Director’s Office

New Health Sciences Education Building

A new Health Sciences Education building is currently being planned! The new building will impact thousands of students across the Schools of Dentistry, Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy, Public Health, and Social Work… Continue to full post

Welcome to 2019

Happy new year and welcome back Huskies! I hope everyone is having a wonderful start to their new year and semester… Continue to full post

Kick off to 2018-2019!

Welcome back to campus for the exciting academic year that lay ahead. As the weather turns chilly and more than 3,800 student prepare for another year in the Health Sciences complex, our Health Sciences Academic Services & Facilities team (HSAS&F) has been gearing-up to best serve our student, staff and faculty community.
Over the summer, major updates to the audio visual equipment systems were made in T639 and T439. Following our new A/V spec, these updates allow for more distance learning connectivity and a user friendly interface. South Campus Center 301 (formally the UW Bookstore) has new furniture to allow for maximum flexibility in the space and an A/V update will follow later this year.
As we continue to focus on updating our formal and informal learning spaces, we are also engaged in the planning process for the new Health Sciences Education Building. Since July 2018, representatives from the various Health Sciences schools and programs have embarked on the planning of a new Health Sciences Education Building to meet the ongoing need for updated classroom spaces and to better address trends in Health Sciences education. Please see the link below to learn more about the planning process for the building, which is slated for completion in 2022 pending continued funding from the legislator. As this project moves forward, HSAS&F will keep stakeholders up-to-date on progress and milestones!

HSEB Project

Will it stop raining anytime soon? That’s what we both heard and uttered for the past several weeks as we worked through Winter Quarter. On to Spring Quarter and the prospect of sunshine and warmer weather. Here are a few highlights we anticipate in the coming months:

• The Health Sciences Scheduling Committee will continue to develop strategies to streamline and update our classroom scheduling policies and practices. The committee is a collaborative effort with Health Sciences Instructional Support and scheduling representatives from the Health Sciences Schools.

• Spring Quarter is always extra busy for the Instructional Support staff that prepare materials for the Health Sciences Teaching Labs, pouring agar plates and slants, and preparing media and solutions used in the general assignment teaching labs.

• Health Sciences Clinical Skills Assessment will conduct nearly 1500 teaching and assessment encounters for Health Sciences students, including the year 1 Foundations Phase OSCE (objective structured clinical examination) required for the School of Medicine MD Program, and testing for MEDEX and Pharmacy students.

• The Scientific Instruments Biomedical Electronics Technician shop has added several new staff members to meet the growing need for electronic repair in the healthcare and research environments. Scientific conferences and publications, the UW Undergraduate Research Symposium, and graduation celebrations mean the Health Sciences Visual Design & Production services will be busy serving the University mission to support learning and research.

• Health Sciences Building Management will complete a refresh of four lactation rooms available on South Campus for students, staff and faculty, install seating in informal learning spaces, and continue to make improvements that support safety and security.

–Nancy Salts, Director Health Sciences Academic Services & Facilities

The 2017 Winter Quarter starts with excitement for the build out of the first active learning classroom in the South Campus Center. Design of the classroom is a collaboration with representatives from all six of the Health Sciences Schools. Opening just prior to the Autumn 2017 quarter, the classroom supports Interprofessional Education and serves as a pilot for technology and design that support interaction within the classroom. Also new this year to the South Campus Center is a student study space on the east side of the third floor and a lactation room also on the third floor. Efforts are underway to address Health Sciences Building safety and security concerns. HSAS&F is partnering with UW Police Department, Environmental Health & Safety, and Facilities Services to improve lighting around the building, develop building access improvements, and enable timely communications to building occupants. HSAS&F was honored with the ‘2016 Organizational Partner of the Year’ award from UW Facilities Services for participation in their Transforming Administration Program Small Projects Committee. The collaborative partnership developed between our departments supports our goal to provide the infrastructure and services vital to achieving academic excellence, scientific innovation, and world-class service (health care). We look forward to another year of collaborative excellence!

HSAS&F staff and students enthusiastically welcome back UW students for AUT16 classes and activities! The past year ushered in learning space improvements to support the student experience and the evolving pedagogy in Health Sciences. Be sure to check out the Health Sciences Student Lounge near the T4 overpass and watch for additional seating near the lecture halls. Partnering with UW Facilities Services and Health Sciences Schools, hallways have been repainted and flooring repaired, and targeted classroom technology advancements are in place. The first installation of audiovisual equipment in a general Health Sciences teaching lab serves as a pilot to evaluate the benefit of displaying lecture content and images produced by students as a result of their experiments.

Within our department, ‘Think Tank Teams’ have developed tools and templates to support compliance, process improvement and customer service. In alignment with the Provost’s TAP initiative, HSAS&F will embark on a customer engagement campaign to deepen our understanding of their needs and deliver on our strategic goal of demonstrating our value through excellence in customer service.

Finally, a big thank you to the dedicated and talented students and staff in HSAS&F for their enduring commitment to the UW and HSAS&F mission. Through their hard work we realize our vision of creating value through centralized resources and services vital to achieving academic excellence, scientific innovation, and world-class service.

Nancy Salts, Director Health Sciences Academic Services & Facilities

Director’s Message Fall 2015

Health Sciences Academic Services & Facilities (HSAS&F) is excited to welcome new and returning students to the UW Health Sciences classrooms for Fall Quarter 2015! We have upgraded technology, furniture, and infrastructure in a number of classrooms and informal learning space areas over the summer. In response to input from Health Science School curriculum leaders, a ‘low-tech’ active learning classroom was installed in the T-wing as a pilot for future efforts to better match our classrooms to the pedagogical needs of the Schools. Lecturers, students, and HSAS&F staff will participate in a post-occupancy study of how the room functions, providing data to guide classroom redesign.

HSAS&F supports UW sustainability efforts through participation in the UW Green Laboratory Program, support for waste diversion efforts, use of UCAR for Scientific Instrument installation, repair and maintenance of patient-care instrumentation and equipment, and Visual Design and Production is introducing an alternative to foam core for mounting print media.