Voices of Acadia. Volume 3 - 175th Anniversary

One-time supplement publication

Voices of Acadia Vol. III Voices of Acadia

Voices of Acadia

Gordon Lockhart Bennett

of Dalhousie and went to the Halifax Ladies College so I had no intention of walking down Chestnut Street to go to college.

“I entered Acadia in September 1939, just a few days after World War II was declared.

We all went home at Christmas, but a lot of the boys didn’t come back because they were joining up and so the numbers of male students were down. In a way, we were an old ladies’ sewing circle. We did a lot of knitting. One of the ladies from a local church came up with rolls of yarn for us and we helped out by knitting socks to send overseas in Red Cross boxes. We took part in parades and rallies and also had penny drives to raise money for the war effort.

“I had four happy years at Acadia and I spent them all in Tully (Whitman House).

Dr. (Marion) Grant (’21) was in charge of the residence and she made sure that we had lots of fun and games, although I’m sure we sometimes drove her crazy. I had no sisters and so living in residence was wonderful for me because it was such a great group of women. The girls were my sisters and we all became lifelong friends. I loved the companionship of eating together in the dining hall where the head waiter gave the announcements for the day and the week.

We went together to church on Sundays and, after, we’d walk along the railroad track half the way to Grand-Pré or maybe up to the Ridge or downtown. We were always together. I never could understand why today’s kids would want an apartment. Over the years we’ve kept in touch, at Christmas and reunions, and I’ve gone to their weddings and watched with interest when the children came along.

“I love the Acadia campus and, of course, my family had a long connection to the University. Crowell Tower was named for my father, who was the long-time Chairman of the Board of Governors and volunteered a lot of his time to Acadia.

“When I was a child, we used to drive up in May to Wolfville to see the Baccalaureate Service and that was the beginning of the summer season for me. I used to see them marching in and I thought, ‘Oh, if I could ever be part of that!’ I was very impressed.

“I spent 40 years working for Dalhousie and when I retired I was Assistant Registrar. I had some wonderful folks to work with there

Gordon Lockhart Bennett (’37, ’47) received his Bachelor of Science and Master of Science (Chemistry) from Acadia. After a career in teaching at the high school and university levels, he turned to politics and was elected in 1966 to the legislature in his native province of Prince Edward Island. The popular educator was re-elected in 1970 and 1974 and held various cabinet portfolios in the Liberal government of Premier Alex Campbell.

He served at various times as President of the Executive Council, Minister of Justice, and Provincial Secretary.

In 1974, Bennett was installed as the 34th Lieutenant-Governor of PEI, a position he held until January 1980. In 1975, he became a Knight of Grace of the Order of St. John. After his retirement, he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in 1983. That same year he was enshrined in the Canadian Curling Hall of Fame, one of his proudest accomplishments.

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Marion Crowell A lifelong Halifax resident, Marion Crowell (’43) graduated from Acadia with a BA and almost immediately went to work in the Registrar’s Office at Dalhousie University, where she would remain for 40 years.

However, her memories of Acadia during the Second World War are still vivid and evocative.

Crowell is the daughter of one of Acadia’s greatest benefactors, Dr. Harvey E. Crowell (DCL ’56), who served as Chairman of the Board of Governors from 1959-73. In a tribute after Dr. Crowell’s death in 1977, former Acadia President Dr. J.M.R. Beveridge said, “over the span of almost four decades, the advancement of the University – as evidenced by the time and effort he spent on her behalf and by his own very generous, substantial support – was uppermost in his mind. His name has become part of the history of Acadia and will never be forgotten.”

“I was born on Chestnut Street in Halifax,” says Ms. Crowell. “I lived in view 1

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and I enjoyed the academic life very much, but Acadia was my first love. Dr. Patterson was a great family friend and so were Dr. Kirkconnell and Dr. Beveridge and his family.

“As President, Dr. Patterson did it all.

He would visit families in the area and sit in the back kitchen and look at grandpa and say, ‘I want you to send young Johnny off to Acadia.’ The following week you might get off the Ocean Limited train in Montreal and bump into him because he was on his way to beg some money from somebody in the business community.

“As you can see, I’ve always had a very warm spot in my heart for Acadia and I was sad when it came time to leave. I’m always glad to stand up and cheer for Acadia.”

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“One of the greatest things that happened at Acadia was I met my wife there. We’ve been married 64 years.

She was an American girl who wanted something different so she went to the Encyclopedia Britannica and the first listing she saw was Acadia so she decided to go.

She was in her sophomore year and I was a senior, so when I graduated we carried on a romance by letters. Fortunately, they’ve all been burned. We got married as soon as she graduated. Bobby’s degree was a BA with major in biology. We both played varsity basketball, but she had a great career and is in the Acadia Sports Hall of Fame.

“After I graduated, I went to Toronto and wandered the streets for two weeks, took streetcars looking for the right job. Back then, any college graduate got a job and I had six or seven offers, but the one that really turned me on was Goodyear. I joined them as a trainee on the plant floor and I stayed until I became president. I preach to my grandchildren: for God’s sake, stop looking for the corner office job. Get in and learn the business. I learned the business and became very good at manufacturing.

At 31, I became head of a plant with 500 people under me. I was the youngest plant manager in Goodyear worldwide. We did a great job there; they sent me to a bigger factory and then I had five factories. I had a great training ground and my advice for all my grandchildren today is: you’re getting out of college, you’re full of spirit, you’ve got the world to conquer, but first of all, listen.

“I stayed at Goodyear for 23 years and was a candidate for one of the top jobs at Goodyear worldwide, but they said you have to go to Harvard first so they sent me on this advanced management program at Harvard. It was 14 weeks of intensive work and frankly, when I got out of Harvard, I realized several things: I loved business and I lucked into a great field that I loved, but as long as I was working for a multinational I would never test myself as a businessman.

When I got out of Harvard and back to Toronto, I was approached by a group of businessmen who had taken control of a very sick company and wanted me to run it. I pondered that for a while and decided that’s the kind of challenge I’d like right now.

“The company was Jannock, and

Dr. Gordon MacNeill, Barbara MacNeill Students find many things at Acadia, not the least of which, sometimes, is their soulmate. Such was the case with Dr. Gordon MacNeill (’48) and his wife Barbara (’50), who have been married for more than six decades after meeting on the Wolfville campus.

Dr. MacNeill holds the distinction of being one of only two honorary governors of Acadia. His loyalty to the University has led to generous donations of his time, energy, business acumen, and financial resources.

The highly successful corporate leader credits Acadia with opening his eyes to a new world of possibilities while giving him the knowledge and confidence to grasp those opportunities.

“I wasn’t planning on going to college.

My mother was a nurse and worked very hard to bring up the family. One day she met the high school principal on the hospital elevator and introduced herself. He asked what I was going to do and she said, ‘He’s going to get a job.’ Just as the elevator reached the first floor, he turned to her and said, ‘He must go to university.’ And that sealed it. My mother became the great advocate of university. A group of my high school friends were going to Acadia so I decided that Acadia was for me.

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they were in terrible shape. They were a conglomerate and they were in steel, sugar – they owned Lantic Sugar – the brick business and electronics. I was hired as President and CEO and the main criterion I had was that if I’m going to be the CEO, I’m going to be the CEO. I’m going to take this company in a direction that’s different and I want full authority to do it, and they gave it to me. We turned this company around beautifully.

“I’ve often thought about Acadia’s role in my success. As a kid in Sydney, I did all the things you do as a teenager. The world was a great big wonderful apple, but I was looking at it from the perspective of Sydney, N.S. When I went to Acadia, my mind started to open up and I said, ‘Hey, this is an interesting and much bigger world than Sydney.’ I inherited from my mother the ability to work hard so when I got out and had the opportunity to look at what was happening, this all kicked in. I became known as a problem-solver.

“Acadia was the right atmosphere.

There was enough seriousness as far as studying was concerned, but there was a great camaraderie with your friends and people you’ve never met before from all over the country. It opened my eyes to the fact that there’s something big and exciting out there just waiting for me.

“Acadia altered and opened my life.

I got involved on boards of charitable organizations and my church. I spent 24 years on the Board of Governors of Acadia at a very crucial time in the life of the school. I worked with Chancellor Dr. Charles Huggins to formulate a plan that led to James Perkin coming in as President. Dr. Perkin was a great president. As I said to him when he retired, ‘You gave the feeling of collegiality in all the decisions you made, but you always got what you wanted.’ He kind of put a little smile on his face. He was one of the best.

“I know Ray Ivany, too, a good Sydney man. We Cape Bretoners had a good grounding. There was nothing that came easy in Sydney. The steel plant was always under a cloud so the area bred a certain type of individual.

“Bobby and I were fortunate that our wealth was increasing and we talked about

what we should do with it. I said that we had to do something for Acadia because we met there and we’ve had a wonderful life. I called Acadia and asked what kind of scholarship was most needed. I was told a scholarship for students who graduate from high school with an 80 average who can’t afford to go to college. I said, ‘That sounds great,’ and the MacNeill Scholar-Bursary was the result. We’re building that up and will continue to do so. I’d like to see maybe 20 kids every year going through on that.”

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Garth Vaughan It’s one of those classic sports arguments.

Where is the birthplace of hockey? There is no shortage of communities across the northern hemisphere that would gladly take credit for the game. Don Cherry, the colourful and controversial host of Coach’s Corner on CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada’s, maintains loudly and proudly that the honour belongs to his hometown of Kingston, Ontario. Other pretenders include Montreal, Halifax-Dartmouth, and Deline in the Northwest Territories.

Garth Vaughan (’52) should have ended the debate with his 1996 book The Puck Starts Here, a thorough and wellresearched argument that Windsor, Nova Scotia is where it all began. Even before the book was launched, Vaughan was a tireless advocate for the Annapolis Valley town and its compelling case. Canadian hockey icon Paul Henderson, who scored the winning goal in Canada’s win over Russia at the 1972 Summit Series, agrees with Vaughan. “I think his argument is strongest,” Henderson says. Ron MacLean, Cherry’s co-host and chaperone, is convinced that Windsor is hockey’s ground zero, as is former HNIC announcer Brian MacFarlane. “The good doctor makes a convincing argument,” he said. “At the same time he wields a nifty scalpel, and systematically demolishes the lingering and somewhat ridiculous claim that the game first evolved on the harbour ice in Kingston, Ontario.”

Vaughan was instrumental in starting the Windsor Hockey Heritage Centre, which 3

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houses an impressive collection of pucks and sticks from the earliest days of the sport, and his legacy continues to grow. He has put his hometown on the hockey map, making it a must-stop on any hockey fan’s itinerary. Vaughan was also much more than an amateur hockey historian; he was also a skilled surgeon.

Tom Raddall Dr. Tom Raddall (’57, Hon.’13) graduated from Acadia with his BSc and went on to earn a DDS from Dalhousie in 1961. He returned to his hometown of Liverpool, Nova Scotia and established a highly successful dental practice. He served as chairman of the provincial dental board for 11 years and has been named Alumnus of the Year by the Dalhousie Dental School as well as Nova Scotia Dentist of the Year.

Dr. Raddall served on Acadia’s Board of Governors from 2001-2013. A generous benefactor and tireless advocate for the school, he recently donated $1 million to establish the Raddall Research Fund in Biology. It was one of the largest gifts ever bestowed on Acadia by an individual. In October 2013, President Ray Ivany announced the dedication of The Raddall Wing of the Biology building in recognition of Dr. Raddall’s lifelong loyalty and his generous commitment to his alma mater.

“I found Acadia a very friendly university, an easy transition from Liverpool. My father had received an honorary degree from Dalhousie the year before I went to Acadia and there might have been pressure for me to go there, but not verbally. He just said, ‘Sure, go ahead,’ although he’d have liked me to go to Dal, I think. He had a Grade 10 education so he knew nothing about universities and told me so.

“My own recollection of Acadia was friendly people and professors who were

Vaughan attended Acadia at the same time as another hockey historian, except that Connie MacNeil (Class of 1952) actually made history. While at Acadia, Connie became famous for scoring three goals in six seconds. The story of that game between his Acadia Axemen and the Kentville Wildcats has been told and retold so often that it has entered the lore of the game. The great Montreal Canadiens centre Jean Beliveau once asked MacNeil how he achieved such a miraculous feat and his answer was typically modest: “Small rink, poor lights, slow clock.”

After Acadia, the much-loved MacNeil went on to an impressive career as an educator and administrator. He was inducted into the Acadia Sports Hall of Fame in 2011 and his #6 jersey was retired during a ceremony at Acadia Arena last fall.

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concerned about their students. If you didn’t do well on a test, the prof would run into you in the hall and say, ‘What happened?’ They knew everybody, and that was comforting.

“I took dentistry and never regretted it. My son also took dentistry, is a dentist and his son is at Acadia, doing honours in Biology – and he wants to take dentistry. When I graduated from Acadia, I had no idea how successful I was going to be, but even then I had it in my mind – I owe this place. Someday I’m going to pay it back. I’ve been fortunate. I still have lifelong friends from Acadia and we keep in touch.

“One of my favourite professors was an English professor named Dr. Rhodenizer. He was old then by any standards and about to retire – a very kind, gentle man and if you didn’t do well he’d say, ‘Don’t worry about it, you’ll do okay.’ He was always assigning essays and students would pass these things down from year to year. I had a set of essays that were given to me and I literally copied this thing word for word. When the marks were passed out, Rhodenizer said, ‘Would you stay after class, Mr. Raddall?’ I knew exactly what he was going to get me for. He said, ‘That’s not a smart thing to do. I could fail you, but I’ve always liked this particular paper – B+!” That was the kind of guy I remember.

“The other one I remember is Dr. Haley, the math professor, and I took one calculus course from him. He was a tremendous teacher, but I found calculus difficult. He didn’t make it easy exactly, but he made it understandable. There was an equation for infinity that he wrote that went on forever.

He’d start on one wall and go across the front of the room and down the other side with it, writing on the wall itself, but he got his point across.

“I think Ray Ivany is doing an extremely excellent job. I was on the Board of Governors when we went through some bad times and the alumni breaking away and a couple of strikes and it was not good. Enrolment started to plummet and when Ray came along we were down to about 2,800 students and running a deficit.

“We decided the first thing that had to be solved was recruitment. We also had to control the budget so we could do other things. Those were the two sore spots that were hurting Acadia. Ray was firm and literally

overhauled the budgets for recruitment and fundraising and put new people in those places.

“We’re lucky that he has signed a new contract because the man is extremely capable. Ray certainly blew a hole in the idea that universities have to have a president with a PhD. You have to have someone who has strong academics, but can run a business because this is a $60 million business.

“When Ray gets up and gives a talk at Convocation, there are no notes. It’s cold turkey, and there’s not a pause in the entire speech. A few years ago Stephen Lewis (Hon. ’11) gave the Convocation address and Ray had already spoken. When Lewis got up, he said, ‘I’ve been to a good many Convocations in my time, but this is the first time I’ve ever seen a man get up and do what your President has just done.’ That’s a pretty good recommendation.

“I’ve always found Acadia to be a happy place and if a young high school student was sitting on the fence in their decision process, I’d ask them to get in touch with Ray or I’d phone Ray myself and see if Jane Doe could have an interview with him. If anyone can sell the University, it’s Ray. “The Raddall Research Fund in Biology was a gift from the family. When I gave the million dollar pledge to Acadia last year, I thought, ‘Why not do it now? Put $250,000 to go on my debt to the fund for biology students.’ I don’t know anything more worthwhile than to give them a boost and expose them to a place that I have so many good memories about. I also set up a scholarship fund in my mother’s name – Edith Freeman Raddall – and that is right now producing two $5,000 scholarships.

My goal is to work on mom’s so the bursary can be larger.”

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attended N.S. Tech. There was never any doubt in my mind that I’d go to Acadia.

“Major Kelly was our hockey coach and he was an extremely outstanding individual and a great character reference. He was the whole physical education department and also ran the ROTP. Major Kelly didn’t recruit to any extent. First year, I didn’t make the team, but there were a couple of ‘Christmas graduates,’ so I eventually made the varsity squad for the second half of the term. The team included Bill Parker (’56), Donnie Caldwell (’57), Joseph (Jock) Douglas (’61), Donnie MacVicar (’57), and Dave Beardsley (’58).

“When I came back to Wolfville in 1977, I went to the first season hockey game on Halloween night. Acadia got trounced 7-1 by Dalhousie. I remember being very disappointed about getting beaten in our home rink. Don Wells (’65), who was the coach, came to our house and introduced himself, and we struck up a strong friendship. My close friend, Connie MacNeil (’52), also got involved. Connie was an exceptionally great man and he came up with the idea that we should start a booster club. Moncton had one at the time and we spoke with them about what was involved.

“Connie, Bill Parker and I met with Athletic Director Jim Bayer at the gym and said we wanted to start a booster club called the Blueline Club. At that time tickets were generally free for professors and students.

Most of the people who came to games in the old Ice Palace – Don Wells named it that – were parents and girlfriends of the players; maybe a couple hundred people.

“We wanted to sell season tickets and the University said to go ahead. They were $40 and we sold a total of 80 that first year, but made a bit of money to be used at the discretion of Coach Wells. Connie and I wrote a letter to the Board of Governors expressing our concern about the quality of the old Ice Palace. People had to go to the old Irving station to use the washroom. They decided to build the new rink in 1988 and that swung everything around.

We got an excellent arena and some great players, and the team just took off. The money grew and was maintained until the new Acadia Arena was built and then the proceeds from season tickets went into the Blueline Club fund.

