I thoroughly enjoyed our annual Foundation Banquet on Thursday night at John Ascuaga’s Nugget. There were so many highlights: the event was sold-out and more than 900 people attended; our featured speaker, Harvard medical professor Dr. Atul Gawande, delivered an excellent talk on the struggle to perform well in any endeavor, as well as health care in the United States; it was announced during the banquet that the William N. Pennington Foundation has committed $10 million to the University for the purpose of a new Health Sciences Building. The Pennington gift, along with a $2.5 million gift from the Nell J. Redfield Foundation and a $1 million gift from the Thelma B. and Thomas P. Hart Foundation brings the total private investment in the building to $15 million. These gifts, along with $31 million from the Nevada State Legislature, will support construction of a new teaching facility that will have important and lasting impact for our state. The new facility, which is anticipated to open in fall 2011, will allow the University of Nevada School of Medicine to expand its class size from 62 to 100 students for a total enrollment of 400 students, while the number of Orvis School of Nursing students will double for an eventual total enrollment of about 300 students. This expansion will go a long way toward addressing the state’s shortage of doctors and nurses, and will ensure that our future doctors and nurses will be trained under one roof. I am deeply appreciative of the generous, visionary gift that the William N. Pennington Foundation has given the University. This project will allow our University to be at the forefront of a nationwide movement to optimize health care delivery through comprehensive and interdisciplinary care. Perhaps the best praise for this worthwhile endeavor came from our guest, Dr. Gawande, who concluded his remarks with words that truly do encapsulate the impact that such a project can have. Dr. Gawande said that he came to Reno this week not expecting anything special, that he thought it would be a fun trip. “Instead,” he said, “I found the future of health science education. It was a ‘duh’ moment. Imagine, training doctors and nurses in the same building.” At a time when the future of health care is at the top of the national agenda, it was heartening to hear from one of the most influential voices in American health care reform today that our University is a leader in providing a much-needed solution.

To read more about the Pennington Foundation gift, go to:

Nevada News story: http://www.unr.edu/nevadanews/templates/details.aspx?articleid=5184&zoneid=40

Reno Gazette-Journal story:

http://www.rgj.com/article/20090925/NEWS/909250404/1321