The Kean University Center for Science, Technology and Mathematics Education is situated on an open site on a major thoroughfare that divides the university campus. The 110,000 sf building provides an interdisciplinary teaching lab, classroom, research and event space, establishing an architectural focal point uniting the universitys East and West campuses. The university is located in an urban area and annually welcomes 15,000 undergraduate and graduate students.
The centers torque floor plan responds to the dynamic nature of the site, which has no back door. Angled floor plates and large expanses of glass allow for maximum daylight, and at night, display the inner workings of the building to the street. The top floor slopes upward and is oriented to views of the Manhattan skyline.
The building also embraces the most recent innovations in the art of science teaching and the latest laboratory-planning trends, featuring teaching environments that are open and flexible. These spaces combine a seated classroom with a standing wet-laboratory environment, promoting easy access to different teaching methodologies and facilitating group discussion and collaboration. The science spaces are also modular and flexible, to accommodate future curricular and technological changes. A large auditorium, lecture rooms and student lounges are open and foster collaboration while an exhibition area, conference facility, coffee bar and restaurant serve to complete the buildings successful union of science, pedagogy and the public in a fresh, dynamic environment.
Sustainability was key to the client and this project embodies several energy-saving techniques. The buildings design earned an Innovation and Design credit for its custom solar shading. Six-inch wide, transparent vertical fins attached at a 40-degree angle to the southwest-facing curtainwall system greatly reduce exposure to mid-afternoon sun.
The building also utilizes a ground-source heating and cooling systems that extracts free heat from the ground in winter and rejects heat to the ground in summer via a geothermal heat exchanger. This innovative technology will conserve energy across the buildings lifespan while ensuring adequate heating and cooling on extreme temperature days.
The project also offers a green roof, vertical glass solar shading fins, gray water reclamation and natural daylighting. These are in addition to the buildings flexible design, which enables it to remain functional over a long lifespan. The project is design to LEED Gold Standards.