“It all worked out well. The hockey Axemen showed a turnaround late in Don’s

Tom Prescott Since his graduation from Acadia, Tom Prescott (’58) has followed Acadia Athletics with a passion that few could match. A former Axemen hockey player himself, he has a particular fondness for Canada’s game, but has cheered loudly and proudly for every campus sport. As a co-founder of the Blueline Club, he has offered practical as well as moral support to Acadia athletes and teams for decades.

Prescott attended Nova Scotia Tech after Acadia, graduating in Technical Engineering in 1961. He worked with Canadian International Paper, initially in their research branch in Hawkesbury, Ontario and subsequently in operations in Temiscaming.

When the company shut down in 1972, he took a job with Nova Scotia Forest Industries in Port Hawkesbury, N.S. He worked there from 1972-77 and then took a job with Canadian Keyes Fibre in Hantsport to be nearer to his beloved Acadia. He has lived in Wolfville ever since. After eight years at CKF, he taught in the Acadia School of Business as a part-time professor. When the decision was made to build Valley Regional Hospital, Peter Mosher (’64) hired him as project manager and then Director of Services. He remained there from the hospital’s inception until 1997.

“I’ve always had an attraction to Acadia.

We lived in Temiscaming, PQ, but my parents came from Wolfville and we came back to Nova Scotia every year. My mother was Truth Fairn (’33) – she was an Acadia graduate – and so was my dad, Ron Prescott (’30), who later 6

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career in the Ice Palace and coach Tommy Coolen came in after Don was made Athletic Director. Tom had more intensive recruiting contacts out west, brought in some excellent players and we started a winning trend.

“Hockey was gaining such prominence that we felt a bit concerned about the other campus sports so we sat down with Don and tried to figure out how to spread the wealth around throughout the whole Department of Athletics. That year we gave five $1,000 scholarships or bursaries to be used at the discretion of the coach and none of them were to go to the hockey program.

“We didn’t want any one-year wonders.

We wanted guys who came in and got a degree so we set up a mentoring program.

Any student-athlete having difficulties with a course or two could go to their coach and the coach could approach the committee and have the professor assign a mentor to the student, which we paid for.

“Eventually, financing athletics became extremely expensive so the University took over all ticket sales. We still run the 50/50 draws and the monies go to student-athletes.

“My wife and I had a lot of Axemen players live with us, including Fred Armstrong (’85), son of the former Toronto Maple Leafs captain, George Armstrong. We also kept Todd Annand (’89), Richard Leger (’90), Normie Batherson (’94), Duane Dennis (’94), and Dougie Reynolds (’98).

“I think athletics is very important in recruiting students. If you have a successful athletic program and you bring in a studentathlete, you bring in a source of recruitment in whatever part of the world he or she comes from. He or she sends a good message for others to come and if teams are winning, it certainly builds up a lot of spirit in the University.”

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York, must rate as the shortest basketball giant in the game. At 5’2”, he shared the Little Corporal’s physical size, but his stature was stratospheric. He was also a brilliant strategist, a skillful recruiter, and a genius at motivation.

Aberdeen coached the Acadia Axemen from 1958 to 1966, and his intense desire to win made Acadia basketball games must-see spectacles. The impact he had on basketball in Nova Scotia and across this country would be hard to exaggerate. He posted an amazing 12250 record during his stay at Acadia, including an unmatched string of 42 consecutive wins.

He also coached his teams to six conference titles, five Maritime titles, and a national championship.

More importantly, the conquering heroes that he recruited – men like Steve Konchalski (’66), Andy Kranack (’65) and Brian Heaney (’69) – stayed in Canada and made a huge impact as coaches in this country.

And Aberdeen didn’t limit his basketball proselytizing to imports. He helped develop the coaching skills of Canadian players like Ian MacMillan (’69), Richie Spears (’64) and a host of others. Each one of this small army of coaches spawned coaches of their own and, as a result, you would be hard-pressed to find many Canadian university basketball programs without an Acadia connection.

“Aberdeen spawned a generation of basketball leaders,” says Heaney. “Those of us that played for him truly felt that he was one of the greatest coaches in the world and that his time at Acadia was incredible for us.

We immediately knew he was far beyond the average coaches of the day in terms of capability, talent and potential.”

After Acadia, Aberdeen became an assistant at the University of Tennessee and then took over the head coaching job at Marshall University until his sudden death in 1979. He was inducted into the Acadia Sports Hall of Fame in 1989.

“Stu took no prisoners in terms of adherence to the structure and form of what was expected of us,” Heaney says. “It carried on all through life as well. Look at the people who came out of his programs with a high level of success. Success was not a mistake, it didn’t happen by chance. It happened by design, and the architect of that design was Stu Aberdeen.” –

Stu Aberdeen Canadian-born James Naismith invented the game of basketball, but a collection of talented Americans caused its popularity to soar north of the 49th parallel. Stu Aberdeen was the Napoleon of the nets who led the charge at the university level.

Aberdeen, a native of Lewiston, New 7

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but a lot of very good students didn’t get to go to university in those days. My parents took out a loan, I found a summer job in geology and paid them back every September 1st. I can’t overstate how important those summer jobs were for me. The experience was very formative.

“In my first year at Acadia, I had a sudden change of plans. It happened when I took an embryology course. I was so fascinated about how, in three months, you could go from a sperm and egg into essentially a fully developed mammal or human. Suddenly rocks and stones didn’t seem as interesting to me.

“I got into research because I pursued an honours biology degree and that involved research. I had a little lab and office in the basement of the biology building and was supervised by Professor Jacqueline Ellis.

That was my honours thesis research and I had a lot of independence and responsibility.

That is a big part of my story when I look back and think about how the Acadia days set my foundation for the future.

“The research started with that. I was also a lab assistant in one of the physiology courses and that gave me more funding for my development and education. My job involved setting up the labs and practicing some of the things that would go on in labs: anesthetizing rats and doing minor surgery and so on. It gave me more responsibility and was fascinating work. That one-on-one experience probably wouldn’t have happened at a larger university. Professors like Sherman Bleakney (’49) and Chalmers Smith, who was the head of the Department, were very influential, as were Jacqueline Ellis, who supervised my thesis, and Dr. Chet Small, who taught me biochemistry.

“Even today, when I think of Acadia, I think of the fall. I remember the beautiful campus and surrounding area. I remember Winter Carnival with the snow sculptures and dances where friends coupled up and sometimes the couples would change. They were fun times.

I think of the Students’ Union Building, where good friends gathered in the evenings for a lot of different shenanigans. I still have a lot of friends from my Acadia days and have kept in touch with them all through the years.

“I learned to work hard and efficiently, to do more despite the other activities I was involved in. I had a strong desire to learn

Robert Sutherland Dr. Robert Sutherland (’61) graduated from Acadia with a BSc (Honours Biology) before going on to a pioneering career in science, first in the halls of academe and later in the world of commercialized technologies. He is especially interested in conducting applied research that directly benefits patients. “I wanted to get discoveries out of the lab to be developed into products and services that could help people,” he says.

Dr. Sutherland was among the first to point to the importance of the micro-environment in cancer. He did this by growing cells in what were called spheroids – multi-cellular groups of cells with three dimensions – that could simulate these environments inside the body.

“The cancer cells inside a growing tumor are in a very different kind of milieu than if they were in their normal tissues and the question is: how does that affect the way they behave; the way they respond to drugs; how they grow; how they spread?”

Dr. Sutherland was appointed VicePresident, Commercialization of the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research (OICR) in March 2007. Although now semi-retired and living in California, the Moncton native still works part-time at OICR and is on several boards that deal with commercializing technologies that come out of Canada.

“As with many back then, I was the first generation of my family to go to university so it was a big deal. I was fortunate that I was able to go. I was a good student in high school, 8

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more and do research, and that research theme started at Acadia. I learned to develop confidence from responsibility and relative independence. I learned to be proactive, decisive and more risk-averse. When I look back now, I started out not knowing what university was all about and at the end of my honours thesis I was confident enough to go on to graduate school. There’s a straight connection to a lot of good things coming out of those Acadia days. The seeds of my life philosophy were planted at Acadia: do your best and be nice.”

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USA, the Netherlands, France, Germany and Italy.

Since 2001 he has devoted himself to chamber music performances in the Florence area and to musicological research, mainly on the life of the Piedmontese violinistcomposer, Giovanni Battista Viotti (1755-1824), about whom he has written several articles in scholarly journals and an enthusiastically reviewed biography, Amico: The Life of Giovanni Battista Viotti. The book is a fulllength biography in English of Viotti, one of the great violinist-composers in the history of music and arguably the most influential violinist who ever lived.

Now retired, Lister still performs regularly with I Musici Toscani.

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Paul Corkum Dr. Paul Corkum (’65) is a world-renowned physicist whose revolutionary work in attosecond physics and laser science has captured the attention of the scientific community and paved the way for untold future discoveries. The award-winning scientist currently holds a chair in Attosecond Photonics at the University of Ottawa/National Research Council. He is often referred to as “the father of attoseconds.’ A native of Saint John, N.B., the Officer of the Order of Canada graduated from Acadia with a BSc in 1965 before completing his Master’s and doctorate at Lehigh University.

“When I got my BSc at Acadia, Professor Emeritus Raymond H. Magarvey (’49) was very influential. He was teaching physics and I was studying engineering because my mother thought engineering was a practical thing.

Magarvey taught the first course I took in physics and I thought it was really neat and so, by end of first year, I switched to physics.

“I was pretty focused on that after my sophomore year. Acadia was like a family then.

Classes were small and I took every physics course that was offered. It was wonderful.

When I left, I had this great background. I was nervous going to the U.S. to Lehigh, this big American university that thought of itself as an Ivy League school. I was a T.A. and wondered how I was ever going to teach these smart American kids. But, of course, it wasn’t that way at all because I had such a strong

Warwick Lister Warwick Lister (’61) has brought honour to Acadia throughout his celebrated career in music. In addition to his Acadia degree, the Canadian-born violinist and musicologist holds degrees from the Eastman School of Music (MM) and Boston University (DMA).

He has played in the American Symphony Orchestra, founded by Leopold Stokowski, one of the leading conductors of the 20th century. He also performed in the Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam and, from 1983 to 2001, the orchestra of the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino. His career as a teacher is equally impressive. He taught violin, chamber music and music history at Ithaca College, Ithaca, NY, and was the second violinist of the Lenox Quartet. He has played in numerous violin and piano recitals and chamber music concerts in Canada, the 9

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background from Acadia. I was not at any disadvantage whatsoever.

Dr. Corkum recalls the research that has caused him to be known as the ‘father of attoseconds’.

“My scientific career consists of a series of small contributions, but really one particular contribution. I’ve learned to make the fastest flashes of light that you can make in the world.

To get an appreciation for why anyone would be interested in such a thing, you can think of your camera – you use a flash to capture something that might otherwise be blurred by the camera lens being open too long. You need a fast flash to make a fast picture, or to stop fast things in process so you can measure them.

“Attosecond laser pulses enable us to see and record chemical reactions in real time.

In an attosecond, light can only move the dimensions of an atom, essentially. It would be frozen to that dimension. And yes, I’ve been called the father of attoseconds. You always work on what other people did, but I think I made the major contribution. The question of practicality is always harder to answer. Over the last 50 years, every time you make an advance in the ability to measure something fast, you learn something new about nature, and it is almost always important. For example, before attoseconds, we learned how to do flashes that were fast and learned about semiconductors and how to make them respond quickly.

“We put many of these fast flash pictures together just the way you make a movie. I’ve learned to make the shortest flashes of light, and they correspond to the time it takes for electrons to do things – to ‘move around’ in layman’s terms, inside molecules and form bonds. An attosecond is to a second as a second is to the age of the universe, and attosecond laser pulses enable us to see and to record chemical reactions in real time.

This breakthrough has made a large splash in the scientific community. Over the last 50 years, every time there has been an advance in the ability to measure something fast, we have learned something new about nature, almost always something important. We know that attosecond-scale measurements will be important, even if we’re not yet sure why.

“Science is an incredibly social profession. It’s kind of interesting because it’s

quite different from what most people assume.

I met my wife, Nadja (’66), at Acadia. She is a writer, and arts majors tend to be more outgoing. But if you think about the reality of these professions, scientists constantly work in groups and you hardly ever see a paper written by an individual. I speak to people around the world and they come to work in my labs so I’m constantly interacting with people.

Meanwhile, my wife, this outgoing woman, is in front of her typewriter. Being a creative writer is a lonely profession.

“Receiving an honorary doctorate from Acadia (in 2006) was wonderful because many relatives came and I was able to celebrate with my family. There is no honorary degree I could possibly get that would mean more than the one from Acadia.”

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Don Wells Don Wells (’65) had already been a star hockey player at UNB before arriving on the Acadia campus to play his final season with the Axemen under the legendary Fred Kelly.

To say that he had an immediate impact on Acadia Athletics would be an understatement.

He earned team MVP honours that year, but that was just the beginning.

Over the next 33 years, his impact would continue to be felt. In 1965, he was named coach of the hockey Axemen, a position he held for 19 years. He was named Acadia’s Athletics Director in 1984, and for the next 10

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13 years his sportsmanship and dedication earned the respect of athletes and coaches throughout the Atlantic conference and across Canada.

In 1998, he received the Austin Mathews Award for Outstanding Contributions to Canadian University Sport. He is also an Acadia Hall of Famer and a recipient in 2008 of the Distinguished Alumni Award. Fittingly, the Atlantic universities unanimously voted to rename the Most Sportsmanlike Award the Don Wells Trophy. Above all, Wells was a teacher and the lessons he imparted, on and off various fields of play, were profound and lasting.

Lindsay Titus (’73) was Acadia’s hockey manager for four years (1969-73) when Wells was still coaching the ice Axemen. “What can I say about Don Wells? From the day I first arrived on campus, he treated me as a friend.

That not only lasted during my four years at Acadia, but extended for many years after.

“He always had time to talk and the conversation was always genuine. When I was manager of the Axemen hockey team, he always treated me with respect. I can honestly say that he never directed an unkind word toward me during those four years.

“I think he was genuinely disappointed when I graduated. He trusted me enough to give me master keys to the arena and to babysit his children. The babysitting usually occurred on a Saturday night, so once the children were asleep I could watch the Leafs on CBC on their television.

“On long hockey road trips, when returning to Acadia, I would sit up front on the Mackenzie Lines bus – his seat was always in row one, opposite the driver – and listen to his many stories, most of them about hockey.

“I remember, too, that he worked in the pulp and paper mill in Corner Brook, and that one time there was an ammonia leak and when he walked in the huge doors of the mill, the ammonia hit him and he dropped to the ground. I suspect that, based on his hockey scars, the ammonia was one of the few things that knocked him down. I think that on the ice he was pretty tough, but off the ice he was – with a few between-periods exceptions – softspoken. He talked with reverence about Major Kelly, and had a strong, deep connection to Acadia and his teams. For him, coaching, teaching, and administrative leadership at

Acadia were not merely jobs; they were a passion. Whenever I visit Acadia, I have to fight the urge to look for him, and that’s tough, but in many ways, he is there still.”

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Harvey Gilmour As Acadia’s Vice-President Alumni and Development for 12 years, Harvey Gilmour (’66) was widely respected as one of the most successful university fundraisers in Canada. He was also effective in raising the technological profile of the school through his work on the innovative Acadia Advantage Program.

“After I graduated from Newton South (Massachusetts) High School, I was in the middle of that great pause button of life where I didn’t know what to do. My father had spent time in Greenwood, Nova Scotia and knew about Acadia. I came up to visit and immediately loved it.

“I was working toward a BA and my favourite professor by far was Jack Sheriff.

The only reason you should go to Acadia or any university is to link up with some professor or mentor that will be a lifelong guiding light.

Everyone can go to university to read books and search the Internet, but the lucky ones are those who develop relationships. I had that with Sheriff.

“I also developed a great friendship with Acadia president Watson Kirkconnell. He taught Canadian poetry; just came in the classroom and read his stuff. It may not have been stimulating in the way we think about it today, but he was great. After class you could go and see him in his office and have a wonderful talk. Little did I know at that time that I’d have a lifelong relationship with university presidents.

“My total focus was school, football, and playing bridge with Donnie Reed (’66) and a few other guys. I was captain of the football team in my junior year and there was a major changeover in attitude under our new coach, Bill Bushing. After winless seasons, we actually won a few games in my senior year. In my first and second seasons, St. F.X., under coach Don Loney, was a powerhouse and used to beat us by scores of 90-0 and 76-2. I’m proud of being one of the leaders 11

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Steve Konchalski

in the turnaround in focus on football. I think I contributed to the building process, not by scoring touchdowns but by providing some leadership in bringing about change. I’m proud that we had the courage to stand up as team and go in a different direction.

“When I worked at Mt. Allison as their Director of Development, I had a great relationship with Bill Parker (’56) back at Acadia. We talked all the time and most of the job skills I learned were rooted in those conversations. Years later I got a call from Bill telling me he was leaving his position and asking if I wanted to apply, and I did. I had been at Mt. A for 22 years, from 1972 to 1994, and stayed at Acadia from 1994 to 2006.

“I soon learned it’s the university president who raises the money, not you. My ego might think there were people who gave to Acadia because of me, but I know better. Most was donated because of people’s interest in students and professors and the vision the president has. Kelvin Ogilvie (’63) was the most visionary president that I worked for. He could see so accurately what the world would look like in five or 10 years. I’ve never seen anybody like him.

“After our first conversation I thought, ‘What a vision to take out to the world.’ I was proud of the role I played in the laptop program, along with several others – Kelvin and Sandy Fraser and Jennifer Bolt. The whole Acadia Advantage initiative was so novel; one of few times in our history that Acadia has been able to be part of a fundamental change recognized by others.

