Med School Project Reaches Construction Milestone
Albert "Albie" Sherman peered up Wednesday afternoon at a white steel beam framed by a blue sky as it made its way by crane to the top of a $405-million building named after him.
Sherman, who is vice chancellor for university relations at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, said he was "absolutely overwhelmed" as he watched the ceremonial beam - signed by faculty and staff, legislators and other officials - installed at the highest point of the nine-story building by a construction crew.
More than 100 people gathered to watch the ceremony, which was billed as "the topping off" of the 512,000-square-foot Albert Sherman Center. UMass officials said the steel frame is nearly complete and that the building should be enclosed by the end of the year.
Michael Collins, chancellor for the medical school, called the Sherman Center "a transformative" project.
"It will yield seminal scientific discoveries that ultimately will lead to pioneering treatments and cures that will benefit all of mankind," Collins said.
In an interview after the ceremony, Sherman pledged that the center would lead to more Nobel Prizes for UMass, which got its first in 2006 thanks to the work of Craig C. Mello, who attended the ceremony Tuesday.
"It won't be just one Nobel Prize," Sherman said. "We have the tools and we have the people here."
And more people are coming, Sherman added. He said that the Sherman Center is drawing tenured faculty members from other schools who want to work at UMass.
Speakers Tuesday included Jack Wilson, who is retiring as president of the UMass system; Susan Windham-Bannister, president and CEO of the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center, which pitched in $90 million in funding for the Sherman Center; David MacKenzie, executive director of the UMass Building Authority; Michael O'Brien, Worcester's city manager; and Sen. Harriet Chandler, D-Worcester.
When completed, the center is expected to support 1,600 jobs and $264 million in annual economic activity, according to state officials.
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