Dear Colleagues:
In August, I shared with you the great news that our Dental Sciences Building had received initial capital funding of $25 million in the state budget for final planning and design, site preparation and early construction. Gov. Mike Easley’s signing of this budget capped off a year in which state and university leadership, alumni, faculty, staff, students and others shared their strong support for our dental school and this building – and for the ways in which the Dental Sciences Building will enhance the School of Dentistry’s missions of education, service and research.
Since that announcement, planning efforts have focused intently on many different factors related to the construction phase of the Dental Sciences Building. The most important concern has been to ensure that the construction’s impact on our clinical and teaching missions – and to our patients and students and faculty and staff who directly support these missions – will be minimal. Another major concern has been to ensure that we do everything possible to minimize any inconvenience to our School’s other faculty, staff and administration.
The construction of our 216,000-square-foot teaching and research facility will entail the demolition of the Dental Research Center and the Dental Office Building. Faculty, staff and laboratories within these buildings will need to be relocated, and we anticipate that this will occur in the early part of 2008 in preparation for an approximate summer 2008 construction start. With less office space, some staff will need to be relocated to sites away from the central School of Dentistry campus during construction.
How did we determine the areas that would be located off-campus? The most prudent approach was to look specifically at areas that do not have direct clinical and teaching responsibilities. We anticipate that some or all employees within the following areas will be relocated to off-campus sites: Financial Affairs, Patient Accounting, Dental Faculty Practice Administration, the Dental Foundation and Dental Alumni Association, Dental Research Administration and CDE/AHEC.
This process will be challenging, and we must ensure that students, faculty and staff can continue to perform their work effectively and in a way that maintains their vital connection to the School of Dentistry. This relocation may span multiple years, so we are working hard to locate temporary office space that will be close to campus and offer as many other conveniences, such as transportation, to our employees as possible.
You will learn much more about our Dental Sciences Building in the coming weeks. I encourage you to e-mail me with your comments. I ask for your patience and understanding as we embark on a challenging – but very exciting – time ahead.