Remarks to the Rotary Club of Calgary David Docherty, President, Mount Royal University Sept. 27, 2011 Thank you and good afternoon. I d like thank you for this opportunity to speak, not only because this is a chance to introduce myself and tell you a bit about what s happening at Mount Royal University, but also because I am honoured that one of my first major addresses to the community is being hosted by the Rotary Club. Your members are among our community s most dedicated and passionate community builders, and I thank you for inviting me here today. First, let me say how pleased I am to be in Calgary, and at Mount Royal. As you heard in the introduction, this summer my family and I moved to here from Ontario. We arrived in the midst of the Calgary Stampede, and jumped right in by riding in Mount Royal s float in the Stampede Parade. Since then, I ve had the honour of throwing the first pitch at a Vipers game and making the opening kickoff at a Stamps game. We ve been exploring our community, getting to know the city s culture, and meeting great people. All along, we ve been impressed by the friendly welcome we have received, not just at Mount Royal, but throughout the city. Next, to share a bit more of my background. When I went to university as an undergraduate, I didn t really know what I wanted to major in. So, I took a number of classes at Wilfrid Laurier University, and a political science one really piqued my interest. Then I became the first Laurier student to work as a Legislative Intern at Queen s Park. I didn t know it at the time, but even back then, there was already a Mount Royal connection in my life: David Taras worked as an intern there before I did, and David currently holds Mount Royal s Ralph Klein Chair in Media Studies. As a Laurier student, I was actively involved in Student Association affairs, serving as Vice-President of the Association, a perfect fit with my interest in politics and an early illustration of the value of encouraging 1
students to become involved in the University community outside of the classroom. After I went back to school and earned my master s and PhD, I worked hard and seized every opportunity to walk through the doors that my hard work opened. Those efforts ultimately led me here, but back then, I never would have expected I d be a professor (let alone the president of a university), but I did eventually return to Laurier as an Assistant Professor. I was a proud member of the Laurier Community for the next 17 years. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Laurier, it is a small to mid-size school that shares a city with the University of Waterloo. It has a student population in excess of 30,000 and a myriad of different programs. It s one of Bill Gates s 10 World Universities, and it is renowned for its engineering and science programs. Looking back, it s interesting to see the many similarities between Laurier and Mount Royal University. Both are student focused. Laurier is primarily undergraduate; Mount Royal is completely undergraduate. Both are located in a two-university city. At Laurier, our relationship with the big school up the street the University of Waterloo was one of cooperation and collaboration, not competition. This is one of the strongest similarities with Mount Royal University, because I don t think Mount Royal competes with the University of Calgary. I think we complement each other. We take the approach that when you are different, you can do different things and you can do them extremely well. Calgary can sustain two universities; and a world-class arts college; and a leading-edge technical institute; and a college that delivers unique learning opportunities to communities in and beyond Calgary. We also have two highly-regarded faith-based university colleges that, though small, contribute much to Calgary s well rounded post-secondary landscape. It s not about competing for resources or students or even reputation; it s about cooperation. Calgary is a dynamic city that provides a full range of educational opportunities for post-secondary 2
students and life-long learners, and I m looking forward to working with my colleagues in Calgary and throughout Alberta to provide the most rewarding opportunities for students at all levels. For many years, I have been aware of Mount Royal s stellar reputation as an institution that excels in teaching and learning, so I am very proud to have become the University s ninth president. There were many things that attracted me to this position. On the surface, there is the University s beautiful campus. But what s even more striking is the sense of community at Mount Royal. When I first came to Calgary to discuss the president position with the selection team, I asked for a tour of the campus. It was a cold, dark and snowy Saturday night but the campus was warm and inviting. Young students were streaming in to the Conservatory, musical instruments in hand. A band was setting up in our student centre, called Wyckham House. There were students working together on class projects. Signs for a pond hockey tournament were everywhere. And I thought, Done! This is a place with a real community spirit. This is a university that believes in the importance of learning in the classroom, but also sees the university experience in the broader sense. To me, that s part of what a university should be. My views have not changed since that time they have only been reinforced. The students I have met in the halls, in our classrooms, and at events like our New Student Orientation and our annual U Fest, have all impressed me with their enthusiasm. I have yet to meet one Mount Royal faculty member, support staff or administrator who doesn t say they love coming to work every day. We are lucky to have that work environment, and I am certainly glad to be a part of the Mount Royal team. Of course every post-secondary institution has its challenges some common; some unique but there are so many positive attributes of Mount Royal: More than 2,300 committed and engaged faculty members and support staff an enthusiastic and bright student body of more than 13,000 credit students professional and motivated managers, directors and senior academic and administrative leaders
more than 80,000 alumni who are making remarkable contributions to their families, employers, professions and communities. And, last but not least, a supportive community. As I learn more about Mount Royal and our place within that community, I discover that these strengths have been in place for more than a century. Mount Royal was founded as a college in 1910, and it has continued to evolve to meet the needs of our community. For example, Mount Royal was the first institution in Calgary to introduce university courses and that was back in 1931. Following the Second World War, Mount Royal introduced retraining programs for returning servicemen and servicewomen. We introduced Canada s first applied degree programs in 1995, and in 2007, we launched our first independent baccalaureate degree, the Bachelor of Nursing. We were accepted as members of the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada in 2009, and earlier this year, Mount Royal introduced our eighth and ninth new degrees: the Bachelor of Education Elementary, and the Bachelor of Midwifery. Research at Mount Royal has also experience rapid growth over recent years. We have established three main themes which define research at Mount Royal: undergraduate involvement in research; community engaged scholarship through partnerships, and the scholarship of teaching and learning. This research actively contributes to instructional excellence at Mount Royal, and it also contributes to the cultural, social and economic well-being of the community, both locally and internationally. So, what is my vision for Mount Royal University as we embark on our second century? I hope it does not seem to be a cop-out, but my vision is not markedly different than the existing ambition of the institution: to be Canada s premier undergraduate institution based on important measures of student success and satisfaction. It s a well-thought out and ambitious goal for an institution with a long-established track record for excellence in post-secondary education. It strengthens the foundation of what made Mount Royal special in the first place, and it s a vision I embrace and share.
