New Vision for UAB Nursing

PAYETTE is pleased to unveil the design for the new addition/renovation for the expansion of the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Nursing. Among the top 5 percent of nursing schools in the US, the school is committed to building on a vision to sustain nursing leadership worldwide. With this building, the UAB School of Nursing looks to create state-of-the-art spaces for students and faculty, allowing them to continue to drive the future of nursing and healthcare in Alabama and around the globe.

After completing a study in 2013, PAYETTE was selected along with Williams Blackstock Architects to design the new addition and renovation. The enrollment has grown at the school by 200% in six years thereby outgrowing their 1971 home; the new program adds classrooms, offices and research space, along with increased skills lab space and a new Nursing Competency Suite for detailed training and testing. The building is efficiently designed to maximize use of the existing footprint with both new and renovated spaces, and the layout is planned to maximize usable net area within the building envelope. A combination of new and renovated space on the ground floor concentrates classrooms, skills labs and the Nursing Competency Suite on one level. Combined with the student lounge on the second floor, this will provide a high level of activity and vitality in these areas.

The program also includes a museum for original Florence Nightingale writings. The Nightingale Museum is a replica based on her “ideal” patient ward dimensions and will be used as a classroom. A central atrium with an open staircase located at the joint between the new and existing buildings provides circulation and connections at all levels; all programs will come together to collaborate and exchange ideas in the space envisioned as “synapse.” The new addition will tie into the UAB Master Plan “crescent,” a loggia that ties the health professions, nursing and informatics buildings together.

The Nightingale Scholars’ Center is located at the main entry on University Avenue. A student lounge area is located on the second floor, just off the entry from the UAB Plaza level. Faculty lounges are located at the link between the new and existing buildings at levels 3, 4 and 5. A new elevator and corridor connection allow for handicapped access between the ground floors of the nursing building and the Learning Resource Center. This will also facilitate transfer of large skills lab-related equipment, such as patient beds and supplies, between the LRC and the main building. The new expansion will be designed to LEED Gold standards, utilizing green roofs, hydronic cooling/heating system; convection air in the atrium; on site solar renewables and daylight.