TORONTO, October 24, 2003 -- York University’s Schulich School of Business officially opened the doors to its new home today. After two years of construction, this striking $102 million combination of light, stone and steel is ready to welcome the next generation of competitive business leaders to its prominent location at the entrance to the university’s Keele Street campus.
York President Lorna R. Marsden opened the facility in a ceremony today with Dezsö Horváth, Dean of Schulich School of Business, York Chancellor Avie Bennett, Marshall (Mickey) Cohen, Chair of the Board of Governors, York University benefactor and entrepreneur Seymour Schulich and Kathleen Wynne, Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities. The building’s namesake, Seymour Schulich, donated a total of $24 million to the business school, the largest cumulative donation to a business school in Canada. Representing Ontario Superbuild Corporation, which contributed $30.5 million to the new school, was Superbuild President David Lindsay.
"Schulich is helping to redefine management education," said York University President Lorna R. Marsden. "This world-class complex is a bold reflection of York’s commitment to excellence and innovation. It is a showpiece on York’s vibrant and modern campus."
In keeping with Schulich’s ranking as one of the world’s top business schools, the 335,000-square-foot building includes such state-of-the-art accommodations as wireless Internet cafés, 60 executive residential suites, 13 breakout conference rooms and 14 three-tiered lecture halls for 60-65 students. The lecture halls are equipped with plasma screens and the library study areas are fitted with network ports connected to online business databases. The school’s marketplace area boasts a gigantic screen tuned to business broadcasts, brand-name food services and a 220-seat dining hall with its own executive chef and a two-storey kitchen.
Built in what joint-venture architects Hariri Pontarini and Robbie/Young + Wright call the Nordic humanist style, the new Schulich building features strategically placed wings radiating from a central hub that allow sunlight to fill its theatre-style lecture halls and offices. The glass and limestone exterior form a natural-looking veneer over a spacious, hi-tech facility built with the needs of its 2,750 students and 10,000 executive trainees in mind.
Dean Horváth and the team behind the design concept wanted something beyond a concrete box – a space that would set the benchmark for how business education would be delivered in the 21st century.
"We encourage multiple perspectives, looking at the world through different lenses because business students today require a much broader frame of reference for making decisions in an increasingly complex world," said Dean Horváth.
Schulich’s dramatic complex was cited as one of the new breed of 21st-century business schools in a recent Financial Times of London article that explored how these structures are changing the way business is taught.
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