Dedication of Engineering Makerspace Also Set for Next Week

Lobby of Pulichino Tong Business Center at UMass Lowell showing stock ticker
One of the unique features of the new Pulichino Tong Business Center is a real-time stock ticker that hangs above the lobby so that it is visible to students on the upper floors of the building. Another live ticker is located in the state-of-the-art trading room on the first floor.

04/13/2017

Media contacts: Christine Gillette, 978-934-2209 or Christine_Gillette@uml.edu and Nancy Cicco, 978-934-4944 or Nancy_Cicco@uml.edu

* M E D I A A D V I S O R Y *

WHAT:UMass Lowell will officially open the new home of its business school – the university’s 13th new building since 2009 – and dedicate its engineering makerspace, which together represent the combined generosity of more than 70 donors who have committed close to $15 million to make both possible.

The Pulichino Tong Business Center, which opens with an event on Thursday, April 20 at 11 a.m., will offer students in UMass Lowell’s Manning School of Business a state-of-the-art, real-time trading room and other features including a live stock market ticker suspended above the 54,800-square-foot building’s lobby, “smart” classrooms, faculty offices and meeting space.

The Pulichino Tong Business Center is named for alumnus John Pulichino and his wife, Joy Tong, successful entrepreneurs and longtime university supporters who have donated more than $4 million to student scholarships.

The building will house the new Donahue Center for Business Ethics and Social Responsibility and the Wilson Center for Entrepreneurship, along with three other major named spaces established by 14 donors who have contributed a total of $4 million. The Commonwealth of Massachusetts contributed $25 million in bond funding toward the $47 million project.

The April 20 event is scheduled to include remarks by both Pulichino and Tong, along with Lt. Gov. Karyn Polito; UMass Lowell Chancellor Jacquie Moloney; UMass President Marty Meehan; state Rep. Brian Dempsey of Haverhill; state Rep. David Nangle of Lowell; Commissioner Carol Gladstone of the Massachusetts Department of Capital Asset Management and Maintenance (DCAMM); Lowell Mayor Ed Kennedy; Manning School of Business Dean Sandra Richtermeyer; and student Rebecca Foley of Acton.

The Lawrence Lin MakerSpace will be dedicated at an event on Wednesday, April 19 at 4 p.m. Lawrence Lin, who came to the university from Taiwan to earn his Ph.D. in plastics engineering, demonstrated a steadfast approach to earning his degree that personifies the determination of UMass Lowell students past and present. Since his graduation in 1990, Lin has gone on to achieve career success, including tripling the size of his family’s manufacturing business while converting it to an environmentally friendly operation that has won Taiwan’s top award for corporate social responsibility.

Lin and his wife, Jangli Chang, who is also a UMass Lowell graduate, have been generous supporters of UMass Lowell and its students, endowing scholarships and most recently, a $1 million fund to equip and operate the College of Engineering’s new makerspace, an 8,500-square-foot open-concept work area that offers students 3-D printers, laser cutters and other equipment to guide their projects from concept to reality. Support for the makerspace has also come from Analog Devices and Haas Automation.

Speakers at the dedication are scheduled to include Lin and Moloney, along with Vice Chancellor for Advancement John Feudo; College of Engineering Dean JosephHartman; and student Stephen Kender of Chelmsford.

WHERE:Lin MakerSpace dedication – Falmouth Hall, 1 University Ave., Lowell

Pulichino Tong Business Center opening – Grande Tomaney Innovation Plaza, 72 University Ave., Lowell

For directions and parking information, please contact UMass Lowell media relations.