Peter Poole received a Master's degree from SFU for his thesis entitled "Organized Labour Versus the State in British Columbia." The thesis examined the British Columbia labour movement's reaction to the Social Credit government restraint program of 1983. During this period, labour organized Operation Solidarity; as well, various community groups cooperated under the umbrella of the Solidarity Coalition.
Evelyn T. and Leigh Hunt Palmer were active members of the Simon Fraser academic community from 1966 until their retirement in 2001. Leigh served as an associate professor of physics while Evelyn was a laboratory instructor in chemistry.
Both Palmers were active in university affairs and in scientific and cultural groups. They sponsored a number of seminars and lectures at SFU including the Albert Einstein Memorial Lecture Series, which they initiated on the one hundredth anniversary of the birth of Albert Einstein.
For further details of the Palmers' careers and achievements, see the autobiographical sketch in the Appendix (available only in the Archives reading room).
Non-Faculty Teachers Association
The Simon Fraser Non-Faculty Teachers' Association was formed to negotiate collective agreements between the University and non-faculty teaching staff. The Association contrasted its activities with the work of the Graduate Students' Association, which concentrated on non-contractual matters such as student housing. The executives of both organizations had members in common.
The complete history of the Non-Faculty Teachers' Association is not known. Its work was taken over by other organizations: the Graduate Student Union, formed in 1971, and the Teaching Support Staff Union, chartered in 1976.
David J. Mitchell is an author, historian, public policy analyst, former Member of the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, and Vice President, Chief Development Officer of Simon Fraser University. He is the author of W.A.C. Bennett and the Rise of British Columbia.
Born in Montreal in 1954, David J. Mitchell completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in History and Political Science at Simon Fraser University in 1975 and a Master of Arts degree in Canadian History, also at Simon Fraser University, in 1976. In addition, he has completed the Parliamentary Internship Program with the British Columbia Legislature in 1978, and attended the Banff School of Advanced Management in 1988. As of 1999, he is a Doctoral candidate in the Department of History at Simon Fraser University.
David Mitchell's diverse career path has included senior positions in both the public and private sectors. He has served as Deputy Clerk of the Saskatchewan Legislature, and as an Archivist and Editor at the Provincial Archives of British Columbia. In addition, he has held executive positions within the BC resource industries. From 1991 to 1996, David Mitchell served as an independent Member of the Legislative Assembly for West Vancouver – Garibaldi.
David Mitchell is an award-winning writer whose books are well known to British Columbians. He is the author of W.A.C. Bennett and the Rise of British Columbia (1983), considered by many to be the definitive text on W.A.C. Bennett. Bennett, the former premier of British Columbia whose Social Credit government held power between the years of 1952 and 1972, granted Mitchell a number of exclusive interviews between 1976 and 1979, forming the foundation for the subsequent book. David Mitchell is also the author of All Aboard! The Canadian Rockies by Train (1996) and Succession: The Political Reshaping of British Columbia (1987). He has also contributed various articles on public affairs and business to a number of journals, publications and newspapers including the Financial Post, The Globe and Mail, The Vancouver Sun, and Business in Vancouver. In addition, he serves as a frequent commentator on television and radio and has hosted a number of radio and television programs.
In the spring semester 1989, Kathryn McPherson was instructor for Women Studies 202, "History of Women in Canada." As part of the course work, McPherson assigned students to conduct a 2-3 hour interview with a British Columbia woman. Students were encouraged to select a woman over 60 years of age, and the interviewer was responsible for the themes covered. The interviews were recorded and deposited in the Archives.
Thomas J. (Tom) Mallinson (191--1999) was a professor of Communication Studies at Simon Fraser University. Trained as a clinical psychologist, Mallinson came to the newly-founded SFU in 1965 to head the Centre for Commuications and the Arts within the Faculty of Education. The Centre later evolved into the School for Communication.
Cliff L. Lloyd was a professor in the Department of Economics and Commerce from 1973 until his sudden death on January 24, 1977. As an experimental economist, he is remembered for his proposed Northern Stores project, an attempt to investigate demand theory (would people buy less of a product if it cost more). For a fuller appreciation of Lloyd's research, see the introductory essays by his SFU colleagues in The Collected Works of Cliff L. Lloyd (F-143-2-0-11).
