TEACHING LABORATORY UPGRADE FOR HITCHNER HALL
The Department of Molecular and Biomedical Sciences and our students are in urgent need of new teaching lab space for courses like the first-year Genome Discovery course supported by Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Imperative to our ability to educate our undergraduates is to provide experiences in which they can work alongside their peers in settings similar to those they will find in graduate school or in the workplace. We now have a terrific opportunity to modernize a portion of Hitchner Hall in time for the incoming class next fall, 2020. The new project will renovate the space above the Food Pilot Plant as undergraduate teaching labs. The space is designed in a collaborative style with central desk space and bench space around the perimeter. The funds were raised through a national grant requiring University matching funds, the department’s share of the $332,700 cost of this project is $20,000. It is our hope that you will consider contributing to the department specifically for this renovation. As department chair, I believe strongly that the quality of education available to our students is first rate; we need to ensure that our facilities provide optimal opportunities for students’ hands-on experiences as well. I hope you will join me in making a generous donation, as this project will have an immediate impact for our students.
At the end of 2019, we reached our project goal of $20,000 thanks to some very generous donations. However if you would still like to contribute to this project by providing additional funds to purchase much needed new laboratory equipment for the new labs it would be very welcomed!
You can make your gift online at http://our.umaine.edu/hitchner
If you would like to discuss this project, I hope you feel free to contact me (gundersn@maine.edu).
If you would like to discuss your gift, please contact Liz Erickson (elizabeth.erickson@maine.edu or 207-581-1145).
Thanks so much for your support of Molecular and Biomedical Sciences.
Regards,
Robert Gundersen, Chair
Department of Molecular and Biomedical Sciences