It’s moving day for UNL’s Department of Food Science and Technology.
After nearly 18 months of planning, the department has started a month-long relocation to the new Food Innovation Center at Nebraska Innovation Campus. The move — one of the largest in university history — roughly doubles the space available to the department, which has doubled enrollment in the past eight years.
“We could not be more ready or excited,” said Rolando Flores, director of the food processing center and professor of food science and technology. “Like with any move, we know there will be issues. But, we trust that the organization we have in place will take care of any issue. We’ll definitely be ready for students when classes start in August.”
Including students, the move will impact about 200 people, as three floors of offices, laboratories and classrooms in the Food Industry Complex and Filley Hall pack up for new NIC facilities.
To assist with logistics, UNL hired Workspace Innovations, a business moving company based in Fort Collins, Colorado.
“We hired them to consult on and help coordinate the entire move,” said Barry Shull, facilities director for the Office of the Vice Chancellor of the Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources. “They developed a day-by-day schedule of what will be moved. They also helped coordinate the about a dozen manufacturers who have to come in and help disconnect and reconnect specialized equipment in labs.”
Shull said procedures with redundancies are being used to assure that samples from the department’s 27 labs survive the move. And, the Food Allergy Research and Resource Program will operate labs on both campuses until its new NIC space is accredited by the American Association for Laboratory Accreditation.
“In terms of complexity, other campus moves I’ve been involved in do not even compare to this one,” Shull said. “The coordination and planning to pull this off are a tremendous feat. Rolando and the rest of his staff have done an amazing job keeping everything on track.”
At the department level, Flores and Wanda Bowder, internal operations manager, have worked with Workspace Innovations, NIC representatives and campus administrators.
Along with emails, a team of department move managers communicated details about the move to faculty and staff. Flores said monthly move manager meetings have been held for more than a year.
During the move, which will be completed in waves through all of July, the department will operate on a limited basis. Individuals may encounter delays when trying to contact department faculty and staff during the move.
All department phone numbers will remain the same. The department is scheduled to return to full operations in the new space on July 31.
Mail delivery to department offices on East Campus ended July 1. It begins at the new building today. The new address is: University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Department of Food Science and Technology; 1901 N. 21st St., Lincoln, NE 68588.
Along with new lab, office and education spaces, the move will expand food science and technology’s pilot labs from three to five. The labs offer industrial systems that allow producers to generate small amounts of food products for testing before being mass produced.
The move will also include an updated, modern space for the food sensory lab, which allows clients — ranging from professors to industry leaders — to conduct taste tests on products.
One part of the department will remain behind as the UNL Dairy Store and its production facility will continue to operate in the Food Industry Complex.
“When this move is complete, we will be in a new space that will allow us to give students a better overall educational experience,” Flores said. “A lot of work is ahead, but nothing that is good is done without a lot of work.”
A grand opening celebration for the department’s NIC space is planned for October.