Richard Lester was born in Toronto, Ontario in 1928. He came to Vancouver in 1947, eventually attending law school at the University of British Columbia. After being called to the British Columbia Bar in 1953 he practiced in Maple Ridge (then Haney). He served on the schoool board and was president of the BC School Trustees Association from 1961 to 1963.
In 1963 he was appointed to the first Board of Governors for the newly formed Simon Fraser University, a position he held until he became Chairman of the Board in the fall of 1968. He resigned this position in 1971, returning to his law practice.
Lester lived in Maple Ridge and then West Vancouver. He married Lois Audrey Jensen in 1952 and has 4 children.
Vivien Leong graduated from SFU in 1990 with a major in communication. During her time as a student, she was a member of the Recycling Group of the B.C. Public Interest Research Group, and the Communications Student Union. The B.C. PIRG recycling program was the first such effort on campus.
Michael Lebowitz, B.S. (N.Y.), M.S. (Wis.) is an emeritus Professor of Economics at Simon Fraser University. He joined SFU in 1965 as a charter faculty member in the Department of Economics and Commerce. Lebowitz was active in university affairs throughout his career.
Andrea Pinto Lebowitz came to Simon Fraser University in 1965 as a charter faculty member in the Department of English. Lebowitz participated in a number of feminist activities including the Women's Caucus. She became the first coordinator of the Women's Studies program and transferred her appointment to the Women's Studies Department in 1997.
Learning and Instructional Development Centre
The Learning and Instruction Development Centre (LIDC) was a service unit that provided in-classroom technical assistance and support; worked with SFU departments to create multimedia educational productions (photographs, sound recordings, film and video); and offered training programs in new instructional techniques and methods.
LIDC had its origins in the Audio Visual Centre established in the Library in 1967. Headed by Walter Griba from 1967 to 1993, the AV Centre became an independent unit in 1973. It was renamed the Instructional Media Centre (IMC) in 1981, then LIDC in 2001. For most of its history, the unit reported to the VP Academic portfolio, with a short period (1986-1991) during which it was part of the VP Research group.
In 2010-11, LIDC was reorganized and its two core functions were separated out to two new units: the Teaching and Learning Centre (TLC), focussed on instructional support services; and Creative Services, focussed on the creation of multimedia works supporting or highlighting SFU teaching, research, and programs. In 2014 Creative Services was renamed Creative Studio and became part of University Communications and Marketing.
Name history:
Chief officers:
Successor bodies:
For a visual representation of LIDC's administrative history data, see the appendix in the pdf finding aid for F-18, Learning Instructional Development Centre fonds.
Zoltan S. Kiss is one of the contributors to the architecture of Simon Fraser University. He was responsible for designing and building the Academic Quadrangle according to design specifications outlined by Erickson and Massey, the architects responsible for the overall design of the university. Kiss built the Academic Quadrangle in two phases, starting the first phase in 1964 and finishing the second phase in 1967.
Zoltan S. Kiss was born in Menfocsanak, Hungary in 1924. He studied at the Technical University of Hungary in Budapest during the war, and then went to Denmark to continue his studies. He later moved to Canada and attended the University of British Columbia where he completed a degree in architecture in 1951. Kiss worked for Thompson Berwick Pratt from 1953 to 1962. In 1963 Kiss submitted an entry to the contest to design the new university that would be built on top of Burnaby Mountain. His design finished in third place. According to contest parameters, the top five winners would each be given a contract to build a section of the campus according to the winner's overall design. Kiss chose the Academic Quadrangle, and incorporated his own ideas and innovations with Erickson and Massey's concept. Kiss, upon winning third place in the competition, started his own practice. His other contributions to the architecture of Simon Fraser University include the President's house, student residences, and the pub.
Hugh Johnston is professor emeritus of history at Simon Fraser University, where he taught for 37 years. His book Radical Campus: Making Simon Fraser University was published to coincide with the university's 40th anniversary (2005). He joined SFU as a faculty member in 1968 and witnessed firsthand SFU's tumultuous beginnings. At various times in his career, Johnston led the History Department as chair.
