SFS Student Emily Tyner has received a U.S. Student Fulbright Award for her project entitled "Assessing environmental impacts of aquaculture cages on Lake Malawi".  The award will support her work in Malawi in 2013.

Ushering in a new era of freshwater research in the United States, the UWM School of Freshwater Sciences (SFS) is only a few short months away from breaking ground on a new $53 million addition to its Great Lakes Research Facility. This substantial new building will continue the transformation underway at the School, which recently added graduate programs and two new disciplines to its 46 year-long history, much of which was spent as the Great Lakes WATER Institute.

“The building will greatly expand our ability to understand freshwater issues,” said David Garman, founding dean of the School of Freshwater Sciences.  “The tools and technologies we will have in place when it opens will be second to none.  Together with the new centers and programs we’re introducing at the School, UWM will be one of the preeminent places in the world to study freshwater.”

Built adjacent to the current Great Lakes Research Facility and serving as its front door, the new 100,000 square foot building will be home to the faculty and scientists of the UWM School of Freshwater Sciences, as well as their research teams and graduate students.  It will house the Center for Water Policy, Great Lakes Genomics Center, state-of-the-art laboratories for researchers and students, classrooms, quarantine facilities to allow researchers to acquire and study aquatic organisms from the Great Lakes, and a substantial expansion of the SFS aquaculture labs.  Additionally, UWM engineering faculty who explore water technologies will have space on the top floor, contributing to SFS’ interdisciplinary nature and mission.

 “One of the greatest challenges of the 21^st century is how to reconcile human activity and environmental sustainability,” said Val Klump, SFS associate dean of research.  “Nowhere is that challenge greater than in the realm of freshwater.  These new research facilities and UWM’s School of Freshwater Sciences are a direct response to that challenge.”

“We want to put cutting edge tools in the hands of the best and brightest scientists, students and policy makers, so that we can effectively, economically and protectively manage freshwater resources for the future, not only here in the Great Lakes, but globally as well. ”  

Research will continue to be conducted in the original sections of building, which will be reorganized to allow for maximum efficiency, and the SFS research vessel Neeskay and the EPA’s boat Lake Guardian will continue to be docked at the Great Lakes Research Facility.

Because of the transformational nature and high visibility of SFS, a group led by UWM’s Institute of Ecological Design (School of Architecture and Urban Planning) and the City of Milwaukee will also use the construction of the building as a catalyst project to begin redeveloping Milwaukee’s inner harbor region.  Phase one will focus on reconstructing Greenfield Avenue east of 1^st Street, and will include an innovative storm water management plan and educational features focusing on freshwater habitats.

Groundbreaking for the building is planned for June 2012, with major construction wrapped up by December 2013.

Several developments are making progress and other buildings are filling up in Milwaukee's Walker's Point neighborhood, which is at the center of the region's efforts to become a water technology business hub and home to the School of Freshwater Sciences.