Representatives of the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB) held a ceremonial groundbreaking on Thursday for their next major campus building, a $120 million, six-story home for the School of Social Work at 600 W. Lexington Street.
The 127,000-square-foot building will consolidate the school’s Master of Social Work and Doctor of Philosophy programs, which are currently spread across three locations. Planners say it will be the first net-zero emissions building within the University System of Maryland and the first in downtown Baltimore, with features such as geothermal wells, solar panels and a green roof.
The construction site is bounded by Saratoga Street on the north, Greene Street on the east, Lexington Street on the south and Pearl Street on the west. It’s currently an empty lot on the north end of the UMB campus on the west side of downtown, between Lexington Market and the old Metro West complex, part of which is being converted to a new home for the Maryland Department of Health. It’s within easy walking distance of the state’s subway and light rail line and several parking garages.
Ballinger of Philadelphia is the architect and Whiting-Turner Contracting Co. is the builder. Plans call for a mix of research, teaching and gathering spaces, including 10 classrooms; two media labs; six simulation rooms; 13 conference rooms; 16 small meeting rooms; 27 huddle rooms; a coffee lounge; bike racks; showers; a foot-washing station; a prayer and meditation room; a lactation space; and a large multi-purpose event space for education and community outreach.
More than 200 people attended the groundbreaking event, where speakers touted the building’s sustainability features and said it will be a center for academic, community and civic engagement. School of Social Work Dean Judy Postmus said it represents “the future of social work” and was designed “with social work values in mind.”
The new school “will be more than just a place to develop the next generation of social workers, leaders and scholars – it will be a vibrant community hub where students, faculty and local partners come together,” she said. “I am enthusiastic that these adaptable spaces embrace social work’s core values of social justice, the importance of human relationships and service to the community, by going above and beyond in areas of sustainability and accessibility.”
UMB president Bruce Jarrell said moving the school to Lexington Street will align with and bolster efforts by city and state planners to revitalize the west side of downtown. He said the School of Social Work will lead a new wave of activity and construction over the next several years on the north end of campus, where the university is working with private developers to convert spaces to housing, stores and research space.
“This is a new beehive of activity that’s going to happen at UMB over the next couple of years and Social Work will be at the very center of it,” he said. “I hope in the next several years, concurrently with the development of this building, that you will see other activity there in terms of new development, developers and people on the street. That’s the idea about this north campus.”
Jarrell suggested that School of Social Work students and faculty will benefit by being close to the future home of Maryland’s health department, which is moving from State Center: “There might just be some useful interactions that take place there.”
He said he hopes that the school’s students and faculty will flourish in their new home.
“The fact that Social Work is the center of attention up here leads me to think I have great expectations of them,” he said. “I expect them to create new energy, new vibrancy, in this city that we love, Baltimore. I expect them to spread out their tentacles around this whole area and become an important element of change in Baltimore.”
With features such as a “high performance building envelope” and a usable roof garden, the building is expected to use 65 percent less energy than a traditional building of its size, and zero operational fossil fuels. Planners say they’re aiming to achieve LEED Gold certification and aspiring for LEED Platinum certification – the highest level awarded by the U. S. Green Building Council. In addition, they say, the project is tracking to earn LEED Net Zero Energy certification.
The new building “reflects UMB’s deep commitment to our core values of Well-Being and Sustainability,” Jarrell said. “From its green roof and geothermal walls to its net-zero energy design that will power learning and gathering spaces, this building exemplifies our mission to reduce UMB’s environmental impact while enhancing our campus and our connection to the surrounding community.”
The School of Social Work is one of six professional schools and an interdisciplinary School of Graduate Studies on the UMB campus. The School of Social Work has about 700 students and 80 full-time faculty members. Other programs include the Center for Restorative Change; Promise Heights Family Connections and The Institute for Innovation and Implementation.
According to Jarrell, more than 15,000 people are on the UMB campus on any given day, and another 9,000 people are in the University of Maryland Medical System’s buildings. After the ceremonial groundbreaking on Thursday, construction of the School of Social Work is expected to begin in December and be substantially complete in the summer of 2027.
This is the best they can do? (sigh)