The Smithsonian Institution recognized that this was one of the most significant achievements in education in the world and we were right smack dab in the middle of that.

“I also had an incredible opportunity to serve Acadia and be involved from the beginning in Arthur Irving’s (’52) vision for Acadia. Arthur’s investment in Acadia is and continues to be enormous. The passion he has for Acadia is hard to put into words.

No development person in history had the opportunity I had to work and travel and raise funds alongside that man. I am so fortunate that it happened on my watch. He is the greatest and most passionate philanthropist in the history of this country, and I was lucky to be able to ride a lot of coattails.”

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With 825 wins and counting, Steve Konchalski (’66) has recorded more victories than any coach in Canadian university history. In the U.S., the mention of ‘Coach K’ means only one man – Duke’s legendary Mike Krzyzewski – but in Canada, and especially at St. Francis Xavier, where he has been head coach for more than 38 years, Konchalski is the one and only Coach K. Konchalski is possibly the most beloved basketball personality in Canada. Although the Coach K label is now firmly attached to him, he will always be remembered at Acadia as Super K, one of the finest ballplayers ever to don an Axemen uniform.

“My four years at Acadia were terrific.

I grew up in New York City and in my senior year of high school I was 16 years of age. I always wanted to go to a small school, but in 1962 the thought of going to Canada was pretty remote. Stu Aberdeen came down to New York because he knew my high school coach, Jack Curran, who had pitched for the Kentville Wildcats back in the late ’40s and early ’50s.

Stu started recruiting me. I was quite hesitant about coming to Canada. That wasn’t my first choice at the time, but Coach Aberdeen was a great salesman and a great coach.

“When I arrived on campus it was what I expected: small school atmosphere where I could find a home, a comfort zone with all the students. Academics were a high priority for me and for my parents, and I thought it was a great situation to be able to combine academics with my basketball development.

“Stu made an incredible impact on basketball in the Maritimes and across Canada. He made the game so much fun for us and created such an environment around the game that a good percentage of us gravitated toward coaching. He started it all.

“Even now, when I come into the Valley, it’s a special feeling. It has an effect on me, there’s no doubt about it. Of all the schools that I compete against, when I drive down into the Valley to play Acadia, it brings back memories.

The whole experience was great: the national championship, of course, but mostly the friends that I made, the camaraderie we had on our team. It was very close-knit, and we’ve stayed close. It’s all about the people. It was the people that made the place so special.

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“I embraced the whole Acadia experience, from basketball to my classmates to professors like Dr. (Millard) Cherry, who was such a wonderful man. Wolfville itself was a major part of the experience. I remember Al Balcom (’38) and his wife Marie Balcom. Al was mayor of Wolfville at the time. His son Byron’s (’76) 10th birthday wish was to have Peter Pike (‘67) and me come to his birthday party and we did, of course. Byron’s a lawyer in Wolfville now.

Marie and Al lived next to the gym and every single game that X played at Acadia – every single time when the team got to the gym – I’d go over and spend time with the Balcoms, and it all began with that 10th birthday party for Byron.

That’s a treasured relationship that exemplifies what my experience at Acadia was like.

“Playing for Acadia gave you a real sense of pride. The winning edge; that’s what Aberdeen gave us all. Stu was special man and he instilled in us a winning edge. We all loved to compete and he taught us not only a lot about basketball, but a lot about life.

“The four years I spent at Acadia changed the direction of my life. Acadia started it all.

When I was first interviewed for the position at St. F.X., I wished it was Acadia but then realized I’d always have my friends from Acadia and Wolfville. If anyone asks me about going to Acadia, I tell them it’s an excellent school. I could never have a bad word to say about the place.”

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immediately after graduating from Acadia with a Bachelor of Commerce degree. He remained at RBC throughout his entire 33-year career, serving as Vice-Chairman from 1994 until he retired in 1999. Galloway was a driving force behind the innovative and highly acclaimed Acadia Advantage campaign and served as a member of the Acadia Board of Governors for almost two decades, 1991 to 2009.

While at Acadia, the Montreal native played defensive end for the football Axemen and was named to the 1960’s All-Decade Team. He was also Commerce class representative on the Acadia Students’ Union.

“I started out in the Science faculty, but switched over to Commerce in my third year when Jim Durrell (’68) said that the odds were about 90 per cent that I’d end up in the business world anyway. It turned out to be absolutely the best thing that could have happened to me. I had professors like Fred Fountain in finance, Ron Gerard in accounting and Rudy French in economics. One of the best professors I ever had was Dr. Stokesbury in freshman history. He brought history to life and had a lasting impact on me.

“I took statistics from Dr. David Haley and his classroom was a kind of amphitheatre at the bottom of U-Hall. At the top level of seating there was a window looking over the campus.

One winter day he was 10 minutes late and the class decided – since he wasn’t there – that the unofficial rule was, class dismissed.

Rather than go through the front door, we all went out through the window in the back of the class. He walked in while this was going on.

He looked up, looked at the few people who were still sitting there and said, ‘After them, men!’ Everyone who was left chased them; he crawled out the window too and then joined us at the SUB rather than returning to the classroom. He was a very memorable guy.

“I got involved with Acadia again largely through Harvey Gilmour (’66). He approached me and asked if I would help out on the fundraising side for the Acadia Advantage program, which at the time was unique. Harvey wanted to take advantage of my contacts in the business world and I agreed to chair that campaign. I approached corporations and foundations across Canada to get funding.

I was asked to go on the Board and that reconnected me to Acadia. I was voted in for a second term and then, in the third term, as I understand it, Arthur Irving (’52) didn’t want me

Bruce Galloway Bruce Galloway (’68, Hon. ’03) began his illustrious career at the Royal Bank of Canada 13

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to leave the Board so they managed to find a way to keep me on as a government appointee.

I remained on the Board for 18 years.

“I was also active in the last capital campaign, Tides are Turning. It was the first time we had ever really engaged the alumni in fundraising. Acadia had a history of staying in contact with alumni – hosting social functions – but never really asking for money. The Board at the time led the charge and contributed almost $8 million to the campaign. It was unprecedented. As I recall, there were over 300 alumni that contributed in a meaningful way to help that campaign become successful, and we hit the $50 million target.

“George Bishop (’65) was Chairman of the Board and a key guy to the Tides are Turning campaign. There was some pressure on those of us who had some financial wherewithal to lead by example. I think it was a turning point for Acadia to get alumni so re-engaged after a long period of time and to get that type of financial support.”

“Recently, we’ve been trying to raise $2 million from about 20 people – $100,000 each – for a renovated Patterson Hall. To me, the business program has an opportunity to be showcased on campus. Given its importance to the student population and to the financial strength of Acadia, it’s a no-brainer.

“Vice-President, Advancement Rod Morrison suggested getting $100,000 from each of 20 people, which will be enough to complete the renovation of Patterson Hall. I said I’d do $100,000 if we could get 19 others to do the same thing – all or none. We embarked on that and we’re now at 17 people, with other donors naming individual rooms with additional gifts. It will create a building that the school can be proud of and make it a legitimate centre of activity for business at Acadia.

“The reality is the university isn’t going to be able to invest in itself unless it gets support from alumni. Without help, it doesn’t have the necessary financial resources. Major gifts from alumni are absolutely critical to keeping things going.

“Acadia dramatically changed my life. I met my late wife, Sheila Nickerson (’68), in my second year. My closest friends today graduated from there. I’ve been Jim Durrell’s best man twice and he’s been mine twice. My wife’s two sisters went to Acadia. I have a daughter who went, a cousin who went, and two stepdaughters who have gone so there’s

a family connection that is real and ongoing. I have 10 grandchildren and I would hope that one or two or more of them will end up there in due course.

“All graduates say similar things about what a great experience Acadia was, but what they all have to know is that the wonderful experience only happens if you can afford to make it happen. No matter how small the gift, alumni should be thinking of giving back and keeping this experience alive for future generations.

“Acadia has a wonderful leader in charge.

We are so lucky to have somebody with Ray Ivany’s skills. Ray has an open approach to sharing information and engaging other people.

He lets people know what the realities are and still maintains a great relationship with the powers that be at the provincial government.

I’d love to be on the Board now just to be a part of what he’s doing because it’s inspiring.”

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Jim Durrell As quarterback and co-captain of the Acadia Axemen football teams of the late ’60s, Jim Durrell (’68) learned valuable lessons about leadership and life. After graduating with a degree in business, the Montreal native put those lessons to good use.

He ran for and was elected Mayor of Ottawa in 1985 and remained in that position until 1991. He was the first president of the Ottawa Senators hockey team, a franchise that he is largely responsible for bringing to Canada’s capital city. He secured the 1988 Grey Cup game for Ottawa and delivered a Triple-A baseball franchise. He is currently 14

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owner of a large car dealership in our capital city and a member of several corporate and charitable boards.

He was presented with the Order of Canada in 2013, an honour he claims rendered him “speechless – and that doesn’t happen very often to me.” He added, “if somebody had ever told me 45 years ago (that) this would be your life, I would have just said, ‘Wow, what a ride!’ I don’t know how else to describe it.

“I was 17 when I showed up at Acadia and 21 when I graduated. What Acadia did for me was it allowed me to grow as a person and not as a number. It was a nice size school and it took me from a boy – literally a teenage boy – to a young man and gave me every opportunity to grow as an individual.

“You know, we often look at a university strictly from the academic perspective and while you cannot diminish it, because that’s their raison d’etre, there’s so much more to university. Every time I see a young person from Ottawa who’s planning to go to Acadia, I tell them that their life experiences and opportunities to develop your self-worth, your self-being and you as a person, are limitless at Acadia.

“Being an athlete, you learn competitiveness and discipline. I look at all the things I’ve been blessed and fortunate enough to have accomplished and I think a lot of it comes down to the discipline I developed playing sports at Acadia. It’s transferable to life.

“Without reservation, I’d recommend Acadia to any student. The academics, in my humble opinion, speak for themselves, and academics become much more important in post-graduate school. When you’re in a postsecondary education, the strongest part of the school is the ability of that school to recognize you as a unique individual and encourage you to grow to your maximum potential. I think Acadia allows and encourages you to do that.”

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Vicki Bardon Vicki Bardon (’68) graduated from Acadia with a BA and later went on to New York to study design and work for American Home magazine. With her husband Gary, she returned home and founded Suttles & Seawinds, a uniquely Nova Scotian company

often credited with the international revival of quilt-making.

The company expanded to include placemats, runners, tea cosies, cosmetic bags and pillows. A clothing line was created “using techniques such as piecing, appliqué and quilting.” Suttles & Seawinds is known throughout the Canadian art world and its products can be found in prestigious stores such as Saks Fifth Avenue and Bloomingdales in New York. The retail store is housed in a Victorian mansion and adjoining barn in Mahone Bay, N.S. “I came from a small rural community and close family, so Acadia seemed a comfortable first step away from home. For a student with such a sheltered background, one of the aspects of campus life that was so enjoyable and enlightening was the diversity of students and professors and the variety of personalities who became friends or associates. They were people to be admired in class and in residence.

My three years there gave me the gumption to go on to New York to study and work.

“I majored in English and minored in history, however my most memorable professor was Ian James. I took two courses from him in art appreciation. He would show slides on a screen at the front of U-Hall, many of which were black and white and somewhat indistinct.

He would describe the artist’s style, influences, life, historical importance, and so on. Many students thought of these as ‘bird courses’ and could sleep through the classes. I didn’t know anything about art, but was interested.

“When I moved to New York after graduation, I went to the Metropolitan 15

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Museum. I will never forget my surprise and delight upon entering one of the galleries, looking at a painting and exclaiming to myself, “That’s an El Greco!” And sure enough, upon checking the notation, I was right! Well, I soon found out that I could recognize the work of quite a few famous artists. Those gentle classes with Professor James kindled an interest in art for me that I otherwise may never have developed.

“Because of our business, my husband and I made several trips a year to New York, often taking our kids, and the first place we would take them is the Met, where we would spend the day – they with their little notepads, sketching their favourite sculptures, having lunch, and picking out art books for children from the amazing gift shop. Now my three children, all grown up and global travellers, measure the worth of a city by its museums and galleries. They too have Professor Ian James to thank for this gift.

“In 1973, I started a little company in Lunenburg County called Suttles & Seawinds in order to create employment for rural women, using their sewing skills based on quilting. I did the design and my husband looked after the business aspect. We had a showroom in New York, sales agents in Canada, and sold to fine department stores and specialty shops all over North America. We made women’s fashion, home accessories, gifts and quilts. Although there have been many changes in over 40 years, our shop in Mahone Bay still sells many quilts and other products that I design and which are made by local women.”

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lineup. Meanwhile he played with the Knights of Columbus, Police Athletic league and anyone who would let him play. Finally, after years of waiting patiently on the bench, he was inserted into game – for exactly two minutes.

When high school was over, university offers were not exactly pouring in. But one small school in a part of the world he knew little about was eager to see what he could do. Stu Aberdeen always had his ear to the ground for players he could shape and mold into champions. In Heaney, he saw the potential for greatness.

At Acadia, playing alongside such greats as Steve Konchalski (’66), Dave Rode (’66) and Andy Kranack (’65), Heaney quickly blossomed into a star. “It was by far the most intelligent team I’ve ever been associated with,” he said years later. That combination of ability and intelligence took the Axemen all the way to the national championship in a game at St. Patrick High School in Halifax in 1965. Heaney called it “the highlight of my life.” Among Heaney’s many offensive feats, he scored a record 74 points versus Mount Allison in his senior year and averaged 34.1 points per game. That caught the attention of the Baltimore Bullets of the NBA, who signed him to play at the highest level of basketball.

After his NBA stint, Heaney coached the St. Mary’s Huskies to two national championships, becoming the first to win national titles as a player and a coach. He became Athletics Director at the University of Alberta and then later at Acadia. He also coached the Canadian women’s national team before turning to a successful career in the world of finance.

Brian Heaney Brian Heaney (‘69), was known as the Hawk during his years at Acadia. His success story was the basketball version of the movie Rocky.

An altar boy from Brooklyn, New York who worked summers at the New York Herald Tribune as a copy boy in the business section, he came under the wing of the kindly local parish priest in Rockaway Beach who encouraged his love of basketball. His modest dream was to make the high school basketball team and he worked tirelessly to make it a reality.

Unfortunately, Bishop Laughlin High School was an all-boys school of 2,000 students and a surplus of great athletes. It was three years before he was able to crack the formidable 16

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“Acadia lived up to every one of my expectations and hopes when Stu Aberdeen introduced me to the campus as a recruit for the basketball program. I had four criteria. First, I wanted it to be a beautiful university in a country setting. Secondly, I wanted it to be an excellent science school because that was my proficiency in high school. Acadia had a strong pure science reputation, one of the finest in North America for an undergraduate school. I wanted it to be a coed institution because I went to an all-boys high school of over 2,000 boys so I wanted to enjoy a full social atmosphere. The combination of those three met my criteria, and the fourth and extremely important was an opportunity to play in a great basketball program. Stu Aberdeen had led Acadia to the national tournament on two occasions and won four conference championships so he was a thoroughbred coach with an excellent program. Those four criteria were met and surpassed and that convinced me that Acadia was the perfect choice.

“When I arrived it was just as I had envisioned. It actually had a New England flavour – a combination of New England and the Maritimes. I remember the lights at U-Hall were on and the lawn was immaculate. I was at home that first night.

“In addition to winning the national championships, my best memories of Acadia were the home games – all of them – because the fans were so rabid, so engaged. They never missed a possession on the floor and it was a euphoric inspiration to play basketball before the Acadia fans of the day. In my opinion, it has never been replicated in Nova Scotia for the last 40 years. We felt like national champions in an Acadia uniform every day that we stepped onto the court before those fans.

“At player reunions, people always say, ‘Well, look at what we’ve done in life.’ It’s a little puff of ego. Looking back, couldn’t we have gone anywhere we wanted as undergrads? St. John’s, UCLA? Sure, just look at what we’ve become. But we’ve also said to each other on many occasions, ‘If we had it to do all over again, knowing what we know today, would we have chosen another school?’ and the answer universally is, ‘No. We’d have picked Acadia all over again.’”

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Jim Prime Jim Prime (’69) grew up in Freeport, Nova Scotia, at the tip of Long Island. His father, Curtis Prime, had attended Horton Academy and his sister, Margaret Rockwell (’68), preceded his arrival at Acadia by a year. While earning a BA in English, Jim explored his creative talents by writing for the student newspaper, The Atheneaum. He later became a frequent contributor to the Acadia Alumni Bulletin and served briefly as the magazine’s interim editor.

Jim has also written 20 books over the past 25 years, including most recently From The Babe To The Beards, published in October of this year. He has authored all three volumes of the University’s special 175th anniversary supplement, Voices of Acadia. Recently retired from a 36-year career in educational publishing, he now writes full-time. He also holds the lofty title of Lieutenant-Governor of Red Sox Nation for Nova Scotia and is co-founder, with Dave Ritcey (’83) and Don Hyslop, of the Bluenose Bosox Brotherhood, a Nova Scotia-based group that brought the 2004 and 2013 World Series trophies to the province. In 2011 he threw out the first pitch on Nova Scotia Day at Fenway Park.

“Acadia was the only university as far as my parents were concerned. It was always taken for granted that I’d go there. I don’t remember even discussing another option. My big sister Margaret came home during Christmas break with stories about what a wonderful place it was and I admired my father Curtis (’27) and my uncle, Dr. Eric Titus (’34) so much that it was an honour – almost a responsibility – to go where they had gone.

