The Douglas Institute and the MacDonald engineering school are among several McGill University buildings that will benefit from a $103 million infrastructure grant from the provincial and federal governments.
The university says the money is to conduct "essential maintenance and construction projects" but McGill Principal Heather Munroe-Blum says the real benefit will be to help attract the best minds to McGill.
"I've found that professors and researchers are not greedy for personal compensation, but they are greedy to use their talents," she told reporters.
"If they don't have the infrastructure support they need to be able to express their talents fully, they will go where they can."
The money will go to four areas:
- The Douglas Institute in Verdun will get over $19.5 million for a new brain-imaging centre:
- The McIntyre Medical Building at the main McGill campus gets $28.7 million to upgrade the life sciences facilities:
- The Otto Maas Chemistry Building and the Pulp and Paper Research Institute will be upgraded to the tune of $27.6 million:
- And the Macdonald Engineering Building gets $24.7 million in renovations.
McGill says the money addresses urgent repairs but that more work needs to be done.
The money comes from a $2 billion government initiative to help Canadian universities.
