A New York State court has ruled that Stony Brook University's plan to severely cut programs at its sustainability campus, in Southampton, N.Y., violates state education law, reports the The East Hampton Press. A group of students had sued the State University of New York branch, which planned to close the academic programs to save money, amid severe state budget problems. According to the newspaper, Judge Paul J. Baisley Jr. said the university's council had not reviewed the decision, as required by law. A Stony Brook spokeswoman said that the university would respond to the ruling and that its council would soon "convene to further discuss the decision to relocate the undergraduate and residential programs from Southampton to the Main Campus."

• U. of Minnesota at Duluth Adds $15-Million Civil-Engineering Building (Kate Joyce Studios photo; see more images here)

• Harvard U. Celebrates 31st and 32nd LEED-Certified Projects

• Mississippi Community College Begins Replacing Structures Lost to Katrina

• Calhoun Community College Readies $17-Million Robotics Center

The Salt Lake Tribune reports on the space crunch faced by a number of colleges in Utah, with a memorable anecdote a few paragraphs down:

At Snow College, a small but growing community college in Ephraim, space is so tight that students study in a room where cadavers are stored.

“For a school with a terrific reputation for pre-med and pre-engineering, this is embarrassing,” Snow President Scott Wyatt said.

The Tribune story mainly discusses a plan at Utah Valley University to acquire 100 acres once taken up by a World War II-era steel mill, two miles north of the campus. The property is now slated for redevelopment. If the $5-million purchase is completed, the cleaned-up land would provide space for intramural-sports fields and student-life facilities. The deal joins a trend of redevelopment projects among higher-education institutions.

The newspaper says Utah Valley has seen a...

• U. of Southern California Dedicates $130-Million Campus Center (AC Martin Partners rendering)

• Thom Mayne Will Design Computer-Science Building for Cornell U.

• Vincennes U. Opens $2.5-Million Diesel-Technology Lab Facility

• Utah State U. Plants Trees in Anticipation of Losing Existing Maples on Quad

An addition to the front of Buchanan and Marshall Halls brings big improvements to the 1956 dorms. (Chronicle photographs by Lawrence Biemiller)

Buchanan Hall was only 20 years old in 1976, when I moved in as a Franklin & Marshall College freshman, but already it left a lot to be desired. Like its twin, Marshall Hall, Buchanan was a three-story shoebox of a dorm, with 20 double rooms per floor and cinderblock walls that echoed with the music pounding out of our giant stereo speakers. The showers were communal, but that was about it for social space, except for an underused lounge outside of what had once been a dining hall connecting Buchanan and Marshall. Buchanan's red-brick exterior had one horizontal band of limestone trim and a couple of vertical stripes, but architecturally it was about as exciting as wax paper.

A decade or so ago, both Buchanan and Marshall got partial...

• Angelo State U. Breaks Ground for $35-Million, 400-Bed Residence Hall (Angelo State U. rendering)

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• Grand Rapids Community College Renames Former Davenport U. Campus

• Bucking Criticism, Haywood Community College Presses to Make New Arts Building Sustainable

Laura Wolfgang holds Oliver, her Black Welsh Mountain lamb. (Photos by Scott Carlson)

Poultney, Vt. — At Green Mountain College's post-petroleum farm, students learn how to grow crops without using fossil fuels to drive tractors or haul in copious quantities of fertilizer. Much of the work here—plowing, mowing, improving the soil, and so on—is done with the aid of animals, which are vital partners in the farming endeavor.

Recently, I stood out in a sunny pasture here with two sustainable-agriculture students, Dayna Halprin and Laura Wolfgang, along with a cow named Princess. True to her name, Princess conveyed an air of bovine entitlement, amplified by the way that Ms. Halprin and Ms. Wolfgang stroked her hide and cooed at her.

"I love Princess—she's a good cow," Ms. Halprin said. A moment later, as Princess's big, wet nose nudged her face, she added: "Hey, don't eat my hat!"

"I...

• Oklahoma State U. Opens Research Facility to Serve 6 Disciplines (Rees Associates Inc. photo)

• Sustainable Student Housing Opens at U. of Michigan at Ann Arbor

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• U. of Iowa Short-Lists 4 Firms to Design Replacement for Flooded Auditorium

A science-building addition at North Carolina Central U. is one of two campus buildings to win awards from the American Institute of Architects. (Photo by James West)

The American Institute of Architects' Committee on Architecture for Education included two university buildings among nine projects that won 2010 Education Facility Design Awards.

An award for excellence went to the Biomanufacturing Research Institute Technology Enterprise, or Brite, at North Carolina Central University. The 56,300-square-foot building, an addition to an existing science facility, houses teaching and research labs focused on biomanufacturing. It cost $17.8-million and opened in 2008. The design architect was Freelon; the architect of record was O'Brien/Atkins Associates.

A citation went to the Foster Center for Student Innovation at the University of Maine at Orono (left; U. of Maine photo). The 5,73...

• Joliet Junior College Wins Go-Ahead for 10-Story Downtown Project (Demonica Kemper Architects rendering)

• Student Union Debuts a Year Early at U. of Missouri at Kansas City

• U. of Florida Expands Its Recreation Center Again, This Time by 40,000 Square Feet

• Complex of 68 Townhouses Opens at State U. of New York at Oswego