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“I came from a very rural place and to me, Acadia was the big time. It was a whole new world and a bit overwhelming at first. I lived in Willett House, a residence that had more than its share of characters, including several football players. I was pretty quiet and shy, but university life helped to change that. You had to join in just to survive. There was always something happening on campus: an athletic event, Winter Carnival, or any number of great concerts. I remember seeing Simon and Garfunkel, Gordon Lightfoot, The Left Banke, the Blues Magoos and Ian and Sylvia. It was all magical for me.

“Acadia fostered two things in me that have made my life richer: my love of sports and my love of writing. The sports scene was incredible. The basketball team had stars like Brian Heaney (’69), Steve Pound (’72), Rick Eaton (’72) and Jerome ‘Bruiser’ McGee (’74) and the gym was packed to the rafters for games. They were always a threat for national honours. Another unforgettable experience was attending football games with the entire floor from Willett, and later Chipman House.

The rivalries with SMU and X were so intense in those days. I always say that I’m a fan of the Boston Red Sox, the Montreal Canadiens, the New England Patriots, and any Acadia team.

Even today when I go to a football or hockey game, those feelings come rushing back and I cheer for Acadia as if I was a freshman. Again.

“I gravitated toward English courses and especially enjoyed Dr. Alastair MacDonald and Dr. Govind Sharma. They had such great respect for writers and I shared that feeling myself. I wrote for The Atheneaum and years later for the Bulletin, where I learned so much from the editor, Linda Cann (‘62). In my mind, writers are at the top rung of society and I put high value on the ability to write, and write well. I became an avid and lifelong reader and embraced the classics because of Acadia. It has been a huge part of my life. Through my writing I’ve met people like Ted Williams, Bill Lee and Paul Henderson, all of whom I’ve co-authored books with. I’ve interviewed dozens of athletes and gained insights into their world.

“My Acadia experience was eye-opening and very much a coming of age process for me. When anyone asks, I’m proud to say that I’m an Acadia alumnus. I know my degree means something.

“Working with Fred Sgambati (‘83) on the

Voices of Acadia project has rekindled my love of Acadia. The talent that has passed through the halls of Acadia is overwhelming and it was a humbling experience to profile many of them.

There’s such positivity about Ray Ivany and the direction that Acadia is now taking. I’ve come to realize what Acadia means to people and the impact that professors, coaches and fellow students can have on so many lives. Incoming students should read Voices to see what their time at Acadia can mean. I think it would inspire and inform them and confirm that they made the right choice in coming to the best small university in Canada.”

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Dr. James Perkin When universities consider what to look for in a new president, they would do well to study the example set by Dr. James R. C. Perkin, Acadia’s 12th President. Dr. Perkin was president during a time of great change and growth, within the university and society at large. An Oxford graduate in Greek, he was the epitome of the teacher-scholar. He kept his finger on the pulse of the campus while ensuring that Acadia’s academic reputation was maintained and enhanced. He brought prestige to the institution and kept a steady hand on the tiller as the University passed into uncharted waters. His decisions were invariably well-reasoned and made in consultation with the capable and trusted team he had gathered around him.

“I think the relationship of Acadia and the community is probably the most distinctive thing about Acadia. I’m familiar with St. 18

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Francis Xavier and Antigonish, and with Mt. Allison and Sackville, but there’s nothing approaching the sort of two-way relationship that Acadia has with Wolfville. It works both ways, and there is a long tradition of members of the University being involved in the town.

Wolfville was incorporated in 1893 and one of the prime movers in that was the president of the day. When I came into the position, I inherited a time of some student unrest. I suggested that we have a liaison committee with representatives from the town and the University to examine common problems. Ray Ivany has reinstated that and now there are students involved, which is a good thing.

“Jim Beveridge and George Levy recruited me to Acadia. I was teaching at McMaster Divinity College at the time and got a letter saying they were starting a Department of Religious Studies and would I be interested.

It was 1969 when I came here as Professor of Religious Studies, a new position in a new department that had previously been the Department of English Bible, headed by Dr. Levy. I was Professor of Religious Studies from 1969 to 1977 and I was Dean of Arts from 1977 to 1980 and then Vice-President before becoming President in 1981. I served for 12 years. Things have changed since then in the presidential world, in particular, the style of presidency.

“People have often described me as a teaching president because when I was recommended for the presidency, I said that I wanted to continue teaching. Some members of the Board were very hesitant about that.

Personally, I am convinced that universities are teaching institutions. They do a lot of research, they do a lot of athletics, they do a lot of community service and all of those things, but really what universities exist to do is to teach things. That was my whole academic career to that point. I had taught in France and Scotland and Hamilton. If I knew anything, it was teaching.

“Lloyd Caldwell, the Chairman of the Board, was a very wise man and I recall him saying to the Board, ‘Well, some of us think the President can teach and some of us think the President can’t, but none of us really knows and there’s only one way to find out.

We will appoint Jim on the understanding that he will teach for one year and if the Board is unhappy with the results, he will have to

choose whether he wants to be a President or a teacher.’ It was never an issue after that.

“One of the biggest challenges that we faced was that the faculty had just been unionized in 1977 and soon after that the administrative staff was as well. That required a different style of administration. There is a very large body of people in communities and sometimes in universities that think a university should be run like a business.

This never persuaded me because every organization has its own ethos. If you are a military administrator, then you run things in a certain way. If you are a health care administrator, there’s an appropriate style for that. In universities they are different again, and it isn’t as if you can copy models from outside. What you have to do is work with the one that’s there and try to make it better.

“One of the things that pleased me most during my time as President was the financial campaign we launched. The largest previous campaign had been for $7 million. I had a meeting with the Vice-President and together we decided that we would aim for $20 million over five years – triple the previous best. It was a challenge, but we met it.

“Every Wednesday morning, I’d meet with my VPs and we each brought a list of issues and concerns. The hours spent at those meetings were valuable because we’d often head off potentially disruptive things. I liked to consult, but I also did it for a very pragmatic reason – because I didn’t know as much as those at the meetings. You could know your own subject and research and write and speak about it, but you had better not think you knew as much about finances as the controller or as much about athletics as the VP Administration to whom the Department of Athletics reported.

You set up a structure and gave it a chance to work, and didn’t interfere unless something was clearly not right.

“That’s another way in which a university is a distinctive entity: you ought to be able to talk through even the most contentious issues.

It was and is my belief that when things can’t be solved by rational discussion, then a university is not being true to itself. After all, that’s what it stands for – the rational way of dealing with knowledge.”

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Dr. David Levy

1572–1620.

Writing in the foreword of Levy’s 1997 book, More Things in Heaven and Earth: Poets and Astronomers Read the Night Sky, then Acadia president Dr. Kelvin Ogilvie (’63) said, “David Levy is a natural symbol of the oldest of truths, the continuum of artistic and scientific expression. By lifting our spirits to such majestic heights, perhaps he can help put back together on earth what mere mortals have torn asunder, the union of art and science.”

Levy has discovered or co-discovered 22 comets and has written 34 books, most of them about those experiences. His words are inspirational. “Nature does what it wants to do,” he told Acadia graduates in 1995, “and so should you. Follow your heart and soul as well as your head. And whatever you decide to do, be a good teacher at it. Go into a classroom several times a year and tell the children why you have a passion for what you do.”

Passion is really what David Levy is all about. He is passionate about life and the uncharted, magnificent possibilities it offers.

–

For those who think that Acadia is out of this world, there is now proof to back that up. Somewhere between Jupiter and Mars, a 15-kilometre-wide asteroid is orbiting the sun. It is known as Acadiau. According to Dr. David Levy (’72), “it is my understanding that it extends Acadia’s land holdings by a factor of 50.”

Levy graduated from Acadia with a degree in English literature, and it was literature that served to whet his appetite for what lay beyond even the realm of his imagination. His Acadia sojourn included time spent stargazing on the roof of Crowell Tower. In 1993, his relentless search of the skies was rewarded in a spectacular way. Along with colleague Carolyn Shoemaker, he identified a previously unknown comet that came to be known as Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9. In 1994, the star-like body collided with the planet Jupiter While accepting an honorary doctorate in science in 1995 from his Wolfville alma mater, Levy drew comparisons to the Annapolis Valley. “Acadia’s mighty tides are no match for Jupiter’s tidal yank on this comet, which fell apart into 21 pieces,” he told the rapt audience of graduating students. “It looked like a string of pearls when we found it. Anyone who doubts that Jupiter could pull a comet apart should hike out to Cape Split where, thanks to the moon’s gravity, in a few hours water surges into the Minas Basin with the force of all the rivers on earth.”

This melding of the imagination and science and the ability to describe scientific and astronomical events with such clarity and drama is another paean to the power of a true liberal arts institution such as Acadia.

Levy exemplifies the worth of such a balanced education.

There is no divide between love of science and literature for Levy. He is not being coy when he talks about the “poetry of science.”

He has studied the allusions to comets in the writings of Gerard Manley Hopkins and his writing reflects his love of literature and science.

In 2010 the Hebrew University of Jerusalem awarded him a PhD on the completion of his thesis The Sky in Early Modern English Literature: A Study of Allusions to Celestial Events in Elizabethan and Jacobean Writing,

Pat Townsend In her job as Acadia’s Archivist, Pat Townsend must be equal parts historian, detective, teacher, ambassador, tour guide, and recordkeeper. She keeps her eyes on the past, present and future simultaneously.

Pat is the gatekeeper to the University’s memory bank. In short, she is ‘The Source,’ as in, ‘If you want accurate information about Acadia, go to the source.’ She is currently 20

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working on a book for a scholarly series entitled Baptists in Early North America, soon to be published by Mercer University Press. Hers is the only Canadian volume in the 13-volume series.

“I grew up in Ontario and went to Trent University, where I was influenced by Allan Wilson, a professor in my honours history course in Canadian Studies. He had taught at Acadia before he came to Trent and got me into Maritime history, especially religious history.

I did archivist training after that and came to Acadia in 1972, where I kind of fell into this job.

“There had never been an actual trained archivist at Acadia before me. My official title was Junior Archivist, but there was no Senior Archivist. Soon I was just ‘the archivist.’

“The role is multi-faceted. You have to be part historian, but equally important is gathering material and bringing it into the archives. For government archivists, the parameters are much more defined, but in a university setting you are also asked an awful lot of questions about the history of the institution. We get inquiries from University administration as well as the Alumni Office. There are days when I jump around from pillar to post. It’s never dull.

“All the early records of the university – whether it’s the Board of Governors or Senate minutes or whatever – are in paper form.

Because so much information is now coming digitally by e-mail or other electronic form, the question becomes: how do we take care of this digital aspect and store things? It’s a huge issue in archives.

“A lot of people think that archives are just old dusty stuff, but they’re not – they’re very current. I could get a question from the Alumni Office about somebody that graduated last year and did they have any other relatives who went to Acadia. The President might need some background information for a speech. My job is all over the map. Sometimes I’m giving campus talks to newcomers and current students or giving campus tours and talking about the buildings and histories of the residences. That’s actually one of my favourite parts of being at Acadia. I call it a sense of place. You can just feel it on this campus when you go out and about. I feel it particularly in those core buildings around University Hall: Seminary, Emmerson, Whitman, Rhodes. It’s important to make kids aware of their connection to the past.

“The archives have changed phenomenally since I arrived. We are as high-tech as anyplace because we’ve had real leadership from the University librarians, way back to people like Ian Bates, who was very gung-ho on technology and getting us into it. We’ve been able to digitize some of our collection. The paper still comes in, but now we get things in different formats, too.

“Alumni Bulletin editors like Fred Sgambati (’83), and before him Linda Cann (’62), would call and say, ‘Have you found anything interesting and do you have any pictures with it so we can do a story?’ We have many photos in the archives that are unidentified. We used to run those in the alumni magazine and the responses we got were wonderful. Barry Moody (’67) has had a phenomenal influence on me. He’s such a wonderful researcher and historian. Get him talking about Acadia and he’s a walking bibliography.

“We have made many discoveries and solved a lot of mysteries over the years. We discovered that Acadia once had a golf club where Whitman House is now located. That generated great excitement. We found that the Acadia seal over the front door of Emmerson was produced by Tiffany and Co. in New York.

That’s one of my favourite parts of the job – the sleuthing. You’re like a Jack Russell terrier, always digging. That’s the fun part – the stories.

“People have teased me over the years that I breathe and ooze Acadia. I truly do. I love what I do.”

–

Susan Hicks Susan Hicks (’73) graduated from Acadia with a BSc before attending the University of New Brunswick, where she earned a BBA. She was Chief Financial Officer and Chief Regulatory Officer of Spielo Manufacturing Inc. (Spielo Gaming) until the company was purchased by GTECH in 2004. She is currently CEO and President of Technology Venture Corporation (TVC), a private venture capital and investment holding company based in Moncton. The company focuses on venture capital investments in technology industries such as wireless, real time energy reporting systems, vehicle software and hardware, sensor technology and internet security, as well 21

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as insight imaging and diagnostic systems.

In 2012, Technology Venture Corporation became the first private company to join three provincial governments – Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and PEI – in a regional venture capital fund. In announcing the initiative, New Brunswick Premier David Alward said, “Connecting smart, innovative companies with the venture capital they need to create jobs and grow this region’s knowledge economy is a key part of our plan to rebuild New Brunswick.” The $47.5 million fund is designed to support highpotential companies in Atlantic Canada.

“We are excited to be part of this fund,” said Hicks at the time. “We see this as a vehicle to help the companies that have significant opportunity to reach their next stage of growth and contribute to wealth creation in the region.”

Hicks was formerly Director of the Board of New Brunswick Power and Vice-Chair of New Brunswick System Operator. She currently serves on the board of the Enterprise Greater Moncton Leadership Council and is a member of various private company boards.

“I have many fond memories of Acadia.

I loved the hominess of the campus and the surrounding community of Wolfville. I really enjoyed my microbiology classes with a favourite professor, Dr. Joseph Basaraba.

I have vivid memories of tutoring Home Economic students in the ever-dreaded biochemistry course.

“I can still recall playing games of bridge before the 8:30 classes and taking in all the basketball and football games. We seldom missed a game, especially when we were hosting the St. Mary’s Huskies.”

–

Alex Colville, Chancellor Alex Colville (Hon. ’75) was one of Canada’s great artists. He saw beauty in the mundane and importance in the ordinary. In Dr. James Perkin’s 1995 book Ordinary Magic, Acadia’s former President explored Colville’s gift for taking commonplace scenes and “infusing them with an extraordinary quality, a magic that brings surprise, delight and a new dimension to the viewer.”

Dr. Perkin called Colville ‘Canada’s Painter Laureate’ because of the manner in which

Colville moved so easily “between small-town Nova Scotia and the sphere of international fame.” Indeed, Colville involved himself in the life of the Acadia and Wolfville communities, lending his support to various causes and blending in with the general populace. “Parallel to being the figurehead of the University,” adds Dr. Perkin, “and a very good, internationally known figurehead, he was a very ordinary member of the Wolfville community. He liked speaking with people. Alex collected mail at the post office regularly and would engage in conversation with various people from town and campus. Often, he knew and inquired about their family. He built an enormous amount of respect in the town and University.”

Colville served in the Second World War, where he not only encountered but, as a war artist, recorded in stark and powerful images man’s inhumanity to man. The experience left a profound and lasting impression. After the war, he spent 17 years as a professor of art at Mt. Allison University, where he mentored artists such as Tom Forrestall, Mary and Christopher Pratt, and Dawn MacNutt.

In 1963, he gave up teaching to become an independent artist and, in 1973, he and his wife Rhoda moved back to her family home on Main Street in Wolfville. It was during this time that a close friendship began between the Colvilles and Dr. Perkin, then an Acadia professor. Colville became Acadia’s Chancellor in 1981, the same year that Dr. Perkin took over as President, and for the next 10 years their personal and professional friendship deepened.

They would remain friends for more than 40 years until Dr. Colville’s death in 2013.

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“It’s impossible to talk about Alex without also talking about Rhoda,” says Dr. Perkin.

“She was so much a part of his entire life: professional, social, and domestic. She was his fiancée, his wife, his model, his housekeeper, his advisor on what clothes to wear, and much more.”

Former Acadia students will recognize many scenes in Colville’s canon of work.

Some might even consider them to be parts of Acadia’s extended campus, scenes that are evocative for anyone who has spent time at the Valley school. Minas Basin is featured in Low Tide and other works. The French Cross in Grand-Pré is the subject matter for the painting of the same name. Chaplain is an interior of the Manning Memorial Chapel with a contemplative former University Chaplain Roger Prentice (’69) front and centre. Colville donated his Coyote in Alders to the University and allowed reproductions – some personally signed – to be sold to raise money during Acadia’s 150th anniversary year.

“When he became Chancellor, he fitted into the Acadia academic scene in a remarkable way. He was an academic person and a highly successful artist, but he moved, spoke and thought in terms that are proper to universities. He gave many addresses at the University to many groups and clubs and student organizations.

“Chancellorships tend to be a function of the kind of person who is Chancellor. Alex’s interpretation of his role was to do well the things that he was legally required to do – such as conferring degrees and representing the University at certain national events – but he was more comfortable with being one of the academic community. His contribution to Acadia was unique. He was generous with his time, but circumspect with his opinions.

He conferred degrees with dignity and would always make that link with students, engaging them in conversation not only at Convocation but before and after, on the paths of Acadia and in the streets of Wolfville. I remember one instance of a student who was very enthused to get her degree because it had been something of a struggle for her. At Convocation she said to me, ‘Acadia has done a lot for me and I am grateful to all of the staff, but most of all I am grateful that I received my degree today from Alex Colville.’

