Connecticut Science Center
The Connecticut Science Center has community down to a science
The Connecticut Science Center will bring discovery and exploration to the thousands of visitors who are expected to visit beginning in the fall of 2008. Now under construction at Adriaen's Landing in Hartford, the Center is designed to be a world-class science education facility and foster an appreciation of science by immersing visitors of all ages in fun and educational interactive experiences.
Overlooking the Connecticut River, the building - designed using "green"energy technology - will house more than 200 hands-on exhibits on all aspects of science, including engineering, communications, the mysteries of deep space and the Connecticut River. Among the exhibit galleries will be Planet Earth, Exploring Space, The Picture of Health, Forces and Nature, and Invention Dimension. The Science Center will have a 3-D cinema, four classrooms, a special events room and a cafeteria.
"Our goal,"explained Dr. Theodore Sergi, president and chief executive officer of the Connecticut Science Center, "is to excite visitors about the sciences and engineering, and influence the workforce of the future." Today's Science Center visitors could be tomorrow's scientists, doctors, inventors, teachers and engineers.
With just over a year before the grand opening, the $150 million project will bring to fruition a Connecticut institution that is long overdue. A $1 million grant from the Northeast Utilities Foundation helped make the Center possible. "Northeast Utilities has been with us from the very beginning," said Dr. Sergi. "They are one of a handful of outstanding corporate citizens who are really making this happen."
The Northeast Utilities Foundation grant will fund the Science Center's physical science gallery, Forces and Motion. Visitors to Forces and Motion will have opportunities to operate a ball-throwing robot, build a vehicle that hovers over its track by magnetic levitation, design and fly a helicopter, and experiment with a high-speed video camera that captures motion at 1,000 frames per second.
"This very generous gift from the Northeast Utilities Foundation brings us closer to our dream of establishing a world-class destination and educational resource facility for families and school groups alike," said Dr. Sergi. The Science Center is expected to draw visitors to Hartford and the surrounding region, providing incentive for further economic development in the area.
