We’ve been watching the building rise for two years now, anticipation swelling with each milestone in the construction process. The topping off. The closing in. The start of tours offering a peek inside.

The crowning touch is scheduled for October, when university leaders and supporters plan to cut the ribbon on the Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Building. Join us as we cheer. Case finally has a flagship worthy of its status as a tier-one research university.

a tier-one research university. With its soaring walls of glass and masonry, ISEB instantly assumes iconic status. It’s the largest structure ever built on Case Quad and the largest university research building in the region. Tens of thousands of eyes will soon be gazing toward it.

For the handsome, five-story, $300 million complex also reshapes the Quad in dramatic ways. ISEB offers a second main entrance on Martin Luther King Drive, presenting a friendly facade to passing motorists. That, and the new Veale Gateway, opens the Quad to the city below.

Then there’s the science that will take place inside. A university hungry for lab space is suddenly flush with big, bright, state-of-the art laboratories designed for collaboration and discovery. Researchers will be exploring frontiers of electrochemistry, ecology, robotics, advanced materials and life sciences in interdisciplinary teams.

Threats to federal research funding dampen the mood, but the feeling of achievement is unmistakable. Faculty and students are anxious to get started. Many alumni deserve our thanks, as their generosity and support helped to make this building rise. All can say they were there at the cusp, the beginning of a new era of research and discovery on Case Quad.