President Watkins and SVP Reed announced Monday that the new Applied Science Building was approved by Utah lawmakers during the 2020 Legislative Session. The university's request for $60 million from the state to renovate and add to the historic William Stewart Building was included in the state budget adopted in the session.

This $85 million project will provide critical updates to our educational and research facilities for the Departments of Physics & Astronomy and Atmospheric Sciences. Together, the two departments teach more than 5,600 students and house 46 faculty members, who brought in $11.5 million in outside research funding in FY19. New construction-a 40,700 square-foot renovation and 100,000 square-foot addition-is expected to result in a 56 percent increase in capacity for experimental and computer labs. These new spaces will allow the departments to address critical bottlenecks in science and technology degree programs.