Johnston grew up in south-western Ontario. He received a B.A. from the University of Toronto and attended the Ontario College of Education. Johnston went on to receive an M.A. from the University of Western Ontario and his PhD. from King's College at the University of London.
His teaching and research interests have centered on British and South Asian migration and settlement, eighteenth century exploration of the Pacific Northwest, the history of British Columbia, and higher education in Canada. Johnston is well known as an expert in Sikhism, Sikhs in Canada, and India-China relations. From 1992 to 2001 he also served on the board of the Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute, a bi-national organization promoting scholarly exchange, and in 1995–1996 he was resident director of the institute's office in Delhi. In 2001 he was the institute's president.
During his career, Johnston wrote numerous scholarly articles and books. In 1995, with Tara Singh Bains he co-wrote The Four Quarters of the Night: The Life Journey of an Emmigrant Sikh. Other books include The Voyage of the Komagata Maru: The Sikh Challenge to Canada's Colour Bar; British Immigration Policy, 1815-1830: "Shovelling out Paupers"; and the History of Perth County to 1967 (co-authored with W. Stafford Johnston).
John Howard Society of the Lower Mainland of British Columbia
The John Howard Society of the Lower Mainland of British Columbia (JHSLM) takes its name and its spirit from the 18th century English prison reformer who observed unjust social conditions in prisons, both as a prisoner of war during the Seven Years War, and as High Sheriff of Bedfordshire, a post which included the task of inspecting local prisons. The suffering that John Howard endured and witnessed led him to become a lifelong advocate for criminal and social justice reform. Throughout his life he demonstrated a firm belief that every citizen must ultimately accept his or her individual responsibility for the criminal justice system.
The society began as the John Howard Society of British Columbia, established in Vancouver in 1931. It was the first John Howard Society in Canada. The objects of the Society as outlined in its Constitution (1932) were to seek to remove conditions which lead persons into crime; to befriend the first offender; to work for the wise and just treatment of those confirmed to penal institutions; to guide and help the mothers, wives and children of men in prison; to help discharged and paroled men and women to re-establish themselves; and to work for wise and just legislation with reference to court procedures and penal administration.
The Society has grown so that in 2020 there are over 60 John Howard Societies across Canada with a national office in Ottawa.
Throughout its history, the professional staff of the Society have been responsible for visiting regularly or being on-call to various correctional facilities throughout British Columbia. These include prisons, forest camps, community correctional centres and half-way houses. Staff offer counseling, advocacy, pre-release planning, educational guidance and develop self-help groups such as Alcoholics Anonymous and the Seventh Step Society. Staff also assist clients in the courts offering pre-sentence intervention, alternatives to incarceration, and counseling. In addition, family members are supported by the Society in acquiring life skills and attending community development programs.
Today, the JHSLM has expanded its services to assist people with complex needs achieve greater independence and value their positive contributions to society. While the JHSLM continues to advocate for and support people impacted by the criminal justice system, the organization has developed an expertise in assisting people facing multiple barriers, including those who may be experiencing homelessness, unemployment, problematic substance abuse, mental health challenges, developmental disabilities, or spectrum disorders. This is done through a range of programs that provide assistance with housing, life-skills, education, employment, and community-based services, with the goal of creating a safe, healthy and inclusive community for all.
The Society is also involved in parole, probation, bail supervision and community assessments, lessening the demands on existing facilities. In the area of education, the Society provides speakers for service clubs, churches and community groups desiring information about the criminal justice system and for furthering the cause of penal reform. In the area of advocacy, the Society's staff has been involved in preparing briefs and papers and corresponding with Government officials and others in an attempt to monitor the criminal justice system and encourage alternatives.
Organizationally, the John Howard Society of BC and the Vancouver Office of the JHS operated under the same roof and had the same executive director until 1983 when the provincial office was removed to Victoria, physically separated from any local branch office. At that time the JHS of BC and the JHS of Vancouver Island were amalgamated. The Vancouver office became the John Howard Society of the Lower Mainland of BC. There are currently seven regional John Howard Society’s in BC, and one provincial organization which now operates in the same office as the JHSLM.
