Boone Science Hall Renovation

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This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5). The College of Idaho is one of only 5 liberal arts colleges in the Intermountain Region, encompassing Utah, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and Nevada. Since its beginning in 1891, this undergraduate institution has been known for its quality education and strong science orientation and today produces students who have the highest graduate school acceptance rates in the state. This award will provide funds to support a portion of the comprehensive revitalization of Boone Science Hall, which for forty years has housed classrooms and laboratories for chemistry, biology, environmental studies, math and physics. This award provides funds to renovate the seven research and research training labs of Boone Science Hall at The College of Idaho. The labs include biochemistry, ecology, tissue culture, molecular biology, physiology and chemistry. These research labs will be modernized to improve lab efficiency and new cabinetry, hoods and lab benches will be installed. The laboratory redesign is planned to facilitate new interdisciplinary discoveries in problems indigenous to the region. Specifically, the faculty will expand individual and collaborative research into the human impacts on ecosystem health in the Intermountain West. Biologists, chemists, mathematicians, ecologists, and physicists will work together on problems ranging from the deteriorating condition of local shrub steppe ecosystems to the impact of mining waste on local flora and fauna. The broader impacts of the renovation of Boone Science Hall center on outreach to traditionally underrepresented populations in science. Over half of the college's student science researchers are women. The college is increasing local Hispanic population enrollment. Updated facilities will assist in attracting more Hispanics into science research. An updated, modern facility provides greater potential for further collaborations with neighboring research institutions, such as pursuing research collaborations with the state's EPSCoR institutions. Creating a network of research relationships has the potential to expand synergies and allows Idaho to move from its under-represented status in scientific research to more full participation