The centerpiece of the Health Education Campus is the Sheila and Eric Samson Pavilion, a 477,000-square-foot building in which medicine, nursing, dental, physician assistant and even social work students study and learn together.
Named after the Samsons, the pavilion features a 27,000-square-foot central atrium that draws maximum light from a specially engineered roof. Admissions and other academic learning environments, including the Rhonda and Marc Stefanski Center for Community Health Education, surround the central first-floor space. The first floor also includes a $5 million conference center featuring a 7,000-square-foot auditorium and 4,800-square-foot lecture hall, where students from all programs may gather for interprofessional lessons, featured speakers and demonstrations.
The building also houses an innovation laboratory, where students and faculty can develop and test new technologies, and pilot their use in health care education.
London’s Foster + Partners architects designed the Samson Pavilion. Take a tour of the Samson Pavilion or view a timelapse video of the construction.
About the Samsons
Sheila and Eric Samson’s significant gift, announced in July 2018, helped make our state-of-the-future Health Education Campus a reality. It also made the couple, who are natives of South Africa, among the largest donors to Cleveland Clinic.
A steel company executive, Mr. Samson had successful heart surgery performed by Toby Cosgrove, MD, executive advisor and former CEO and president of Cleveland Clinic. Mrs. Samson is also a patient. Mr. Samson, executive chairman of Macsteel Holdings, is a member of Cleveland Clinic’s International Leadership Board.
The Samsons made previous gifts to Cleveland Clinic to establish the Samson Global Leadership Academy, to the Sydell and Arnold Miller Family Heart & Vascular Institute and to the Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health in Las Vegas.
“The new Health Education Campus will bring in a new era of teaching,” Mr. Samson said. “We have to look to the future, new technology and an updated way of imparting knowledge. The collaboration between Cleveland Clinic and Case Western Reserve University will certainly make this campus the best teaching facility available to students.”