It s also a vision that Mount Royal is well on its way to achieving. In the Globe and Mail s 2011 Canadian University Report, among all Canadian universities of a similar size, our students gave Mount Royal top grades in five categories, including quality of education and overall satisfaction. We were also ranked number one compared to all surveyed universities in the category of innovation and openness to new ideas and approaches. And, in the National Survey of Student Engagement, Mount Royal scored higher than 90 per cent for firstyear and senior-year satisfaction more than 10 per cent higher than the national average. In the next two years, I want to work on measureables to quantify our success, because I don t think anyone wants to buy into just one of the many rankings out there. In fact, there are probably things that the rankings don t even measure that Mount Royal does really well. Which leads me to how Mount Royal plans to continue moving toward our vision. One initiative we are currently undertaking is updating our Academic Plan. The updated plan will delineate the framework for excellence in teaching and learning; bring research into the classroom; and foster a culture of student and faculty research and learning opportunities. We wish to expose more undergraduates to research opportunities and to make the classroom a place of research and teaching. I fully support this vision in fact, one of the most meaningful honours of my career was to be named the 2005 Faculty of Arts Teaching Scholar at Wilfrid Laurier, an annual award that honours a faculty member who integrates both scholarly research and teaching. And Mount Royal is not alone in believing that we can and should be blending our research with our teaching. The President of Canada s Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Chad Gaffield, has described the Bachelor of Arts as a degree which can and should be a research degree. I believe that Mount Royal has a unique opportunity to be in the forefront of Canadian universities by providing such opportunities to keen and bright students.
Another initiative to help Mount Royal achieve our ambitions is the creation of a Student Services Plan to identify those things that are critical to an undergraduate education. The student experience is one of the best indicators of success for students once they graduate, so this plan will help support students through programs and services in and out of the classroom. The beauty of these two plans is that they are not done in isolation. Each will contribute to producing an integrated approach to teaching, learning and developing young minds into thoughtful critical thinkers with a true understanding of community and citizenship. My role as Mount Royal President is to help build the framework that will allow us to achieve our goal and, importantly, to determine ways to measure where we are relative to that goal at any point in time. Currently, I am talking to and meeting with as many people as possible, not only within Mount Royal but throughout the community, which is why I am so pleased to be speaking with you today. So, what challenges does Mount Royal face in the next few years, and what will I do in the more immediate future to help us realize our ambitions? Through the strong leadership of Mount Royal s eighth President, Dave Marshall, and through the hard work of Mount Royal employees, we made the big leap to becoming a University. Now the work continues for Mount Royal to walk the university walk. One example is the completion of the first step in Mount Royal s application to compete in the Canada West Universities Athletic Association. Our basketball, hockey, soccer and volleyball teams will begin competing in the CWUAA in fall 2012, paving the way for the Cougars to join the ranks of Canadian Interuniversity Sport, which is the national governing body of university sport in Canada. This is important for our student-athletes because membership in CIS will enable them to stay in Calgary and compete at the national level. Another example is Mount Royal s $250 million Changing the Face of Education fundraising campaign. We publicly launched the campaign in April, and we ve already surpassed the $150 million mark a
notable accomplishment. This campaign focuses on three main areas: the Learning Environment, with the creation of six thematic Centres of Excellence that will take student learning and faculty expertise to the next level; Learning Opportunities, to increase the number and value of scholarships and bursaries available for our students; and Learning Spaces, which includes the construction of our new state-of-the-art Conservatory and the Bella Concert Hall, as well as a new Library. This new Library is my number one priority. Our library is doing a wonderful job with its current facility, but it dates from the early 1970s. For Mount Royal to truly walk the walk as a University, we need a library that is fitting for a premier undergraduate institution. Libraries are the intellectual heart of a University, and modern libraries are a lot more than books on shelves. Ours will be a library and learning centre that includes a learning commons, academic services, state of the art learning space for individuals and groups, and a whole lot more. It will be a major part of our student success. In the longer term, some of the challenges we face are constant to Universities, such as budgetary issues. But a priority that is especially important to me is to tell Mount Royal s story more broadly. People who know our story including students who are already studying here or who have graduated these people are our biggest fans, and you probably know one or two. You may even be one. But we can t be Canada s premier undergraduate university if the rest of Canada doesn t also know who we are. The story is not about me and my new role as President. The story is about Mount Royal s integrated approach to teaching and learning how that feeds the intellectual curiosity of our students, and creates a hunger for learning that will last a lifetime. It s about the strong bond between faculty and students that our class sizes foster. The story is the amount of research that undergraduates are exposed to in the classroom, and how that allows students to develop their own problem solving and critical thinking skills. It s about the thousands
of students we help prepare to pursue professional or graduate studies; to build a successful career; to tackle the problems of tomorrow. It s about nurturing Mount Royal students to become highly-skilled citizens who have a sense of community engagement and involvement in Calgary and around the world. That probably sounds familiar to dedicated Rotarians like you. In both Rotary and at Mount Royal University, we focus on developing values and skills in our young people that will prepare them to contribute to a strong community and a better world. Our approaches may be different, ours through education, yours by example, but our goal is the same. And based on Rotary s long history of success, and ours, I think the future is in good hands. Thank you once again for inviting me here to share my story and Mount Royal University s story, and thank you for your continued support of our journey.