“At the heart of Alex’s life and work was

the basic conviction that ordinary things are important. He really believed that. He thought one of the reasons people are sometimes disturbed by his work is that it insists that ordinary things matter. We agreed on that. You can’t talk about Alex without talking about his involvement not only at the highest level of the country’s activities, but also knowing many of the people of Wolfville by name. He wanted to speak to the man who collected the garbage.

“While he believed in the importance of ordinary things, he also believed in excellence, and there is no contradiction there. Excellence is a selection from the ordinary.”

–

Cynthia Stacey Dr. Cynthia Stacey (‘75) is the new dean of the University of New Brunswick’s Renaissance College. She received her MSc from the University of Guelph and PhD in Cultural Geography from the University of Ottawa, where she examined the role of heritage in community-based sustainable development initiatives.

“I started at Acadia in ’71, finished in ’75 and we were called the Department of Recreation and Physical Education. There was that separation of physical education and recreation streams.

“Recreation was more of an individual and community-based thing. It was when municipal recreation departments really got going and it became more of a profession. It wasn’t just a sport thing and we weren’t just concentrating on people’s physical health 23

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Fred Kelly

as much as we were on the whole person.

Recreation was for any age group and it was to be inclusive and provide opportunities for all people. It became a public good – like police or fire departments. I went to Acadia specifically to do that.

“When people ask why Acadia is so important to me I tell them that it was small enough for you to get involved in lots of things. You could meet lots of people. I was involved in student government as the physical education representative to the Student Council. I was chairperson of the Winter Carnival one year and I was the first female night manager at the SUB. “Gib Chapman was Athletic Director at the time and, after my less than stellar first year, I got called into his office, which was a pretty big deal at the time because I was very young. He gave me this wonderful lecture about how I was capable of doing much better and if I tried a little I might surprise myself. It was sort of a neat thing because, number one, it scared me silly; and secondly, it was great to know that someone cared that much. It made a big impression and I didn’t want to let him down the second year. It woke me up for the rest of my university career.

“Bill White was the professor who instilled in me the confidence that recreation really was a profession. He let us know all the different things that you could do with a degree. At the time, it was so new and there weren’t a lot of us in it so we did get kind of overshadowed by Phys Ed. He listened to us and cared about what we thought. He was a bit of a mentor and a reference factor when I decided to go to grad school.

“Acadia’s role in my future career was huge. That was the whole foundational piece – figuring out who I was in relation to everybody else I met. At Acadia, I could be involved in everything from the classroom to the activity labs to student activities. That was a perfect practice ground for my personal leadership, but I also got to watch everybody else and learn from watching. It was great for confidence. I think that’s one of the big things I took away from my Acadia days and what makes Acadia so appealing. It’s a great place to build a foundation.”

–

When Fred Kelly (Hon. ’75) retired in 1967 after 40 years as teacher, coach, and for 27 years Acadia’s Director of Physical Education and Athletics, he had established standards of sportsmanship and fair play that continue to be the benchmarks by which all successive Acadia coaches and athletes are measured.

His legacy can be found in every hard-won championship and in every noble defeat. It can most notably be found in the character of the athletes he taught and coached as well as in the quality of the athletes that Acadia now seeks to play varsity sports.

Kelly, a native of Charlottetown, PEI and graduate of St. Dunstan’s College, arrived on the Acadia campus in 1927 after spending two years at McGill University in Montreal. His first position was as a member of the physical education staff and coach of Acadia’s varsity hockey team.

In 1939 he served as Officer Commanding Acadia’s COTC and was given the rank of captain. He was promoted to major in 1941 and was forever after known as ‘Major’.

Winning wasn’t everything to Major Kelly, but never let it be said that he wasn’t a winner.

He led various teams to more than 50 Maritime and Nova Scotia championships, including a jaw-dropping 31 of 33 Maritime Intercollegiate Track and Field titles. It didn’t seem to matter whether the playing surface was ice, hardwood, cinder track, or muddy gridiron.

Kelly teams were always in the fray until the final whistle blew.

At a retirement party for Major Kelly on April 8, 1967, more than 300 former students joined with representatives from nine Maritime universities to pay tribute to the slightly built giant of Canadian intercollegiate sport. Former Acadia goalie Rev. Neil Price (’40) of Sydney cited recent cases where some university teams had blamed referees for their losses.

“Those who played under Fred Kelly would have no sympathy if they protested and sought alibis for their losses,” said Rev. Price “He always insisted on the highest standards of integrity and those would not be sacrificed by any who came under his influence.”

The late Acadia President J.M.R. Beveridge (’37) had been captain of the 1936 Maritime champion English Rugby football squad under Kelly. “Fairness, honesty, 24

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integrity, straightforwardness and mastery of his subject – all these qualities Professor Kelly has, by precept and example, instilled in many of us,” Dr. Beveridge said once.

Dr. Price summed up Major Kelly’s gentlemanly, uncompromising, soft-spoken approach to coaching. “Kel’s success was in the control he always had over the team and himself. No matter how good a player was, he would sit on the bench if he displayed poor sportsmanship.”

–

anyway. Baptists retained several positions on the Acadia Board. I’m actually on the Board of Governors and the Acadia President is part of the Board of the Divinity College. Our students are really university students so they all get an Acadia University degree and our faculty, for the most part, are members of the Faculty of Theology of the University. We are very much part of an integrated web and the President is certainly affirming of that.

“The role of the Acadia Divinity College continues in a number of areas. We have recently established three centres. One is a shared centre through the University library.

The Acadia Centre for Baptist and Anabaptist Studies was established because of one of the professors, the late Dr. Jarold Zeman, who has some wonderful original research in the area of the founding of the Anabaptist movement back during the Protestant Reformation.

“Another centre that we’ve established and we’re very excited about is called the Charles Taylor Centre for Chaplaincy and Spiritual Care. Part of the DNA of this institution is the preparation of ministers and pastors who are able to minister on the fringes of society and in areas of ministry that some might shy away from. Charles Taylor received the Order of Canada just weeks before he passed away. He is someone who championed ministry in the prison system, and for those coming back into the community through community chaplaincy. The theological, philosophical, sociological study that informs students in terms of the Divinity College – the framework for the study – is grounded in the affirmation of persons. We have the solid conviction that all persons are created in the image of God, have dignity, and need to be treated with dignity, cared for and ministered to.

“The third centre is not yet named, but it’s in our heads and hearts and it’s about to be launched. It’s a centre for the engagement of church and culture. We are interested in looking at a centre that would address issues of scripture.

“Acadia Divinity College currently has the largest Doctor of Ministry program in the country. We have over 80 persons enrolled.

The Doctor of Ministry degree is a professional doctorate in the sense that it equips people in their profession and is at an advanced scholarship level. We are attracting some of

Harry Gardner Rev. Dr. Harry Gardner (’77) is President of the Acadia Divinity College, Dean of Theology at Acadia, and the Abner J. Langley and Harold L. Mitton Professor of Church Leadership.

Under the leadership of Dr. Gardner and his predecessors, the Divinity College has become a vibrant and dynamic part of the Acadia campus.

“Acadia University was founded by the Baptists of Atlantic Canada. At that time, there wasn’t quite the same separation of religion from society as exists today. At the heart of the founding of the university was a great openness. There wasn’t to be any kind of segregation in any way, shape or form.

“In 1912, the Faculty of Theology was formed here at Acadia and more formally recognized those principles. That carried on until the mid-1960s when there was a decision made to separate out the Divinity College, and the University went over to the public side of things. It had been growing in that direction 25

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the leading pastors of churches, not only in this country but internationally, to pursue this doctorate.

“I came to Acadia not necessarily thinking about pastoral ministry, but with a great passion to learn. In my youth, I saw a lot of women and children at church so I had the idea that church must be for women and children. My passion for going into ministry was to help overcome some of the mythologies and to get down to the realities of Christianity.

“All of my Acadia Divinity College professors had an impact on me. These days I sit in the Abner J. Langley and Harold L. Mitton Chair of Church Leadership. I feel quite humbled by it. Both of those men were huge influences in my life. Abner Langley preached my ordination sermon and Harold Mitton (’44) was my second Principal, a great and inspiring leader to me. Jarold Zeman taught church history. We would come in early and he’d always have his door open a crack. We’d tap on the door and he’d say ‘Come in’ – big smile – ‘What’s going on in your life?’ He always had time, listened really well and often offered prayer. Same with Dr. (Millard) Cherry and Dr. Taylor. Those were the men who helped shape me as a young leader.

“For me, Acadia has always been a place for a person to come regardless of their background or status in society – whether they come from a rich or poor family, there is a place at Acadia for them. There’s a scripture passage that says, ‘Don’t despise small things,’ and so part of what we do at the Acadia Divinity College is help people gain the confidence to be able to serve other people and to do that from a Christian perspective.”

–

at Acadia from 1975-77 and his daughter Natalie is a current member of the women’s rugby squad.

“I joined the faculty at Acadia in 1999, and in 2007 became Director of the Jodrey School.

My sabbatical year was 2005 and Acadia was suffering, as many universities were, from a lack of enrolment in the School of Computer Science, which was ironic when you consider the world is becoming one where even your average pencil has a computer in it. There should have been more young students interested than ever.

“Few people were entering and exiting computer programs at a time when industry was screaming for more people. You had this odd dichotomy wherein industry had a high demand and very few young people responded. It was a communication and marketing issue. Kids didn’t want to be the geeky math guy. Then The Big Bang Theory changed all that and geeky became cool.

“I had a sabbatical in 2005 and asked myself how I could change this course we were on. I decided a grassroots movement was the way to stimulate the most interest if you really wanted to affect the education system.

“I started the robotics program competition because, number one, robots capture the imagination of youths and adults, too. They are very animated and it’s a very natural thing to want to make the robot move, especially autonomously, by preprogramming it. Kids quickly enjoy writing a little program to make it move forward and then make it turn.

They learn basic ideas of creating loops to

Danny Silver Danny Silver (’79) recently stepped down as Director of the Jodrey School of Computer Science to become Director of Acadia’s new Institute of Data Analytics. He is a former president of the Canadian Artificial Intelligence Association (CAIAC) and founder of the highly successful Acadia University Robot Programming Competitions. Among other awards, he has received the Science Champion Award (2011) from the Nova Scotia Discovery Centre. Danny played varsity soccer 26

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make the robot do something over and over again. What you soon see is that if you show this to 100 kids, 30-40 per cent realize they enjoy it and are fairly good at it. In one-half of those, the light bulb really comes on and they say, ‘Gee, I could make a living at this. This is a career opportunity.’

“At the Institute of Data Analytics we examine practical applications relating to big data. Statisticians have done it for many years, collecting data and building predictive models. In the ’90s there was a wave of data warehousing and data-mining and it’s now back as analytics.

“We can use it in various environmental and business manufacturing situations.

Small pieces of technology, like cellphones, can actually pick up something from the environment – whether it’s just light level or water salinity. It knows where it is because it has GPS technology built in and can communicate. So that provides methods by which we can put things in our fields or into manufacturing or health care settings to get data that we couldn’t get before.

“The same power you use when you look up something can be used in predicting disease in people or quickly classifying an environmental condition as being good or poor. The combination of having that massive amount of data that we could never have put our hands on before, coupled with the ability to analyze it and build predictive models, is a real game-changer. It also has application in Acadia’s role in tidal energy: monitoring and tracking what’s going on and then doing analysis is a perfect fit. There are also implications for the wine industry.

“The bar to get into Acadia is high and the bar to get out is high. It’s never going to be easy, but once you’re in, everyone is going to help you. That’s the essence of Acadia.

Acadia instills a sense of caring where just getting ahead is not enough. You graduate with a sense that financial gain is something you should perhaps aspire to, but it shouldn’t be the end goal. Acadia is all about going the extra mile.”

–

Penney Gaul “Acadia varsity swimmer (Helen) Penney Gaul (’80) helped make sports history during her time at Acadia. As a member of two national championship teams, she learned the value of teamwork and dedication, lessons that would serve her well throughout her medical career.

After Acadia, Dr. Gaul got a medical degree at the University of Ottawa in 1985.

She practiced Family Medicine in Calgary for five years. In 1991, she began a Diagnostic Imaging residency at University of Calgary, finishing in 1996 and going on to do a Pediatric Diagnostic Imaging Fellowship at University of Calgary and University of Toronto. She has been practicing Diagnostic Imaging in Calgary since 1996.

“Being a varsity athlete is so multi-faceted.

I had been a competitive swimmer for a long time and it had been part of my lifestyle to be on a team, have a coach, and travel. It really is a lifestyle because you have to learn that balance between schoolwork, swimming and life. For me, the biggest thing that I took from Acadia was my time with Jack Scholtz. It’s funny, but it gets even more important to me as I get older and although I knew it at the time, I didn’t really appreciate what Jack had given to me until I left Acadia. He positioned me to be the success that I am today. He gave me the skills to be independent, to be a leader and to know the importance of integrity and respect.

He taught me what hard work would get you.

All of those life tools have played such an important role in my personal and professional life.

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Voices of Acadia

David Lickley

“I think sports make students proud to be a part of something, whether as a participant or a supporter. My fellow athletes at Acadia were like family. My first year was 1976-77 and the women’s team repeated as Atlantic conference champions. We then went on to win the Nationals (CIAU) – a first for any Acadia swim team. We were up against big powerhouses like the University of Toronto and UBC and for us to pull off a win was incredible.

I remember Jack had calculated all the points we could get per event and thought we had a very good chance of winning if we could all do what we were supposed to do.

And we did it! It was so great. We successfully defended the title the following year, which confirmed our strength and depth. We did it because of Jack. His style of coaching and his leadership made us want to win. I don’t remember any part of it not being fun: hard work, but fun.

“I knew I wanted to be in science but I wasn’t really sure of anything more. My professors at Acadia were so great that I remember my first year in medicine being a bit easier because I already knew a lot of the material. I silently thanked them many times.

Some of the professors I remember the most are Dr. Toews, Dr. Basaraba, Dr. Stiles and Dr. Ness.

“Acadia was my home-away-from-home, my new family. It made me feel like I was somebody even though I was one of 1,800 people. I still talk about Acadia as a place where you can grow – you can maintain who you are and you can grow within a community that’s very close, but diverse. In big universities, you’re a number and no one knows you.

“At Acadia, an international group of students learns alongside students from across Canada. Together with all the different faculties – from fine arts to engineering to business to biology – it offered diversity. I felt it was where I belonged. I was comfortable. I wasn’t from the area, but I was made to feel at home right from the start. When I left, it was like leaving home all over again.”

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David Lickley (’80) has skillfully parlayed his scientific knowledge, love of music and passion for the environment into a career as a highly respected filmmaker. His extensive IMDb (Internet Movie Database) page would make many Hollywood directors and producers envious. He has produced more than 40 documentaries and nature films, in addition to such TV series as “Wonderstruck” and “Profiles of Nature.”

His films resonate not only on their artistic merit, but they have succeeded in spreading the message of conservation throughout the world via IMAX. Among his many credits are the award-winning Jane Goodall’s Wild Chimpanzees (in which the ‘star’ chimp is named Acadia) and Mysteries of the Great Lakes. Lickley also directed the Warner Bros. instant classic Born to Be Wild 3D, which debuted to record audiences. The prolific filmmaker has completed yet another IMAX production called Wonders of the Arctic for Science North and is in the early stages of several other projects for his production company, Lickley Productions.

“Historically, nearly half of the Arctic was covered by ice year-round,” says the biologist.

“Now only the northernmost 20 per cent of the Arctic remains frozen and it’s predicted that within 15 years there could be a completely icefree Arctic during some months of the year.”

David’s daughter Megan (’09) points to her father as a major influence in her life and career. “Both of my parents were so influential, in particular my dad. He was a biologist and very passionate about documentary films. He pursued his creative career in film-making and has done some great work. It’s a combination of science and music because music is required in the films and he is able to engage his scientific side by putting these films together, so it’s really neat to see what he has done.

“I’m a very proud daughter. For the last 15 years he has been making IMAX films and focused on environmental problems in some of the most beautiful places on Earth. He tells the story of the people of the Arctic, for example, and does a wonderful job of tying in the cultural aspects that exist up north and what climate change means for these people. It’s just a beautiful film that is touching to watch.”

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Motorola in 2012, Ruth took the opportunity to retire and currently serves as an advisor to several early stage tech start-ups and is on the board of a non-profit that provides services to victims of domestic violence.

“As a female computer scientist, I was as rare as a talking dog, but at Acadia I was treated like everyone else. You didn’t get any special pass, but you didn’t get any negatives either. I’m in an industry where women are unfortunately still very rare, but I never felt any bias toward or against me at Acadia. I was just expected to show up, do my work and if I did well, that was fine. If you were a smart person you were a smart person. That probably helped me a lot later on when I got out into the real world of technology. I didn’t expect a special pass nor did I expect to be treated differently. I didn’t go expecting to be discriminated against and, for the most part, I wasn’t.

“In my second and third years at Acadia we were updated to a very state-of-the-art system. When I got to Bell Northern, one of the guys I was working with was from the University of Toronto and he was asking me what equipment we had at Acadia. When I told him, he said that they had used a much older system that was expensive to upgrade.

I certainly didn’t come in with a disadvantage compared with my colleagues.

“Acadia laid a good foundation. I knew nothing about computer science when I got there and I think university should be a place that helps you learn who you are. For me, Acadia was a great place to discover that. I think I learned as much about myself as I did computer science. I was always top of my class in our high school so it wasn’t as if I wasn’t used to being the ‘smart girl,’ but at Acadia I was put in a class of very bright people and I realized that people can be exceptional in a variety of areas and there’s value in all of that. You can learn from everyone. It was a really helpful realization.

