Institute of Architects (AIA)
• National AIA Committee on Architecture in Education
• National School Boards Association & American School Board Journal

The Piqua Area Chamber of Commerce and the Sidney-Shelby County Chamber of Commerce have also given special recognition to Edison and its new Center.