The Learning Center will, we hope, become the community heart of the campus. It’s part of the bigger Strategic Vision 2030 plan—it’s about community, culture, and better serving students by creating a central gathering place. Bringing students together in the center of campus will change how the campus looks and feels.
Veterinary Learning Center to Become New Focal Point of Campus Life
Slated to open next summer, the new building will provide more classroom and community spaces
Preparing greater numbers of highly trained veterinarians to enter the field is one of the main pillars of the Strategic Vision 2030 plan for Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts University. Accommodating larger class sizes requires bigger classroom and learning spaces. Equally important to Cummings School’s leadership is maintaining the strong sense of community among students, faculty, and staff. Opening in the summer of 2027, the new Veterinary Learning Center (VLC) will be a major milestone in achieving those goals. The $24 million project to build the Veterinary Learning Center is accompanied by several other facilitating projects across campus, such as the new Grafton Campus Health Center and expanded parking.
“The Learning Center will, we hope, become the community heart of the campus,” says former Cummings School Dean Alastair Cribb, who stepped down on August 31. “It’s part of the bigger Strategic Vision 2030 plan—it’s about community, culture, and better serving students by creating a central gathering place. Bringing students together in the center of campus will change how the campus looks and feels.”
Over the past three years, Cummings School class sizes have increased from approximately 100 to 130 veterinary students, with the current third-year class topping the charts at 150.
“The Veterinary Learning Center is, in many ways, Strategic Vision 2030 made physical,” says Dr. Melissa Mazan, V93, dean ad interim and professor of equine internal medicine in the Department of Large Animal Clinical Sciences at Cummings School. “Our vision commits us to advancing the health and well-being of animals and people through collaboration and engagement, and to helping students develop not just knowledge but the skills and connections they need to make a difference. The VLC gives that commitment a home.”
The Veterinary Learning Center will house two spacious, flexible classrooms and a large social gathering space, with plenty of room for study groups to meet, quiet areas for students to work, and tables to grab meals with classmates. The flexible classrooms will be reconfigurable for different types of teaching, including hands-on and small-group learning. The main floor social gathering space will accommodate large events like Veterinary Research Day and host student, community, alumni, and continuing education events. The building will also house student-centered administrative offices so they are located where students are.
“Just as Strategic Vision 2030 was shaped with input from faculty, students, staff, and alumni, the VLC's design was shaped by the whole community—down to decisions about lockers versus common seating, lecture theaters versus flat-floor classrooms, even color schemes and furniture,” says Mazan. “That kind of engagement is exactly what our mission calls for: fostering a diverse, inclusive community that has a real hand in the institution it's building. Our student body is vibrant, passionate, and dedicated, and a lot of the best learning happens outside the classroom—in a club meeting, an impromptu lunch, a yoga class, a hallway conversation. This building finally gives that kind of learning a place to happen.”
As part of Strategic Vision 2030, the D.V.M. curriculum was redesigned to more fully prepare students for a changing veterinary field. The new curriculum was introduced with the class of 2028, the first of the increased class sizes.
“Part of our Strategic Vision 2030 was preparing for the future and better serving society’s needs,” says Cribb of revamping the curriculum. “Things we did 50 years ago when the school started in terms of clinical care and research are fundamentally different from what we do now. Students are different than they were 50 years ago, technology is different, and what we have to teach students is different. The Learning Center is an exciting milestone that’s part of a bigger plan tied to the overall growth of the school and the ability to deliver an excellent education.”
“This is part of the ongoing growth of Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine, much of which is supported through philanthropy,” says Laurie Cormier, senior director of development and alumni engagement at Cumming School.
In continued partnership with the university, the next step in executing Strategic Vision 2030 will be increasing clinical education and service space. Construction of a new $6 million clinic that will double the size of Tufts at Tech Community Veterinary Clinic in Worcester Technical High School is currently underway. Following in the pipeline will be a new Veterinary Clinical Education Center that will house a new wing of Henry and Lois Foster Hospital for Small Animals, an expanded Luke and Lily Lerner Clinic, and additional clinical education and research spaces. New research facilities are also in early planning stages.