Ashtabula:
Health & Science

The grand opening of the Robert S. Morrison Health and Science Building represents a dream come true.

“More than 50 years ago, citizens dared to dream about creating Kent State’s Ashtabula Campus, and just five years ago, university and community leaders envisioned this new building — a building where hope for the future can thrive. The future is now.

The grand opening of the Robert S. Morrison Health and Science Building represents a dream come true. This is the right time and the right place for a state-of-the-art learning center of this magnitude in Ashtabula County,” says Kent State Ashtabula Dean Susan J. Stocker, RN, Ph.D. The recently dedicated new facility will help produce professionals to fill the need for health care professionals in this region.

“The marvelous facility offers the finest in technology for developing skills in nursing and allied health professions. It is a showcase of technology including a human patient simulator that reacts to medical and nursing interventions, a modern nursing lab and general classrooms, physical and occupational therapy labs, a respiratory therapy lab and a full-scale apartment for the practice of in-home therapies.

“The radiologic therapy labs are now ‘energized,’ and the human cadaver lab is the only one of its kind between Cleveland and Erie, Pa. Degrees in these fields lead to promising careers that offer good jobs and good pay, even during a recession,” Stocker adds.

The $15 million project, constructed with $6 million in Ashtabula County support, will be home to the campus’s nursing and allied health programs. That local support was raised through Kent State Ashtabula’s first major capital fundraising campaign.

The new building’s completion dovetails with the 50th anniversary celebration for the Kent State Ashtabula Campus. To learn more about the campus’s history, read the Kent State Magazine story in the fall 2009 issue. For more information about the Robert S. Morrison Health and Science Building, visit http://www.ashtabula.kent.edu/Campus/h-sbuilding.cfm.