Faculty and staff interviewed said the College's transition in leadership has stalled the project, which was planned to be completed by 2015. President-elect Philip Hanlon's plan for the space may differ from what former College President Jim Yong Kim previously proposed.
The Dana Biomedical Library staff moved into their new interim space on the third floor of 37 Dewey Field Road last week. The library will remain there during the demolition of the previous space and construction of the new building, biomedical libraries director Laura Cousineau said.
While the new library space remains a work in progress, she said it has a "lighter" atmosphere than the previous building. The one floor interim space was designed by Boston architect firm ADD.
The new space lacks room for many books that were previously housed in Dana, Cousineau said. The books have been temporarily relocated to a separate space during construction of the new building.
"One thing that is an issue is that there is not a lot of collaboration space," Cousineau said. "We need more room for education technology, and of course we want to bring our books back."
Two years ago, Dean of the Faculty Michael Mastanduno informed sociology department chair Kathryn Lively that a select number of academic departments would have the opportunity to move into the new building. The sociology department was one of those selected, in addition to the anthropology and geography departments.
The Geisel School of Medicine administration, Dana Biomedical Library, Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice and Dartmouth Center for Health Care and Delivery Science were also initially slated to have offices in the new building. But the preliminary plans have since changed.
Richard Johnson, associate director of the Dartmouth Institute, said the group will no longer move into the North Campus space and will instead relocate into the Williamson Translational Research Building, which will reside near Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center. He added that the Geisel administration will also not relocate to the new building.
Several of the Dartmouth Institute's education PhD program students will remain on campus, though it is currently unclear whether the program will eventually move north.
"Originally, we were slated to go into new north with the Geisel administration and the Dartmouth Center for Health Care and Delivery Science, but a month ago the decision was made that the Dartmouth Institute would go to Williamson instead," Johnson said.
While the Dartmouth Institute was initially deeply involved in planning, Johnson said it now is only engaging in discussions about the location of its educational programs, classrooms and meeting places for students.
"Until a month ago, planning was going on, but now we're no longer involved," Johnson said.
Lively said she hopes the new academic center provides a centralized space for the social sciences.
"The idea is that social sciences needs space, though ideally sociology would love to be able to stay closer to government and economics because most of our modified majors come from these departments," Lively said. "From an academic standpoint, we'd rather stay closer, but everyone needs space so we said, Okay, we're going to move.'"
Lively said that it is unclear what will happen to the building, which departments will move in and when the project will be completed.
"The university is a system, and each president has their own priorities," Lively said. "Kim wanted TDI and TDC on campus, that was his goal but it's not President Hanlon's goal we don't know what his agenda is yet."
Issues ranging from the Board of Trustees' disapproval of the building's design to its lack of appropriate space have plagued the development process from the start. Lively said she does not think the building will be completed by 2015.
"To be honest, I don't think anyone really knows what will happen with that building," Lively said. "I don't think anything has happened since 2011, and I don't think anything will until at least 2016, if not further out."
The department of project management will move forward with construction after it receives updates from the Dean of the Faculty and the Provost's Office, department director Matthew Purcell said.
"We'd love to be putting shovels in the ground tomorrow, but we have at least another year of programming to do," Purcell said.
The Board of Trustees finalized the $150 million construction plan for the North Campus Academic Center in Hanover and the Williamson Translational Research Building in Lebanon last year.