Some people go to school focused on getting their education and they don’t learn the rest until later in life. I was lucky enough to learn it earlier and I left Acadia with confidence.

“I started university at 17 and graduated when I was 21 and was living on my own.

Confidence is key because if you can’t go with the flow in technology, you’re in the wrong business. Technology changes so quickly and if you’re uncomfortable with change, software

Ruth Hennigar When Ruth Hennigar (’81) arrived in Wolfville in 1977 after the eight-hour car trip from Plaster Rock, New Brunswick to enter Acadia’s computer science program, her timing couldn’t have been better. The journey from the northern New Brunswick town to Acadia and on to Silicon Valley had many twists and turns, but Hennigar always had her eyes focused on the road ahead. She attended Acadia on the cusp of the computer revolution, and even before her graduation she was being courted heavily by a veritable Who’s Who of the high-tech industry.

After graduating as one of a handful of women in Acadia’s Computer Science program, Ruth began her career as a software development engineer at two notable technology innovators, Bell Northern Research and Apple, where she created telephony, networking and operating systems products.

Since then, she has been an Engineering and Product executive at several start-ups as well as at Fortune 500 companies. She was employed as General Manager of the Java team at Sun and Vice-President of Software Development at Palm.

Ruth then took a break from tech for a few years and co-owned two fine wine and cheese shops. She missed the intellectual stimulation of tech, though, and joined eBay as Vice-President of Program Management and Software Quality Assurance. Her last role was as VP of Software Product Management at Motorola Mobility. When Google bought 29

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engineering isn’t where you should be. Two weeks after my 25th birthday I moved to California, which is quite a leap, but I had the confidence that I could do it.

“Acadia is an intimate school, and I’m a firm believer that you get a better education when class sizes are reasonable. You can get more personal attention and you can participate more in the process instead of just watching. That was encouraged when I was at Acadia and it still is. The level of education there is superb.”

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is having a bad day, it’s nice know they feel comfortable coming to talk with me or just to hang out. Hopefully I can help them feel better by the time they leave. The personal touch is very important and I think it’s what draws a lot of people to Acadia. When Bob Stead (’63) was Director of Admissions he told me about a student who chose Acadia because the secretary was so helpful. That made me feel good.

“It’s a relatively small campus and the School of Music is roughly 160 students, so I get to know most very well. That intimacy draws people here.

“A lot of our part-time faculty members come from Symphony Nova Scotia and that’s a big draw for a lot of instrumentalists.

Christianne is head of the vocal department.

She’s very talented and students think the world of her. We have wonderful facilities, too: Denton Hall Auditorium, which seats 395 people; the Festival Theatre building; and University Hall, which we sometimes use for choral performances. We also have access to the K.C. Irving Environmental Science Centre’s Garden Room with the Steinway piano.”

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Barb Jordan As a music lover, it is fair to say that Barb Jordan has the perfect job. After completing her secretarial training, Barb joined the staff at Acadia in 1982. The last 29 years of her 32-year career have been spent in the Acadia School of Music, where she is currently Senior Administrative Secretary.

“Music has always been a big part of my life from the time I was young. I played piano and guitar, maybe not as well as the pupils we have here, but I do enjoy it. My sister and I sang together in church and coffeehouses. My husband will tell you that when I get up in the morning I’m singing. I get in the car and sing and when I come home from work, I’m still singing. This is definitely the place for me.

“The School of Music has opened up my musical tastes. I used to be limited, but I now like a lot of different varieties of music.

My tastes have become more refined and achieved greater depth. I now know a variety of classical music and have decided which composers are most appealing to me.

“We’ve had several students who have gone on to do their Master’s and PhDs and then came back to work. Paula Rockwell (’87) was one of our grads and so were Christianne Rushton (’98) and Eugene Cormier (’98). Jeff Hennessy (’99) was our former director. I feel blessed that all the directors have been fantastic to work for. I’ve always felt that I worked with them rather than for them. I’ve always been made to think that my input matters and my opinion is valued.

It’s wonderful having John Hansen back as director again.

“I love working with students. If a student

Terri McCulloch Terri Davison McCulloch (’83) graduated from Acadia with her BA in Psychology and went on to complete a BPR (Bachelor of Public Relations) degree at Mount Saint Vincent University, graduating in 1985. Her career path in tourism and public relations is as 30

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impressive as it is varied. She is currently head of Human Resources and Communications for Canada’s largest sightseeing tour company, Ambassatours Gray Line.

“Acadia was my first choice of universities for three reasons. As a child, I frequently visited family in the Wolfville area and was enchanted by the mystery and elegance of University Hall. I also grew up knowing that two great aunts were among Acadia’s early female graduates in the 1920s. I felt that, at about 3,000 students, Acadia was a manageable size – the same as the entire population of my hometown of Parrsboro, Nova Scotia.

“While at Acadia, I thoroughly embraced residence life by living on campus throughout my time there and heartily participating in friendly rivalries between residences. I also became heavily involved in Campus Police.

I found Acadia’s learning environment very inspiring. I had a particular fondness for the Vaughan Library and recall frequently ‘sitting among the stacks’ on the third floor just for the pure pleasure of being surrounded by so many classic books.

“I also expanded my horizons at Acadia by learning my first martial art, Kung Fu, there and also playing soccer for the first time, which resulted in training and successfully trying out for the women’s varsity team. I thoroughly enjoyed meeting students from all over the country and around the world. In my first year in particular, I made many friends from Bermuda and Trinidad, and I am still in regular contact with them. I enjoyed my first taste of Vietnamese and Greek food at friends’ apartments.

“I credit Acadia’s intimate campus environment with fuelling my interest in people, their behaviour and motivations.

Following my first year in psychology, I worked as a researcher in the Springhill Penitentiary’s psychology department. After returning to Acadia, somewhat bewildered because my intended career in criminology didn’t seem to be a fit, a kind Psychology professor helped me refocus my ‘people’ interests toward a mix of psychology and business courses. Those led eventually to a successful career in public relations.

“After graduating from Acadia in 1983, I continued my studies in PR before launching my career with Sheraton Hotels in Halifax.

After several years in various management

positions with Sheraton, I became a trainer for the Tourism Industry Association of Nova Scotia and later a tourism program designer and faculty member at the Nova Scotia Community College. My interest in tourism and communications inspired my work as a tourism consultant.

“One particular highlight of my tourismrelated work in the past decade occurred while I was Bay of Fundy Tourism’s Executive Director. Working for the provincial tourism departments of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, I had the honour of leading Bay of Fundy’s quest to be recognized internationally as one of the New7Wonders of Nature. The Bay of Fundy’s global campaign resulted in over $10 million in print media coverage and vast social media exposure throughout Canada and around the world. During the Fundy campaign, I was delighted that Acadia students were first in a national challenge to create giant sevens on university campuses across the country. Acadia students, of course, immersed themselves in the Wolfville harbour’s mud to create a human seven for the occasion!

“When the Bay of Fundy campaign concluded, I made a foray into television as the national Unit Publicist for This Hour Has 22 Minutes for three seasons, working from CBC’s Halifax studio. In May 2014, I accepted an executive position as head of HR and Communications at Ambassatours Gray Line.

“I remember my university days at Acadia with great fondness. Looking back at the past 30 years since I graduated, it’s clear that the seeds of my career, countless other interests, and enduring friendships took hold and were nurtured at Acadia.”

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Pam D’Entremont As Acadia’s Financial Aid Counsellor, Pamela D’Entremont (’84) is one graduate who has literally given back to her alma mater. In these days of rising tuitions across Canada, her role is vital in helping deserving students complete their studies. These graduates will go on to successful careers in a variety of fields, and many will continue the Acadia tradition of giving back.

“I was living in New Brunswick and I applied to Acadia for admission to the 31

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business program without having been to Wolfville or ever setting foot on campus. After earning my BBA in 1984, I returned to New Brunswick briefly to work then worked in the metro Halifax area before accepting a position in the Admissions and Student Assistance Office where I worked with Bob Stead, Lyle Davis, and Mary Miles.

“I have worked in scholarships and financial assistance for 27 years. While I was a student at Acadia I received some scholarship support, which I greatly appreciated. When I was a student here, tuition first broke the $1,000-per-year barrier, but four years of postsecondary education could still be reasonably financed through student loans. Now that costs are so much higher, student financial aid has become much more complex. Working at Acadia has given me the opportunity to assist students to achieve their goal of attending and graduating from Acadia, to see them benefit from scholarship and financial support.

Watching these students cross that stage during Convocation is very gratifying.

“When I first came to Acadia to study, I expected to be here for only the academic years needed to meet my degree requirements. But I soon fell in love with the Valley and Acadia. A small campus and a small town have so much to offer. You know people by name: students, staff, and faculty. There is a great sense of community.

“My favourite professors, in order of when I took their classes, are Maurice Tugwell, Walter Isenor, and Pat Corkum. All three are wonderful people, excellent instructors, and very knowledgeable. They were approachable, loved to teach, got to know their students, and knew what we as students were capable of even when we didn’t know it ourselves!

As a staff member, I also had the pleasure of working with Walter and Pat on university committees.

“Friendships you make at Acadia can last a lifetime, even when those friends are now halfway across the world. And, of course, Acadia has an outstanding reputation academically.”

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one sequel and perhaps a prequel or two to do it justice. The trouble is it would also take someone with Bawtree’s talent, versatility, vision and stamina to bring such a production to pass. The Canadian actor, director, author and educator has made an impact in virtually every area of the theatre and in such iconic performance venues as the Stratford Festival, the Shaw Festival, the Banff Centre, and the Atlantic Theatre Festival, which he founded.

From 1990-2003, he was Director of Drama at Acadia where, along with his partner Colin Bernhardt, he staged numerous student productions of high quality.

“I couldn’t really talk about Acadia much without talking about Colin Bernhardt, who was my partner for 46 years. He came to Acadia in 1986 as voice and acting teacher. In 1990, the former director of drama suddenly left to take a position elsewhere. Because the theatre program is technically under the English department, Colin proposed to the then head of the English department, Alan Young, that I might be approached to stand in as acting director of drama. I came in 1990 and my appointment was extended in 1991, by which time I was fully immersed in Nova Scotia and the Valley. Then they opened it up as a tenure track position, I applied for it and was successful.

“Until 1998, the department was just me and Colin. I had known Colin since 1966. He had worked with me when I was at the Banff Centre and many places elsewhere. At Acadia, he and I were running the theatre program alone with our technical director from 1990 to 1998, when we finally brought in somebody else.

“Colin and I were completely dedicated to the students and we were a good team because we were somewhat different. I was more intellectual, organizational and administrative. Colin was kind of the soul and spirit behind it. He so loved the students and he would give hours of his time to them outside working hours. It was just a very happy family that we created, which Acadia allowed us to create.

“When students first arrived, they didn’t act on the stage immediately. While learning to act in their courses, they were backstage learning costume design, construction, marketing, running the box office, lighting, and so on. They learned it all, so that there would not be a hierarchy, with actors on one level

Michael Bawtree If Michael Bawtree’s life story is ever adapted for the silver screen, it will require more than 32

Voices of Acadia

and backstage workers on another.

“Some graduating students started out in the theatre, but didn’t continue – it’s a wretchedly tough profession. Some went into arts administration, or teaching, or business.

But many have said, ‘Look, I’m not in theatre now, but I would never have gotten to where I am if it hadn’t been for the theatre program.’

People learned to be articulate in public, to trust their intelligence, to be self-reliant and collegial. It was extremely good training for people, and for life.

“Colin had the first inspiration for the Atlantic Theatre Festival. We wanted our Acadia Theatre Company to be run along professional lines, with professional standards. We were training people to be professional actors. That didn’t mean that they would be professional actors, but our standards were in that direction. Colin kept saying that we needed a properly professional company here, in addition to our own student theatre. He thought Wolfville was the right place for a major festival. I took up the challenge and a group of us founded the ATF Association in 1993.

“We were able to raise between $2-3 million to convert the old ‘Ice Palace’ into a theatre through an infrastructure program of the provincial and federal governments, and to create an extraordinary festival. Two years later, in 1995, we opened, with Christopher Plummer cutting the tape alongside Kelvin (Ogilvie, ’63), and Peter Donat (’49) leading a company of 25 professional actors in The Tempest.

“We really aimed to be the Stratford of the Atlantic Provinces. That was the scale we worked toward. Michael Langham, who ran Stratford for 13 years and had been my personal mentor, came in his seventies and directed some of our most wonderful productions.

“One of the best things about it for Acadia was that we were able to give summer employment to many of our senior and graduating students, both backstage and in marketing and box office, as well as on the stage as apprentices. It was beautiful, and one of the great tragedies is that it was allowed to die through lack of faith and tenacity. Harvey Gilmour (’66) and Bill Parker (’56) would always say what an incredible gift it was to the University. I think it was very sad to see that superb theatre, designed for

professionals by professionals - and once described as ‘the most beautiful theatre east of Montreal’ - become just another performance space. It’s a sadness that stays with me.”

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Andre Carey A native of the Bahamas, Andre Carey (’89) graduated from Acadia with a BA in Economics and has spent the last two decades working as an Investment Banker specializing in Asian Equity. Recently, he became a partner in a group that is importing rums into Hong Kong. He gives Acadia great credit for developing his ability to interact with diverse cultures in business as well as social milieus.

“I went to Acadia because I had my arm twisted by a few colleagues during a summer internship at a private bank in the Bahamas. Three of my colleagues were Acadia alums and when they heard that I was still undecided about where to study, they did a fantastic job of selling me on the benefits of studying in Canada in general and in particular their absolute love of Acadia.

“Without a doubt, Acadia was a welcoming place. It was a small community, but I was pleasantly surprised with the diversity of the student body. I think every one of the new international students was seriously surprised at the genuine warmth that was displayed to us on our arrival. Not that I should have been surprised; my old colleagues had been right on that score.

“My favourite profs were in the Economics department. Rudy Ffrench was Head of Economics at the time and he made a special effort to make all Caribbean students feel at home. I think as a Jamaican himself he felt it was his duty to make sure we all settled in and had a father-figure around. That said, he definitely pushed us a little harder too, and I think we appreciated that in the end.

“Another of my favourites was Maurice Tugwell. Professor Tugwell was a fantastic teacher and always had time for us. I made it a point to try to get into his classes when I could, which turned into a real blessing for me in one particular class – Mathematical Economics – where I don’t think I would have been able to make it through without some 33

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really serious one-on-one help from Professor Tugwell.

“I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend Acadia to other international students. I really enjoyed my time there and the fact that I still maintain many friendships from that time is testament to the great experiences I had and the types of students that prospered there.

Acadia is the place for a student looking to immerse him or herself into his study, his college and his friendships all in equal measure.

“Interestingly, as I get older, I’ve started to reassess the skills I learned at Acadia that have become more important for me. Early on in my career as an investment banker, it was the strong academic backbone Acadia provided that allowed me to make sense of and excel in the crazy world of finance. As I progressed and grew in my career, it was really my ability to relate to and understand different cultures that was of the most value.

The huge diversity of students at Acadia and the fact that on a small campus you are forced to interact and learn about each other came in really handy.”

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writing presentations and recommendations and if three years of writing papers teaches you anything, it’s how to write. I interact with a lot of businesspeople who don’t know how to write, so there was a foundational piece to that which has become very important in my career, and that I wouldn’t have had any ability to appreciate at the time.

“Acadia always has a warm spot in my heart. As a kid of 18, leaving home and going to another part of the province where I didn’t have any ties was a leap of faith. I had a feeling it was the right place for me so I went, and it was a fantastic experience.

“Acadia is small, and from my perspective the residence environment was really important. My close friends today are friends I met in residence my first year at Acadia 28 years ago. We continue to get together on a regular basis. We’ve all been through the marriages and the babies and all of that stuff together, so the bonds of friendship are just incredible. For sure that kind of lifelong bond is rare, but not rare within the Acadia community because I see it all over the place.

Acadia is an environment that produces friendships that are still as strong decades later. That’s really rare and really special.

“I’m always hesitant to play the ‘girl card,’ but I work in an industry that can be a little bit lonely as a senior female. Emera has done a tremendous job at creating opportunities for women, but I can tell you when I go out in my part of the world, within my networks and the part of the business where I operate, I’m almost always the only woman there. It’s not something I generally think about, other than somewhere along the way there was confidence-building that occurred that lets me not think about it in a conscious sort of way. Part of that is being at Acadia. It’s a small environment where everybody gets to use their own voice and get used to using it, and that just builds confidence.”

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Karen Hutt Karen (Casey) Hutt (‘89) is Vice-President, Commercial, for Emera Energy and has responsibility for all commercial activities within the corporation, including gas and power marketing and trading, origination, asset management and acquisitions.

Using her almost 20 years of experience in marketing and sales, strategy and business development, she has successfully directed the acquisition and integration of many of Emera’s largest energy clients both in Canada and internationally. Karen is also president of Northeast Wind, Emera’s investment in a joint venture partnership whereby they own wind facilities throughout the U.S. northeast.

She graduated from Acadia with a political science degree in arts before completing her business degree at Mount Saint Vincent University.

“I lived in Cutten House and was the assistant don with Mary Hanneman (’83), who was the don at the time. When I’m asked how applicable a political science degree is to my job, I tell them that I spend a lot of time 34

Voices of Acadia

settings in Africa. “These kits allow access to laboratory support in resource-poor clinical settings for less than $1 per test,” Kirumira says. With infectious diseases like hepatitis, tuberculosis and malaria rampant in many areas, the need is great.