Andre Isakov was a student at SFU who conducted two oral history interviews as part of an undergraduate project for the SFU Centre for Labour Studies.
W. Randle Iredale is one of the contributors to the architecture of Simon Fraser University. He and his partner, William R. Rhone, were responsible for designing and building the Science Complex according to design specifications outlined by Erickson and Massey (the architects responsible for the overall design of the university). Rhone and Iredale built the Science Complex in three phases based on preliminary drawings by Erickson and Massey, but added their own ideas and innovations to the building.
Iredale was born in Calgary, Alberta in 1929. In 1955 he received a degree in architecture from the University of British Columbia, and went to work for McCarter and Nairne until Iredale was registered in 1957. He had his own practice from 1957 to 1959, and then formed a partnership with William R. Rhone. In 1963 Rhone and Iredale submitted an entry to the contest to design the new university that would be built on top of Burnaby Mountain. Their design finished in second place. According to the contest parameters, the top five winners would each be given a contract to build a section of the campus according to the winner's overall design. Originally, Rhone and Iredale chose the Academic Quadrangle, but changed their minds and picked the Science Complex, which Chancellor Gordon Shrum had assured them would be expanded on a regular basis. The Science Complex was built in three phases between 1964 and 1971: Phase I was substantially completed by August 1, 1965, Phase II was completed September 7, 1966 and Phase III was completed in 1971. Rhone and Iredale also designed and built the student pub, circa 1970.
Fred Hope was born in Lancaster, England in 1917. He was a police officer with the London Police Service and also served in the Second World War. Hope came to Canada in 1952 working as an investigator for the Canadian Pacific in Montreal. In 1965 he joined the establishment at Simon Fraser University as the Director of Traffic and Security. He died in Sechelt in 1991.
Philip Hobler was a professor of Archaeology at Simon Fraser University (SFU), who was appointed from 1967 to 2001. For many years, he captained the SFU archaeological research vessel Sisiutil, which was launched in 1972 and used yearly for summer fieldwork until 1992. Hobler worked at various archaeological sites in Egypt, Fiji, the United States, the Northwest Territories, and on the west coast of British Columbia. His work primarily focused on archaeological sites within Nuxalk Nation territory; From 1987 to 1990, he directed the Bella Coola Villages Project, where excavations were conducted at the Nusqualst, Qwliuth, and Snxlhh village sites.
Other projects direct by Hobler took place along the Stikine River, around Moresby Island in Haida Gwaii, around northern Vancouver Island, on the Southern Gulf Islands, at Fort McLoughlin, at Barkerville’s Chinatown, and on the Snare River and Kakisa Lake in the North West Territories.
Dr. Hobler passed away on July 19, 2006.
F. Margaret Hayward was the founder and first director of the Reading and Study Centre at SFU.
She was born in Vancouver in 1919, received her BA and Social Work Diplomas from UBC in 1941 and 1943 respectively, and later earned an MA in psychology from Case Western Reserve University in 1951. Hayward worked as a social worker, counselor, and specialist in reading improvement
In 1963 Hayward wrote to Chancellor Gordon Shrum to suggest that the new university develop a Reading Service to improve the study skills of its students. Shrum and President Patrick McTaggart-Cowan agreed with her proposal and hired Hayward to be the Director of the Reading and Study Centre at SFU at the rank of Assistant Professor. The Centre was administratively placed in the Department of Psychology because Hayward believed that it was important to emphasize the academic nature of the program. Under Hayward's leadership, the Centre operated successfully for several years. When the Centre was moved to University Services in 1971, Hayward resigned her position and left the University.
Robert F. Harrison is one of the key contributors to the architecture of Simon Fraser University. His firm was responsible for designing and building the WAC Bennett library according to design specifications outlined by Erickson and Massey (the architects responsible for the overall design of the university). Harrison's firm also designed and built the Academic Services building, and made later alterations to it and to other buildings on campus.
