VCU news

By Leah Small and Lynne McCarthy

A ribbon-cutting ceremony will be held Friday at the Virginia Commonwealth University Rice Rivers Center to open the Inger Rice Lodge, an overnight facility for VCU students and visiting researchers.

The ribbon-cutting will take place at 4 p.m. at the VCU Rice Rivers Center, 3701 John Tyler Memorial Hwy, Charles City, Virginia. When you arrive at the Rice Center you will see signage pointing to event parking. Proceed up the gravel road to the fork. Take the left fork directly to the Inger Rice Lodge to park. A student will be present to provide further instructions.

VCU President Michael Rao, Ph.D.; Robert Tombes, Ph.D., vice provost of VCU Life Sciences; Gregory Garman, Ph.D., director of the VCU Rice Rivers Center; and philanthropist Inger Rice will attend the event. Rao, Rice, Tombes and Garman will provide remarks. A visitor reception and tours of the Inger Rice Lodge and the Walter L. Rice Education Building — Virginia’s first platinum LEED building — will follow the ceremony. Rice Rivers Center researchers will also offer demonstrations of some of VCU’s most significant environmental projects.

The Inger Rice Lodge is critical to furthering VCU’s research enterprise by building collaborations with other institutions. Additionally, the Rice Rivers Center hopes to finalize plans later this year for construction of a 14,000-square-foot research laboratory that includes meeting and office space. The building would include support facilities such as an environmental chemistry analysis laboratory and a geospatial data analysis laboratory, which would be used by researchers from the center and other institutions.