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Officials broke ground on the new CDIS building on Tuesday, April 25. Photo by Andy Manis
In the year In 1957, newly commissioned 2nd Lt. John Morridge installed the tabulation center at Dover Air Force Base with the latest in computer technology: a 25-ton, 6,000-square-foot Honeywell Datamatic 1000.
Speaking on the construction site of the future Wisconsin-Madison School of Computer, Information and Information Sciences, Morridge spoke about how things have changed with the future in mind. Crowds gathered Tuesday for the building’s groundbreaking ceremony, with tiny smartwatches on their wrists carrying more computing power than the DATAmatic 1000.
Expect an even faster growing future as an important link to CDIS construction.
“Thousands of young minds will walk the halls, occupy their labs, sit in the classrooms,” said Morridge, who is joined by his wife, Tasia, as a major donor supporting the construction. “Their task is to use data and information tools – many of which they design – to understand and influence some of humanity’s most pressing problems: climate, disease, energy, waste, artificial intelligence and space, to name a few.”
Governor Tony Evers, UW System President Jay Rothman, Chancellor Jennifer Mnuchin, Interim Provost Eric Wilkos and CDIS Founding Director Tom Erickson thanked Morgges and the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation for their investment in the building. Celebrating the members of the UW–Madison community and the design and construction professionals who will make the nearly 350,000-square-foot structure a reality over the next two years.
When completed, the building will house CDIS – the School of Data and the Departments of Computer Science and Statistics – UW School of Medicine and the Division of Public Health Biostatistics and Medical Informatics, the American Family Insurance Data Science Institute, N.Y. +1 Institute and Center for Advanced Computing.
“The partnerships developed here with major industry and area employers ensure students are workforce ready and have countless opportunities with in-demand skills.”
Tom Erickson
As a high-tech beacon in Wisconsin, the CDIS building will be a symbol of innovation and collaboration, nurturing a diverse and inclusive technology community, enabling computational excellence across all disciplines, supporting groundbreaking research, fostering entrepreneurs and attracting businesses,” said Erickson.
Evers expects the impact of the building and the school to extend into the future of Wisconsin.
“The partnerships that have already been developed with major industrial and local employers ensure that students are ready for the workforce and have countless opportunities with highly sought-after skills,” he said. “And that’s why, as a nation, creating a pipeline of students with programs like this is critical to building the workforce of the future and the visionaries who will build the future we all want for our country and the world.”
The state’s higher education institutions are rising to the challenge, Rotman said, with campuses of interest being an example.
Helping to break ground for the new CDIS building are, front row left to right, Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation Managing Director Eric Iverson, UW System President Jay Rothman; Interim Provost Eric Wilcotts; Chancellor Jennifer Mnuchin, and John and Tashia Morridge, Major Donors. Back row from left, Bucky Badger; Tom Erickson, CDIS Founding Director; Stephen Van Dyke, LMN Architect and Partner; Jeff Pitt, Kahler Slater Vice President; Bo Muwahid, Facility Planning and Management Project Manager; and Jim Yale, president and CEO of Finderf. Photo by Andy Manis
“Wisconsin can be proud that this new facility will allow this university to remain competitive, as well as provide a vehicle for collaboration with other system universities in the state,” Rothman said. “The UW System currently produces more than two and a half times as many computer and information science graduates as we did a decade ago. And UW–Madison is leading the way, more than tripling its graduates in this area.
The university also offers wildly popular degree programs in computer science (the largest on campus) and data science (the fastest-growing major) open to all UW–Madison students.
“This reflects our commitment to ensuring that all students have the opportunity to incorporate mathematical thinking, data and information into their learning,” Wilcotts said. “This is the Wisconsin way, and it sets us apart from our peers in a very important way.”
Monkin announced that the new building’s student commons will be named for the late Chancellor Emerita Rebecca Blank, “a person who believed deeply in the idea that to do truly amazing things, you must first bring people together,” Mnukin said.
The new home of CDIS, UW–Madison’s newest school, is a way to multiply the impact of technology across the university’s many, deeply talented academic disciplines and encourage collaboration.
“This institution allows us to do something that no other university in the country does – by bringing together three high-level departments under one roof and connecting computing with biomedical research and engineering in a high-tech corridor. Medicine,” said Mnookin. “We know we need to work to solve the world’s problems. Building not just partnerships, but entire innovation ecosystems from across campus and beyond to fuel new discoveries and innovations that change lives and help the growing technology sector.”
Bucky Badger stands in front of the new CDIS building construction site. Photo by Andy Manis
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