Senator Charles E. Schumer

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: December 14, 2009

SCHUMER SECURES KEY SENATE SUBCOMMITTEE APPROVAL FOR $100,000 FOR MOUNT SAINT MARY COLLEGE EDUCATION

Funding Is Part Of House And Senate Omnibus Appropriations Bill Passed By House Last Week And Senate Over The Weekend

Today, U.S. Senator Charles E. Schumer announced that both houses of Congress have passed the FY 2010 Omnibus Appropriations bill which includes $100,000 to the Mount Saint Mary College Mathematics, Science, and Technology Center Project for the purchase of nursing lab equipment. The funding was included as part of the FY2010 Omnibus Appropriations bill. The bill passed the House last week and the Senate over the weekend and now awaits the President’s signature.

“With New York in the midst of a nursing shortage, this project will provide Mount Saint Mary College with the equipment, facilities and training to produce more first-rate nurses,” said Schumer. “Access to these resources will produce better quality nurses and will result in better patient care for the entire Hudson Valley region.”

Mount Saint Mary College’s reputation for the quality of its nursing, teacher education and science programs has resulted in increased enrollments that present a unique opportunity for the college to respond to pressing local, regional and national needs for highly skilled professional nurses and qualified, effective mathematics and science teachers. Increasing enrollments in these fields has created demand for biology, chemistry and nursing courses that exceeds the capacity of the college’s current science and nursing laboratories. Existing science laboratories were designed twenty years before the introduction of the personal computer and could not accommodate advances in technology. Ventilation and chemical storage issues also needed to be addressed.

The LHHS appropriation will help finance a project which includes a new Mathematics, Science & Technology (MST) Center and the expansion of nursing labs and renovation of vacated space to create a new Nursing Learning Resource Center. The new MST Center will include seven teaching laboratories for biology and chemistry, a science instrumentation lab, a science research lab, laboratory prep spaces, a computer network design lab, four multi-discipline computer labs and two general purpose “smart” classrooms.

The appropriation was originally included in the Senate FY2010 Labor, Health, and Human Services and Education (LHHS) Appropriations Bill. Last week that bill was combined with 5 other appropriations bill into the FY 2010 Omnibus Appropriations bill. The omnibus bill passed the House last week and the Senate over the weekend.

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