URBANA, Ill. (AP) — The oldest academic building on the University of Illinois’ Champaign-Urbana campus is scheduled to reopen this summer after a $78 million renovation.
The (Champaign) News-Gazette reports faculty will begin moving back into the Natural History Building on May 16 after the school’s commencement.
Classes will resume in the building next fall.
The building will now have high-tech classrooms and modern labs with data ports along hallways.
It was built in the 1890s and had several later additions.
Engineers inspected it in 2010 and found structural problems and sagging concrete.
That forced half the building to close and renovations to be scheduled.
Professor Stephen Marshak says the “crumbling relic” has had “an amazing transformation.”
He estimates as many as 1,500 students will pass through the building’s auditorium every day.
