The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) has awarded LEED gold certification to the new three-story, 50,000-square-foot Allied Health Education and Training Facility at San Diego Mesa College in the Clairemont area of San Diego. Architects | Delawie Wilkes Rodrigues Barker was the project architect and McCarthy Building Companies Inc. served as the construction manager on behalf of the San Diego Community College District.

Completed in August 2009, the new $23 million Allied Health Education and Training Facility is the District’s sixth facility to be LEED certified and the fourth to achieve LEED gold status. Construction was funded by the $1.555 billion Propositions S and N construction bond program, which is providing for new teaching and learning facilities, major renovations and campus infrastructure projects at Mesa, City and Miramar colleges and six continuing education campuses.

Situated off Mesa College Drive at the main campus entry, the Allied Health Education and Training Facility serves as a prominent landmark at San Diego Mesa College.

The design of the Allied Health building incorporates a three-story layout to serve all the uses required by students and staff on the compact site. It features a continuous ribbon window curtainwall system with integral horizontal window eyebrows that help reduce the vertical emphasis of the building, while also playing a significant role in shading the glass and thus lowering the amount of solar heat gain inside the building. It also helps provide abundant daylighting. In addition, the building’s power requirements are offset in part by energy generated by solar panels located on the roof of the adjacent parking structure.