Exceptional Education

The College of Medicine broke ground Nov. 22 for the George T. Harrell, M.D., Medical Education Building.

The University of Florida College of Medicine is preparing students for the future. As one of the premier medical education programs in the country, the college is setting the stage for a renewed curriculum in an environment with leading technologies and procedures.

RenderingThe George T. Harrell, M.D., Medical Education Building, the university’s future home for medical students and physician assistant students, was designed to accommodate curriculum that focuses entirely on the patient through collaborative education. Circular learning studios, equipped with cutting-edge technologies, will help strengthen these team-based learning efforts.

“The strategic plan for UF Health has been focused on creating an integrated academic health center with the goal of improving the health of our patients,” said David S. Guzick, M.D., Ph.D., UF senior vice president for health affairs and president of UF Health. “A major part of that process was creating a medical school curriculum around the patient, and once that was done, we designed a medical education facility that would be customized to house such a forward-looking curriculum.”

The 94,000-square-foot, four-story facility, named after the college’s founding dean, will also enable the college to expand its space for simulation education on the top two floors. The fourth floor will house a state-of-the-art experiential learning theater that can easily be transformed into a variety of settings, creating real-life scenarios to help teach students and professionals complicated, high-risk skills.

“In order to deliver exceptional medical training to the next generation of physicians and physician assistants, we must transform how and where our students learn,” said Michael L. Good, M.D., dean of the College of Medicine. “The Harrell Building is strategically designed to support this shift in teaching and learning.”

The university awarded Charles Perry Partners Inc., of Gainesville, a $30.3 million contract to construct the Harrell Medical Education Building. Heery International and Ballinger are designing the facility, which is slated to open in fall 2015.

For more information, visit http://anewera.med.ufl.edu/.