Milwaukee School of Engineering’s new engineering building and AI lab are underway

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A $75.5 million addition to the Milwaukee engineering college campus is underway.

The Milwaukee School of Engineering on Saturday broke ground on the Robert D. Kern Engineering Innovation Center, a four-story, 97,000-square-foot academic building that will become home to most of the school’s engineering departments. The project will also hold an educational center focused on artificial intelligence, as the college wants to focus on integrating AI and machine learning into all its programs.

Pewaukee-based VJS Construction Services was hired as the construction manager of the center and Ramlow/Stein Architecture + Interiors will serve as the project developers, officials said.

Crews will tear down the north-facing wall of the Allen-Bradley Hall of Science and Fred Loock Engineering Center and connect the innovation center to the two buildings, making a complex of three buildings with the newest facing the southeast corner of North Milwaukee and East State Streets. MSOE aims to finish the innovation center ahead of the fall 2027 semester.

The project’s central feature is the Center for Applied Artificial Intelligence Education, which is part of an initiative to infuse AI learning across all the college’s engineering programs. It’s also a way to attract top-tier faculty and foster partnerships with industry, officials added.

The building will also feature flexible labs, modern classrooms, workshops focused on robotics and AI, an outdoor sustainability lab and public spaces for collaborative learning, officials noted.

Dr. Dwight Dierks, the senior vice president of computer manufacturing giant Nvidia and MSOE regent, spoke at the groundbreaking and shared an anecdote about his experience at the Allen-Bradley Hall of Science.

While working late nights on a project, students would have to stay in the hall overnight and hold the automatically locking door for others who wanted to catch a few hours of sleep in between shifts, he said.

“Today’s students have access to things like our supercomputer around the clock in their dorm room,” Dierks said. “Today’s students want to study in a different, collaborative way, and that’s what this Kern Engineering Center is all about. It brings modern classrooms on this part of the engineering center with the traditional, six-foot wall engineering building,” he added.

After the Robert D. Kern Engineering Innovation Center is completed, many of MSOE’s engineering disciplines will go under one roof, officials said.

Departments that will move in are the mechanical engineering department, the electrical, computer and biomedical engineering department and civil and architectural engineering and construction management department, officials added. The user experience program will move from the Grohmann Museum, officials noted.

The project is fueled by a $125 million comprehensive campaign to change the university’s physical campus and enhance its academic programs. So far, the campaign has raised $91.3 million, according to an MSOE dashboard.