“Historically, the major problem in Africa has been a lack of valid diagnostics. Our goal is to cut the rate of deaths by 25 per cent through the introduction of proper diagnostic tools. It is my dream to reduce that rate substantially, to make a real difference there. Cash-strapped clinics would be unable to afford traditional diagnostic labs. We can change that. My vision is to establish affordable laboratory medicine in Third World countries that do not have access to diagnostic equipment because it is too costly, or because they are without the appropriate technology.”

Refreshingly, Kirumira’s pioneering achievements have been heralded by business and humanitarian organizations alike. In 2006 he received the Acadia University President’s Award for Entrepreneurship. Honours from the World Economic Forum and Planet Africa followed.

In 2007, The Economist presented him with the prestigious Bioscience Innovation Award for his 1993 invention of the first rapid-acting HIV screening test. The three-minute test was developed by Kirumira and Acadia graduate student and now President of MedMira Hermes Chan (’88) for the early detection of HIV. It is now being distributed globally and is the fastest test in the world to diagnose HIV. In 2010, Kirumira won the Harry Jerome Technology Innovation Award for Affordable Medical Technologies and in 2011 was a finalist for the Ernst Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award. He received an honorary doctorate from Acadia in 2013.

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Abdullah K. Kirumira Born in Uganda, Dr. Abdullah (‘Abbey’) Kirumira was forced to flee his homeland during the brutal dictatorship of Idi Amin. He doggedly pursued his dream of becoming a doctor, studying in Iraq and Britain and securing his PhD in Australia before moving to the University of Maryland as a Senior Research Fellow in medical diagnostics.

Kirumira moved to Nova Scotia in the early 1990s to teach biochemistry at Acadia.

During this time he also became the founding professor of medical biotechnology at the College of Pharmacy at Dalhousie University.

Driven by his social conscience and an indomitable entrepreneurial spirit, Kirumira decided to fulfill his dream of providing diagnostic tools to poorer nations at an affordable price. This passion led him in 1999 to found BioMedica Diagnostics Inc., in Windsor, Nova Scotia. BioMedica is a medical biotechnology company that is already a leader in medical diagnostics.

It produces a variety of blood coagulation reagents and instruments designed to assess cardiovascular status, cancer risk and an assortment of other health issues.

Using a highly successful strategy that he calls his “technology cross-pollination business model,” Kirumira and BioMedica are able to provide help for the less fortunate while turning a profit. In partnership with government and international aid agencies such as the World Health Organization, Kirumira’s company routinely places diagnostic equipment in small, resource-poor

Andy Amir Andy Amir (’91) is an example of the dynamism and character that international students bring to Acadia. He graduated from Acadia with a Bachelor of Computer Science degree, specializing in Business Information Processing. He was the Life President of his Graduating Class and Valedictorian. During his time at Acadia, he not only embraced but 35

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inhaled the culture of the Annapolis Valley, Nova Scotia, and Canada. He also spread the vibrancy of his own rich culture throughout campus and the town of Wolfville, making countless friends in the process.

“At the end of National Service in Singapore, I searched for an institution of higher learning and Acadia came highly recommended by my brother-in-law, Yeow Shih Yeh. It was a decision that changed my life.

“From the first sight of Acadia’s awardwinning, well-landscaped campus and Wolfville’s tranquility, my apprehension at being 15,000 kilometres from home eased.

The very first morning on campus I was playing soccer with fellow international students from Bermuda, Bahamas, Libya, U.S., Malaysia, Hong Kong and Indonesia amid the cool, fresh air in a field beside an orchard of apple trees.

“Each and every person who crossed my path helped shaped me to be the person that I am today, from Mrs. Shaleena Theophilus (’91) and Mr. Bob Stead (’63) to Dr. James Perkin and Dr. Kelvin Ogilvie (’63). Every professor enriched me with their knowledge, especially Dr. Leslie Oliver (’62) and Dr. Tomasz Muldner.

They all made an impact on my Acadia experience. I was convinced that Acadia is indeed ‘the best place to grow.’

“My fondest memories begin with all four international student orientations. I remember my first lobster, my first snowfall, and my first snowball fight. I also remember walking into the wrong class, walking on ice while going to class and falling in front of large crowds.

I remember the friends that I made at the Students’ Union Building, the AXE and Exit 10.

I remember Winter Carnivals, where I won the lip sync contest two times! I remember walking home from the library at midnight in the middle of a snowfall. I remember eating ice cream at the dykes in the middle of summer and the mud-sliding carnival at the Wolfville duck pond during the Apple Blossom Festival. And how could I forget tubing on the Gaspereau River? That was my life away from home – in residence and off-campus. Most of all, I remember contributing to student life as Vice-President (Internal) of the Students’ Union.

“After graduation, I moved to Ottawa and began life as a Computer Engineer at Met Life Insurance. I moved back to Singapore in

1998 and was blessed to be part of one of the largest Venture Capital groups in Singapore called SilkRoute. Not only did I manage six start-up companies, I also directed the activities of a lab of knowledgeable minds at SilkLabs. With the dot.com bust in early 2000, I moved out of my comfort zone and took on challenges in the supply chain and operations functions. I went on to establish distribution centers with three successive companies, taking on regional and global roles.

“In my spare time, I coach and motivate academically-challenged primary-level school kids to do better in school. I and my family have also adopted, and pursue fundraising activities for the building of an orphanage as well as a school for the orphans. In the pipeline are plans to include lower income families and financiallychallenged single moms in our efforts, to help them build a sustainable income through online trading businesses.”

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Clint Davis Clint Davis’ (’92) personal odyssey has taken him from his home in Goose Bay, Labrador to Acadia, St. John’s, Halifax, Vancouver, Ottawa, Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, back to Ottawa, and finally Toronto. Acadia served as his compass in many ways, enabling him to set a new course for law school and a career that combines economic development and the burgeoning aboriginal marketplace.

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Among a long list of honours, he is a Canada-U.S. Fulbright Scholar, a former blogger for The Financial Post and a 2013 recipient of the Distinguished Alumni Award.

After graduating from Dalhousie Law School, he attended Harvard, where he earned an MPA from the Kennedy School of Business.

He has practiced law and worked as a government advisor on the three territories where he had a chance to observe the interface between business and government and learn the complexities of aboriginal relations. Davis is currently the Vice-President for Aboriginal Banking at Toronto Dominion Bank. His job is to develop business opportunities and build relationships with aboriginal governments and their economic development arms. His goal is “to ensure that TD is considered the bank of choice for the aboriginal market.

“When I first arrived at Acadia, I was struck by two things: first was the size of the trees. In the North we have plentiful trees, but you get a lot of small black spruce, not like Acadia. The campus was just so picturesque and the huge common area was almost like a garden. And then all the little pathways and walkways was something right out of a movie. The University itself was just old – ‘old’ meaning so established. It had a remarkable amount of history and pride attached to it and it was a really wonderful moment to be part of something that was such an institution on the east coast.

“Professor Shelley MacDougall taught me finance in my core business year and was very, very influential in my decision to pursue finance instead of accounting. I liked her style of teaching, and the fact she had accomplished so much and come back to small-town Nova Scotia when she could have been on Bay Street spoke volumes about her character. It just made finance seem very attractive.

“At Acadia, I was just struck by the number of people who had a perceived path. They were going to medical school or to do their MBA or go to law school. For me, just to get through high school and then to university and succeed was a massive accomplishment for my family. Law school was something that I viewed as untouchable and a million miles from my grasp. But one of my professors, who was a practicing lawyer and business law instructor, said, ‘You know,

you’re really pretty good in this course, you really seem to get it. You should think about law school.’ I said, ‘Yeah, right,’ he said, ‘No, you really should.’

“He went on to coach me and opened a world of opportunity that I never would have considered. It’s neat that for so many of us life is somewhat serendipitous and there’s that chance moment where someone says something and you start to think about possibilities. That’s the effect that he had on me because no one in my family would have ever said you should think about law school.

They were extremely proud and supportive of what I was achieving, but if I had never gone to Acadia I don’t think I’d ever have gone to law school. That’s the impact Acadia has had on my life.

“Acadia provided me with that foundation to look at business and see it as a source of optimism and hope, in particular for the market I deal with, which is in the indigenous community. I had a goal to work at a bank as a branch manager, but once I got into my third and fourth years and moved on to law school, I really started to open my eyes to the indigenous experience. I think it was Acadia that spurred my interest in this.

“In the North and in Quebec and Ontario, there is now a significant aboriginal involvement in business. The fact that I had the Acadia experience inspired me to see what opportunities existed from a financial literacy perspective. I honestly think Acadia – even more than law school – provided the fundamental component that drove me to where I am today.

“I would recommend Acadia, hands down. I definitely talk about it and try to push it as a place to get one of the best educations in the country. I actually want my kids to go there. You get to meet some really cool and dynamic people and connect with wonderful professors, and when it’s time to move on to a larger city, it has given you that undergrad experience.

“I was recognized a few years ago by Acadia as a distinguished alumnus, and in my speech I talked about the competitive advantages that Acadia has in terms of attracting top talents from our community.

In the mid-80s, Acadia was trying to attract students from Goose Bay. What other university was trying to do that? I think it spoke volumes about what Acadia was 37

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trying to do, which was to broaden its reach to different pockets of the country that are often ignored. They realized that there’s talent there.

“For many aboriginal students who live in small, family-oriented, fly-in-only communities, to go to the University of Toronto is a massive culture shock. Compare that to Acadia, where you’ve got a town of 4,000 where people really care for and support each other, located in a part of the country that is one of the most polite and supportive anywhere. It’s a great advantage for Acadia to attract more and more aboriginal people to their campus.”

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Among her many noteworthy performances on stage and screen, she is probably best known for her starring role in the TV series Warehouse 13, in which she plays Myka Bering, an investigator of the paranormal. Kelly was nominated for a Gemini Award for Playing House and had a lead role in The Bay of Love and Sorrows.

She has worked alongside such notables as Olympia Dukakis, Paul Sorvino, Gerard Depardieu and Harvey Keitel.

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Jerome Pathon Jerome Pathon played only one year of football at Acadia (1993-94) before transferring in his sophomore year to the University of Washington to be near his family. But what a year it was! He was named rookie-of-the year in both the Atlantic conference and Canadian Intercollegiate Athletic Union. The wide receiver dazzled fans with sensational catches and breakaway speed, making 44 receptions for 868 yards.

His three-year career at U. of W. was equally spectacular and he was a second round draft of the NFL’s Indianapolis Colts (he was also drafted by the Montreal Alouettes of the CFL), signing a four-year $2.65 million contract.

During his professional career with the Colts, New Orleans Saints and Atlanta Falcons, he had 260 receptions for 3,350 yards and 15 touchdowns in 99 NFL games. He ran back 36 kick-offs for 773 yards.

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Megan Lickley Megan Lickley (’09) came to Acadia from Sudbury, ON, where her father, a distinguished biologist and filmmaker, had graduated some 34 years earlier. Megan earned a BSc in math and found a way to combine that love of numbers with her passion for the environment. It may seem like an unlikely pairing at first glance, but the research she has conducted on tidal power and climate change at Acadia, as well as her current research on climate change at MIT, could well inform future policy in Canada and the United States.

“I knew that I wanted to attend a small liberal arts school on the east coast to study math. I really wanted to get to know the faculty and I wanted a small town. I took a trip and visited all the Maritime schools, and my time with the Acadia math faculty had a big impact. They were extremely generous, showed me a good time while I was there and offered a nice scholarship so I felt quite

Joanne Kelly Joanne Kelly’s (’00) acting career began in the small Newfoundland town of Bay d’Espoir, population 700. Her mother was an English teacher and passed on her love of Shakespeare to her daughter. Despite offers of science scholarships, Kelly decided at the age of 17 to pursue her love of the stage at Acadia, where she studied English and drama. After Acadia, Kelly embarked on a professional career in television and movies.

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appreciated by them. I found Wolfville so beautiful and felt at home immediately so it wasn’t difficult to make up my mind.

“I knew I liked math, but wasn’t sure how I wanted to apply it. I also knew I wanted to work long-term on environmental problems. I pursued both separately for the first couple of years, but math and the environment turned out to be a good match. How much energy can you take out of the tides and how harmful is it going to be? Those issues are informed by mathematics. Richard Karsten, a professor in the math department, got involved in the Fundy tides because he wanted to model the tides to understand them better. I had taken a second-year calculus course with Richard and he got to know me. He’s also part of the Irving Academy for the Environment and I was a student rep on the Academy, so he knew I was interested in environmental issues.

“When this project came his way in my second year, he asked if I wanted to start research on it with him in the summertime.

I was really excited and said yes, and spent the next two summers working with him trying to understand his complex models and techniques. He was quite influential in terms of introducing me to the world of research, the world of publications and numerical models.

“The faculty at Acadia is so accessible and student-focused. I felt comfortable asking them a lot and now that I have been at a much larger institution at MIT I realize how special that was. Having such a close relationship with faculty is quite rare.

“I have also always played music, and grew up in a musical home where my parents are both musicians. I’ve taken a lot of lessons.

At Acadia, I didn’t want to forget what I learned so I took sax lessons for full credit, making it easier to put a lot of time into it. I was part of the Acadia jazz band throughout my time at Acadia and Mark Adam (Music Department instructor) was an incredible person to learn from – very generous and personable, but also a talented musician and teacher. Mark was really great about including community members in the jazz band so I was sitting with faculty, community members and students. It was wonderful.

“Acadia has a very strong sense of community and I learned the importance of that while I was there. I grew up in a strong

community and I think now, in hindsight, how rare it was to have that at university.

The campus is located in truly one of the most beautiful places in Canada. Acadia has very thoughtful profs who really care about their impact on society. That makes a big impression when you’re shaping your view of the world and your ideas on how to make a difference. Having those kinds of role models is important and I feel lucky that I got to learn from them.”

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Fayez Alyami Some people go to great lengths to attend Acadia – literally. In 2007, Fayez Alyami (2011) traveled all the way from Saudi Arabia to attend the Wolfville school. His experience was extremely positive and after graduating with a BBA in Finance, he returned to his homeland with wonderful memories from a very different part of the globe. He is currently cost analyst at Ma’aden Aluminium, a $10.8 billion joint venture between Ma’aden and Alcoa. It will be the largest vertically integrated aluminium complex in the world.

“There are many reasons why I chose Acadia. The most important is Acadia is one of the top universities in Canada and having a degree from a top university was very important for my career prospects. The second reason is the school environment and location. The people around the Valley are always happy, with a big smile on their faces, and I like surrounding myself with such positive energy.

“My wife and I were very happy because we were always welcomed and made a lot of friends during our time there. If you visit my Facebook profile you will see that 95 per cent of my friends are from Acadia University. We still share our pictures and meet once a year at some places we like, such as Dubai, Doha, the Maldives, or some cities in Europe.

“I had a great experience academically as well. To be honest, I don’t have a favourite professor because I liked them all. They were all very helpful and I learned so much from them. I continually recommend Acadia University to my friends in Saudi Arabia. By my last year at Acadia there were more than 100 Saudi students on campus – girls and boys. In fact, literally to this very day, some of 39

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my friends over here still ask me to help them to apply at Acadia to continue their studies.

“Acadia University has one of the very best business programs. The BBA program at the F. C. Manning School of Business provides a wonderful background. In addition, all my profs were very helpful and they were hard workers. They were very supportive and did their best to develop me to be a great student of research, knowledge and innovation. I really gained a lot of information from them and I’m sure it helped me to become a great leader and a team worker. It filled me with positive energy.

“While I was a student I did a lot of volunteer activities around the Acadia campus. I founded a Saudi Club in Wolfville and I managed cultural events for international students. I’m proud to say that I supported my fellow Saudi colleagues, both male and female at Acadia, and helped them find their way around.”

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academic pursuits through classes and independent research projects; critical thinking in and outside the classroom; a perpetual sense of hope, big dreams, and a never-ending stream of inspiration from my professors, peers, and organizations working in the University and Wolfville at large. These themes permeated my experience at Acadia and played a critical role in making me who I am today.

“I discovered Acadia by accident. In 2010, while studying at York University in Toronto, I decided to join the Otesha Project – an Ottawa-based NGO. As part of the project, with 15 other youth, I cycled through communities in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, performing a theatrical play to promote environmental sustainability and social justice.

“After a hilly 90-kilometre ride that tested my quads to the point of tears, my bike buddy and I finally made it to Wolfville – a town I knew nothing about. But when I saw the downtown, something moved within me. It was so charming: the Just Us Café; the University grounds; the wineries in the vicinity.

“Dr. Allan Warner, a professor from the School of Recreation Management, hosted our team at his farm. He prepared a delicious dinner from the vegetables his family grew.

During our meal, he asked me if I’d like to meet a business professor who is also a good friend of his. Coming from York, where classes are 500 to 1,000 students, I had never spoken to a professor! Of course, I said yes.

Dr. Edith Callaghan met me the next morning and chatted with me for three hours. Just because!

“I still remember going to a phone booth right after and telling my mother that I am transferring and moving from Toronto to Wolfville next week. My poor mother…. In retrospect, going to Acadia was the best decision I ever made.

“Through Acadia, I was able to go to India for an internship with a human rights organization where I learned about microfinance (banking for the poor).

There, the idea of combining my business education with the passion for international development hit me. Upon my return, Acadia gave me a chance to explore this idea through an Honours thesis. Another Acadia professor, Dr. Donna Sears, connected me

Oksana Kovalenko Call it karma, kismet, destiny, whatever; Oksana Kovalenko’s (’12) fortuitous discovery of Acadia was life-changing. Both she and the University came away richer for the experience.

