Facilities
BSCI IT
The McWhorter School of Building Science is located in the M. Miller Gorrie Center, which opened in 2006. Gorrie Center earned the State of Alabama’s first LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) gold certification. This state-of-the art “green” building is equipped with unmatched information technology. On the first floor close to the entrance of the building is a digital floor plan which points out energy saving features of this building.
Gorrie Center
The Thesis Room, which is strictly used for thesis work, a BSCI graduation requirement. This room has forty-five individual work stations configured with dual twenty-two inch monitors with a late model Dell i7 machines with Windows 10 Enterprise operating systems. This room also has two Ricoh C830 color laser printers and one HP 2300 color plotter. The room is also equipped with two 70” large screen TV’s used to display teaching material to students. Furthermore, all classroom computers within Gorrie have Vision software which allows the instructor to view what students are looking at on their monitors or the instructor can project the podium monitor onto the student monitors.
The Thesis Annex Lab has an additional seven thesis work stations identical to those in the main thesis room. There is also one Ricoh C830 color laser printer.
The Building Information Modeling Lab (BIM) Lab, which has thirty Dell i7 Windows 10 Enterprise computers with dual twenty-two inch monitors. This room is equipped with five 70” large screen TV’s, two on each side and one in the front of the classroom so students can have an excellent view of material being presented from everywhere in the room. This room is also equipped with a Ricoh C830 color laser printer.
This classroom is in a series of eight PODS. Each pod will seat six students in a circular configuration. The room has eight 55” large screen LED TV’s and one 75” LED TV. There is one 55” TV per pod so that students can present their work for all to view or all the monitors can be used to present information from the podium machine. This room allows for excellent collaboration between groups using the Sharelink (shared screen) system.
Room 205 has thirty-six individual work stations with single 22” monitor and late model Dell i7 computers. We have the ability to add an additional four workstations, for a total student class size of forty workstations, within a few minutes. This room has a large digital projector for projecting information from the podium machine to the students. This room also has a Ricoh C830 color laser printer. Also just outside this classroom in the elevator out cove is two state of the art HP Designjet T1530 color plotters for printing of documents up to 36” wide.
The student lounge, which is a student break area, is equipped with a large conference room table. Room 206 also has two forty-two inch TVs for students to connect their laptops for collaborative/team work. There is a sixty inch LED TV that is for entertainment and Ricoh C840 color laser printer. This room is also equipped with nine individual work stations with single 22” monitors. Some machines are also equipped with high speed scanners.
The large conference room, which like the small conference room, has one computer with a 110” four screen video wall system mounted on the wall and is used for its audio/visual system. It has wall mounted of sound dampening panels to improve acoustics. With the large conference table this room is best used for large group presentations and is often used by other groups within the college.
The small conference room that has a small cozy environment which is normally used by faculty or faculty with a small group of students. Room 118M has one computer with a 65” inch large screen TV mounted on the wall that can be easily viewed from around the room and is excellent for video conferencing.
The Construction Visualization Lab (VDC) is equipped with an Oblong Mezzanine system and a 27 monitor video wall. On demand frosted glass adds privacy to the room or the glass panels can be unfrosted to add a clear view from the lobby area of Gorrie. This laboratory allows for complete engagement into any presentation and allows for high detail of construction models.
Adjacent to the Visualization lab are three competition team rooms, 103-105. Each of these rooms are equipped with a 60” LED TV which can be used via an HDMI cable or the sharelink system. Each room has a table and room for five students. With a folding wall between rooms 104 & 105 an expanded space large enough for ten people can be created. These rooms make an excellent collaboration space which is primarily used primarily used by teams preparing for construction competitions.
TV’s mounted throughout Gorrie act as an information outlet for students. Information can be uploaded remotely for student viewing. Also there are other TV’s mounted throughout the building for displaying student work. There is a monitor dedicated to showing work The Center for Construction Innovation & Collaboration. There are also some high end virtual reality (VR) ready machines that are used with Oculus headsets to totally immersion the user in the project. Gorrie is up to date with the latest wireless technology.