UIC opens state-of-the-art computer science center

The University of Illinois Chicago on Wednesday opened a five-story, state-of-the-art facility that adds much-needed research and classroom space to the school's growing computer science department.

The Computer Design Research and Learning Center at 850 W. Taylor St. will expand the research capabilities of the UIC College of Engineering’s Department of Computer Science. The department, which has grown significantly over the past decade, now has approximately 2,100 undergraduate students.

"We serve this very mixed group, and at the same time we do research on a very serious national level," Robert Sloan, head of the computer science department, told the Sun-Times. "This is bringing this whole effort together in one state-of-the-art place."

The 135,000-square-foot center features 16,000 square feet of classroom space, 21 faculty research labs and a 1,200-square-foot robotics lab, UIC said in a press release. The new building is supported by the Rebuild Illinois capital plan through a $129.8 million allocation from the University of Illinois Board of Trustees, and contributions from several donors.

The facility will let students with different specialties work in the same space, allowing for more cross-field work, Sloan says.

"We expect student learning outcomes — which have been good — to get even better because students will be moving from classrooms and work spaces built in the 1960s, with 1960s ideas, to a space designed mostly in 2018 with 2018 ideas about pedagogy for computer science," Sloan said.

The first two floors have classrooms, tutoring rooms and an undergraduate learning and community center, the school said on its website. The upper three levels have research labs, faculty offices and graduate student workspaces.

Sloan said there is much more lab space now compared to 18 years ago, when he first took over as head of the computer science department. The new spaces allow the university to host conferences and meetings.

There's "approximately enough with a little to spare, instead of being chronically short on lab space," Sloan said.

The new center will enhance the university's mission of delivering "life-changing" experiences to its students, Sloan said.

"In many cases, we're taking a young person from the greater Chicago region whose two parents together maybe make $51,000 a year. ... And that young man or woman leaves us and goes on to work for $80,000 a year," Sloan said. "That's one of the really special things we do."