“As I’m sure it was for many, my time at Acadia was the time of my life. I made lifelong friendships with students from various faculties and benefitted from vital mentorship with knowledgeable professors who put students before research; stimulating 40

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with a former microfinance fellow at Aga Khan Foundation Canada.

“This turned out to be critical in my subsequent career. Today, I coordinate research and product development activities for one of Aga Khan’s microcredit companies in Osh, Kyrgyzstan. We provide access to finances to 14,000 clients living in rural, mountainous areas of the country. I couldn’t be more satisfied with my job, and I have several Acadia professors to thank for that.

“My research supervisor, Dr. Kelly Dye, remains my hero, mentor, and a dear friend.

Without having much research experience in microfinance, she agreed to explore the topic with me for my Honours thesis. She supported me every step of the way, believing in me during the times when I didn’t. If it wasn’t for Kelly, I wouldn’t be where I am today.

“Dr. Michael Sheppard went out of his way to support my involvement with a Toastmasters club that I started on campus.

He provided critical advice on how to manage a team of volunteer executives and on the strategic direction of the club. Over the years, he made a great effort to become not only a professor, but a mentor and a friend.

“In my second year, Dr. Ian Hutchinson, Director of the Fred C. Manning School of Business, invited me to his office and said, ‘Oksana, you have the potential to win the Sobey Award next year. Let’s take a look at what you need to work on to make that happen.’

“Exactly a year later, I asked University President Ray Ivany if he would meet with me for a discussion about the award. I didn’t expect to get a response. He’s a president, after all. But to my great surprise, Mr. Ivany spent two hours just talking with me, providing guidance and inspiring me. In the winter of that year, the news came that I got the award. And it’s the people above that I will never be able to thank enough for it.

“So, what is Acadia to me? It is a school that supports each student to make their unique dreams come true. I recommend it for anyone who is looking for lasting inspiration from peers and professors, strong connections with people from a variety of backgrounds, meaningful engagement in extracurricular activities, and an extraordinary learning environment.”

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Aminah Gedi When Aminah Gedi (’13) was five years old, she and her family fled civil war in their native Somalia and made their way to a refugee camp in Kenya, about 90 kilometres from the border. She would remain in the camp for the next 17 years of her life. It was built to handle about 90,000 people and is now the third largest city in Kenya with over 400,000 refugees. Aminah’s story is one of courage, perseverance and the power of hope over despair.

Aminah now works in administration with a non-profit organization that helps newcomers to Canada (International Women of Saskatoon). Her future plans include completing a master’s degree in business and her dream is to own a local business based in agriculture. “I like farming a lot,” she says.

“It’s one thing I can dream about day and night.” Aminah’s family is still in Kenya, but she communicates with them freely via the Internet.

“I grew up knowing that life is all about the camp. We were the first people to arrive and there was nothing – only some community water taps. At first we didn’t have schools and no one bothered because we thought we were only going to stay there for a few weeks. We didn’t know we’d still be there 20 years after that.

“But I was a believer in having a better life, a good life. At first, when I came to the camp, I saw a lot of kids die, so I pretty much expected to die as a kid. I didn’t because I had 41

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a great grandma to take care of me and make sure I was healthy and living a good life even if it meant I was grounded from going outside most of the time because I could get infected.

There were lots of different kinds of infections striking kids and adults.

“Later, I did my high school in Kenya.

By then we had schools, because people realized they were needed. I was an active kid in school and did a good job there. I applied for WUSC (World University Service of Canada) and got approved to come to Canada, but at the airport nothing was sure.

WUSC wasn’t a big organization then. I only knew six people from my school who had ever gotten scholarships. It was like winning a lottery.

“When I was selected, I knew I’d be attending Acadia. I first came to Acadia at four o’clock in the morning after the flight from Kenya to Toronto and Toronto to Halifax.

When they drove me down to Wolfville, the first thing that struck was that the University didn’t have a fence, a big wall. I was like, ‘Is this the University?’ They said, ‘Yes.’ I just kept quiet; I didn’t say anything. I went to my residence and kept wondering why there weren’t big fences like the universities in Kenya. The next day, when I went out with the WUSC group, I still kept looking around and the houses didn’t have fences. They didn’t have any walls, fences or anything. A feeling of peace and that people were safer here came into my mind, otherwise they would have built all those walls.

“I met a friend immediately. The first person I met was Priyanka Kochhar (’12), the WUSC President at the time. And more than just being WUSC President, we became friends. In my girls’ residence, the first person I went to see was Jenny Palmer (’10), the Assistant Residence Director. She was there earlier than everybody else and I was earlier than anybody else so we got talking and she made me feel calm. Then I met the student orientation leaders and before school was even open I knew lots of people.

“I was in sociology when I started, but I didn’t want to hear any more about problems or social issues or anything like that. My attitude was, I already knew. My perspective was that I didn’t need to study issues affecting societies. I needed to get a solution.

I needed something that would give me hope

and a break from thinking or knowing or associating with that. So I took economics, history and psychology classes my first year. I tried every course that I thought I’d be interested in, that would make me feel comfortable and not emotional. At last, I came to settle on business.

“The professor who made me think I might want to take economics was Hassouna Moussa. I met him during the advisor session – we got to know each other on a personal level and he knew my background. He was that person to whom I just walked in and said, “You know, I can’t do this,’ or ‘I’m afraid of this.’ I didn’t have that feeling I had to hide something or try to figure out something and I could say exactly how I felt. He was a mentor to me. I didn’t have a business background at all and even the technologies were very strange for me. I did well in the class because I had a level of comfort that I could just walk in and ask, ‘How can I do this?’

“I was lucky to have all the best professors. I ended up in marketing in my third year because I took classes with Scott Follows, who was really great. It was just a thing of you aligning with your life and that was how I came to fall in love with marketing – because of him and because marketing is such a sweet thing. It was all just perfect. I wasn’t looking back. I thought, ‘Yeah, I got what I wanted.’

“I grew up in a camp in Kenya feeling I was a prisoner because I couldn’t go out, even on a school vacation. But at Acadia I was free. I was safe and I realized I could now live in any city, any province, go anywhere for school vacation or Christmas break. That’s not something I had even thought about.

“Acadia sponsored me when no one else would. Acadia is a home for me, the place I always miss. It’s the place where, when I have some free days, I wish it was just the other side of the road and I could walk into it.

It’s not just a school for me, it’s like a home, my home in Canada.”

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heart, and to do what I’m passionate about.

“Academics have always been very important to me and I put a lot of effort into maintaining good grades. I ended up graduating with the highest average in psychology and science overall after the Governor General’s Award winner, and I also graduated as the female undergraduate student with the highest average.

“Campus involvement was a critical component of my Acadia experience. I was the first-year representative of Chase Court and then the house president in my second year. In my third year, I was a resident assistant (RA) in Eaton/Christofor and a councillor on the Students’ Representative Council. I also helped start a club called Global Brigades that year and continued with it in my graduating year. I worked with the S.M.I.L.E. program in my fourth year and was the Graduating Class President. Additionally, I did Relay for Life every year as a team captain or participant, I was a teacher’s assistant (TA) in biology, and I was also heavily involved with the Acadia Dance Collective throughout my entire time there.

“I think Global Brigades is a fantastic organization and it has really grown in the past few years at Acadia. Shannon Boldon (’13) had started it and I immediately jumped on board. There are many different types of brigades, but I’ve been primarily involved with Medical, Dental, and Public Health Brigades.

I am planning to go back to Honduras for the fourth time next summer with Global Brigades at Memorial University.

“I’m now in my second year of the Doctor of Medicine (MD) program at Memorial University in Newfoundland. I’m considering completing a residency in family medicine because I have such a passion for global health as well as mental health. It’s a really good field because you’re able to stay current in various areas of medicine.

“I’m currently on the board of the Associated Alumni of Acadia University (AAAU) and I’m the Chair of the Young Alumni Committee (YAC). This relatively new committee exists to improve engagement of young alumni and to increase awareness of the AAAU with graduating students and young alumni. There are six people on my committee, including (former ASU President) Matt Rios (’14). We’re off to a great start this year and we’re working toward a number of

Becca Webster After four years immersed in study, campus politics and a variety of worthy causes, describing Becca Webster’s (’13) time at Acadia as “productive” would be an understatement. In fact, she was an effervescent combination of energy, commitment, and results.

“I grew up in Quispamsis, NB, and when I graduated from high school I knew I wanted to go to a smaller university like Acadia. I ended up really liking cognitive neuroscience and my favourite Acadia professor was my honours supervisor, Dr. Randy Lynn Newman. She was absolutely phenomenal and I took every course I possibly could from her. I decided I was going to do my honours research on Congenital Disorder of Glycosylation (CDG) because one of my cousins has the disorder. Dr. Newman suggested working on the study with her in her lab, which is what happened.

“She is a very strong person who is passionate about everything she does. She strongly believes in women being scientists and succeeding in their careers, and that really influenced me. Although there are a lot more women in medicine now than before, traditionally it has been a field for men only.

The same is true of science and, as a woman in a scientific academic career, sometimes Dr. Newman still sees gender differences and fights for whatever she can. Just seeing her do that in her own career gives me the passion to do similar things in mine – to always fight for what I believe in, to follow my 43

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goals.

“I really grew during my time at Acadia. I became a stronger leader and more confident in everything I did. The best friends that I have in my life are from Acadia. The professors and alumni that I’ve met have also helped to grow my love and passion for Acadia. Every time I go back, it feels like I’m going home. I know I graduated recently, but it certainly is a wonderful feeling to return.”

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“I have a special place in my heart for Sydney. We had a unique connection because we started at Acadia together.

She had the courage to pursue truth and was absolutely fearless. She was willing to debate anything and respected the quality of people’s ideas. These things are hallmarks of the serious scholar. That’s why it’s such a loss, because my crystal ball says she would have ended up being involved in important initiatives as an activist, whether in international development or issues of fairness and equity in Canada. Either that or she would have been an academic, a member of the professoriate because she had that kind of rigour to her thinking.”

Sydney’s father Barry Taylor (’80) recalls her passion for Acadia and for life. “She wasn’t at Acadia 10 minutes before she was making friends and getting involved,” he says.

“She was right at home. I always told her you can go to Acadia and really rise to the top because you have space to do that. Go in there and make it yours, and she did that.

“Now we are doing some things to bring every positive we can out of this negative event. Sydney died on a Tuesday and Acadia graduation was on Saturday. I drove up from Halifax for parents’ night at the SUB because I knew there would be people there who knew her and I felt like I needed to be there. They spontaneously put together this musical event starring the pals that she played and sang with. They invited me up to sing and play, and I did. They dubbed the event Sydstock.

They raised $1,500 for a scholarship that first night. There was such a response that I said, ‘Okay, there’s our fundraiser,’ so Homecoming weekend, on Saturday night (Oct. 19/13) at the Axe, I collected six bands. We had 600 people through and raised about $8,000. We want it to be an annual event that lasts 50 years, like the Bulmer. We want it not only to be a memorial, but also to give a platform to the talent that exists at Acadia.

“I want the person who wins the scholarship to be someone like Syd: a well-rounded person with an inquisitive nature who has a commitment to academic excellence and has enriched campus life.

When Syd came out of high school, she didn’t have the greatest of marks so she wasn’t in the top three per cent who got a free ride to wherever they wanted to go. She had to work for it, and yet her contribution was so far

Sydney Taylor Sydney Taylor (’13) arrived at Acadia with the force of a nor’easter and continued to take the campus by storm academically and socially during her four-year stay. She was a young woman of enormous gifts and a passion for life who died tragically on the cusp of untold accomplishments. However, her caring attitude and countless friendships are her legacy.

Sydney was the first person recruited by incoming President Ray Ivany in 2009. “It was her intensity that first hit me, her level of engagement,” he recalls. “She wanted to pursue a degree in journalism at another school, so what followed was a funny little dynamic. I don’t believe in a strong-arm approach, but I could see that she would be a perfect fit for Acadia. Acadia was practically stamped on her forehead. Once she came here she was like a kid in a candy store, almost giddy with the possibilities that lay in front of her. She was involved in almost every conceivable aspect of campus life as well as being plugged into the local music scene.

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beyond what most kids will make in their lives.

I know I’m her dad, but that’s what others tell me. I was a single dad and Syd and I were a team from the time she was eight years old until I lost her.”

Note: Details about the Sydney Taylor (’13) Memorial Fund and Sydstock can be found at: http://giving.acadiau.ca/sydneytaylor-13-memorial-fund.html –

international and foreign affairs. I’m hoping that in the next five or 10 years I’ll be working with the government. I’d love to be an ambassador or a diplomat. That’s where I’d like to end up.

“I’ve made several switches in my Acadia career. I started off as math major and then quickly determined that although I love it, it’s not the direction I wanted to take.

I switched at the end of my first year to a major in political science largely due to Dr. Geoffrey Whitehall. I took an introductory politics course with him and just absolutely loved it. He really opened my eyes to politics on a global rather than just a Canadian level.

“At the beginning of my second year I switched to a double major, with sociology being my primary focus due almost totally to Dr. Tony Thomson, who was my thesis supervisor. He has been the most influential professor I have met here at Acadia – just an incredible person. His depth of knowledge about anything social and political is amazing and he just inspires students to want to learn more and become involved in social ideas in general. When you think of the classic professor that really has his students’ best interests at heart, that completely describes Tony. He’s there for the students.

“I was a member of the Acadia competitive cheerleading team. We tried to make it to as many games as possible, but we also competed on a national level.

We literally spent a whole year putting together a two-and-a-half minute routine that we performed twice. It was incredibly challenging and I would hope it becomes a varsity sport at Acadia.

“Acadia is a family, the most closely knit community of people that I’ve ever encountered in my life. I always know that I can depend on someone to be there to help me out. I’ve seen first-hand how we can bond and come together as a collective over different issues. We are a family. When you develop friendships at Acadia, they are forever. Some of the people I’ve met here have been inspirations in my life and I can’t imagine my life without them. Representing them is very special.”

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Jocelyn Graham Jocelyn Graham is literally and figuratively a cheerleader for Acadia. Armed with a contagious enthusiasm for life and a daunting work ethic, the president of the Class of 2014 has a bright future ahead of her. She graduated with a double major in sociology and political science.

“I’ve been heavily involved in the Acadia Students’ Union since my first year at Acadia. I really do have a deep love for the Acadia community and especially strong feelings for my classmates. Having worked with the Students’ Union, I knew that I would be able to represent our class very well. I wanted to make sure that I would maintain contact with Acadia and the students I’m graduating with, and being Class President would help me do that.

“The key to representing the students is to be in constant contact with them as well as bringing forth my own ideas. I’m out there talking with students and getting to know them, getting their ideas on campus issues.

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most powerful impact on my professional development was the Acadia Entrepreneurship Centre. I first met Lisa Lowthers, my business counsellor, when I wanted to launch my own charity for athletes and local youth.

The following summer I worked for the Entrepreneurship Centre teaching and facilitating workshops to local business clients.

Lisa continued to teach me how to grow and plan strategically for my own business venture.

“I believe I have developed into the professional that I am today because of my interactions with the Centre and Lisa’s insightful guidance. Much of my academic success occurred after I walked through their doors.

“I would strongly recommend Acadia to students looking for a great community in which to live while they complete their academic careers. The majority of students who attend Acadia are residential students who have come from a different town, province or country. We are all seeking a home away from home and a place where we can ultimately be happy for at least four years of our lives.

“One of my fondest memories at Acadia was the time that my friends and I went sledding down the hill on campus. University administrators put up warning signs every year and ask students not to steal meal hall trays and use them as sleds, but every year the student body gets more creative. There were a lot of students sledding that evening and there was so much laughter because the ground was covered in ice. After the sleds came to a stop at the bottom of the hill, students had to crawl their way to the sidewalk because it was too difficult to walk on the ice. It was a funny sight to see.”

“Acadia is special because it is a university town. Not only is this the most beautiful campus in all of Canada, it is isolated just enough for you to focus on your studies without too much distraction and close enough to Halifax that you can make a weekend trip to party and explore. Before you graduate you will probably know all of the local business owners by name and nickname, and you won’t be able to walk into town without seeing at least five people you are friends with. The community aspect is very hard to replicate at another university.”

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Tiffany James Tiffany James graduated from Acadia in 2014 with a Bachelor of Business Administration.

Even before she was handed her degree, she was using the lessons she learned to create business opportunities for herself and others. She recently started Halifax Hair Extensions, a rapidly growing online company that markets hair extension products throughout the Maritimes. Tiffany is also doing part-time business counselling with student entrepreneurs through the Acadia Entrepreneurship Centre. “My most major accomplishment to date occurs every time I get to consult with a student entrepreneur and help them develop their ideas into real businesses,” she says.

While at Acadia, Tiffany won the Toronto Dominion National Scholarship. She also captured first place in the Innovative Ideas Competition, first place at the Wes Nicol Competition, and first place at the Pitch 101 competition.

“I was born in Ontario and always wanted to travel to another region of Canada to attend school. In my final year of high school I received basketball scholarship offers from a number of schools in the Atlantic Provinces.

I originally attended Dalhousie University for a year and then opted to make the switch to Acadia after just one visit. Acadia has a beautiful campus, the business program allowed for so much flexibility and creativity, and the community of people made me feel at home so far away from my family.

“The organization that has had the 46

Editor: Fred Sgambati (’83) Graphic Design: Cathy Little Stories written and compiled by Jim Prime (’69)

175.acadiau.ca

Photo credits: Acadia University Archives, Acadia University Communications and Marketing, Andrew Tolson (Maclean’s), Jessica Darminan (Maclean’s), Dan Callis, Sandra Symonds, Fred Sgambati