Carnegie Mellon University will celebrate the expansion of its West Coast Campus at Moffett Field, Calif., with a ribbon-cutting ceremony and tour of its new headquarters in Building 23 on the historic Shenandoah Plaza, adjacent to NASA Ames Research Center, at 10:30 a.m. PST, on Friday, Oct. 31.

Carnegie Mellon President Jared L. Cohon and Raj Reddy, Simon University professor and West Coast Campus educational director, will be joined by G. Scott Hubbard, Director of NASA Ames Research Center, and other NASA officials as they showcase the progress made at the campus since it was established in 2001. Eric Schmidt, chairman and CEO, Google, Inc., will be a guest speaker. The campus’s unique offerings in education, research and outreach will be highlighted for visitors.

The West Coast Campus opened for classes in September 2002, with 56 students enrolled in programs leading to a master of science degree in information technology. The first graduation ceremony was held Aug. 29, 2003.

Coursework at the university’s West Coast Campus is built around the concept of ‘learning by doing.’ Classes feature hands-on, project-oriented, apprenticeship-based and individually mentored activities that emphasize teamwork and collaboration.

The West Coast Campus research agenda based on high dependability computing, which is critical to NASA missions as well as industry and daily life, will be highlighted with exhibits. In January 2002, Carnegie Mellon received a $23.3 million NASA grant to lead the High-Dependability Computing Program, a research consortium of five universities.

This past summer, the West Coast Campus completed its second season of RoboCamp,
a six-week summer outreach program for Bay Area high school seniors who built and programmed their own autonomous mobile robots.

Initially, the West Coast Campus had been housed in a smaller location on the Shenandoah Plaza, but its expanding programs demanded additional space. Earlier this year, Carnegie Mellon and NASA agreed on a long-term lease under which the university renovated space in Building 23. The building and plaza are part of the 213-acre NASA Research Park that the agency is developing.

For more information about Carnegie Mellon and its West Coast Campus, see:

http://www.cmu.edu and http://west.cmu.edu/

For more information about the NASA Research Park, see:

http://researchpark.arc.nasa.gov/

NOTE TO EDITORS AND NEWS DIRECTORS: News media representatives are invited to attend a ribbon-cutting ceremony to celebrate the expansion of Carnegie Mellon University’s West Coast Campus at NASA Ames Research Center. The ceremony will be held at 10:30 a.m. PST and feature a tour of the university’s new headquarters in Building 23 on the historic Shenandoah Plaza at Moffett Field. News media representatives must present photo ID at the main gate, Moffett Field, to gain entry. To reach Building 23, drive through the main gate and proceed east on South Akron Road to Building 23 on the right.