Robert Harrison was born in Vancouver in 1925. He became a registered architect in 1954, and became the Registrar of the Architectural Institute of British Columbia in 1961. Later, Harrison was made Chair of the Institute's Examining Board (circa 1964). In 1963 Harrison submitted an entry to the contest to design the new university that would be built on top of Burnaby Mountain. His design finished 4th place. According to the contest parameters, the top five winners would each be given a contract to build a section of the campus according to the winner's overall design. Harrison took Erickson and Massey's basic outline for the library, and expanded it to reflect his own ideas. After the first phase of building, Harrison designed a new administration building in keeping with the architectural character of the university. He also made alterations to the Academic Quadrangle, designed later additions to the library, and made alterations to other buildings at Simon Fraser University.
The Halpern Family fonds consists of the personal archives of five members of the Halpern family: Simon (1865-1939) and Rosalie (1875-1951) Halpern; their daughter Fanny Halpern (1899-1952), a psychiatrist; their son George Halpern (1902-1989), a businessman and philanthropist; and his wife Ida Halpern (1910-1987), a noted ethnomusicologist.
Simon Halpern was born on June 6, 1865. He was a Surgeon-General in the Austrian Army. He died in 1939. Simon’s wife Rosalie Halpern (nee Salkind) was born on November 19, 1875, in Kremenczuk, Russia. She died in Shanghai, China, on June 26, 1951.
Fanny Gisela Halpern was born August 1, 1899 in Krakow, Poland. After graduating in medicine from the University of Vienna in 1924, she worked in various clinics in that city. Her interest in neurology and psychiatry led her to study with Professor Wagner-Jauregg, who had received the Nobel Prize for developing the malarial treatment of syphilis.
Fanny was invited to China in November 1933 to teach at the Medical College of China in Shanghai. She later taught at Shanghai’s St. John's University and Women's Christian Medical College. In 1935 she organized China's first modern psychiatric hospital, Shanghai Mercy Hospital for Nervous Diseases. She became the hospital's medical director, while at the same time serving as a consultant to several other medical institutions.
Fanny founded the first Committee on Psychiatry in China. She also established a Committee on Mental Hygiene in Shanghai, which became the Mental Hygiene Association of that city. The group consisted mainly of volunteers who worked in mental hygiene and child guidance clinics. She wrote many articles on psychiatry and neurology and presented papers at scientific meetings in Europe and China.
For much of her time in Shanghai, Fanny shared her life and home with her mother, Rosalie, who joined her there after Simon's death in 1939. Shortly after her mother passed away in 1951, Fanny moved to Vancouver to be near her brother, George, and his wife, Ida. Fanny Halpern died on June 26, 1952.
George Robert Halpern was born in Krakow, Poland on May 11, 1902. In 1936 he married Ida (nee Ruhdörfer), who was born on July 17, 1910, in Vienna, Austria, to Heinrich and Sabine Ruhdörfer.
George Halpern had a Ph.D. in chemistry, and as a research chemist, developed a number of pharmaceutical and cosmetic preparations that were manufactured in Vienna and later in Italy (1936-1937) after he established a factory there. Halpern's medicines, with such names as "gelamon" and "jonojod," were advertised for the treatment of various illnesses including asthma, rheumatism, atherosclerosis, and syphilis. Halpern's cosmetic products included skin creams and hair tonics.
Once Ida received her doctorate in music in July 1938, she and George decided to leave Vienna. That October they moved to Shanghai to be with George's sister Fanny. While there, Ida taught music history at the University of Shanghai. George considered opening a pharmaceutical factory in Shanghai as well, but instead in 1939 he and Ida left for Canada.
Arriving in Vancouver in August, the Halperns were initially placed under a deportation order. They succeeded in gaining landed immigrant status through the intervention of R.D. Murray, manager of the Chartered Bank of India, Australia, and China located in Shanghai. Murray offered financial guarantees regarding Halpern's proposed business enterprises.
George hoped to manufacture cosmetics in Vancouver, but was discouraged by George Cunningham, the owner of the city's largest drugstore chain, who told George that his stores only dealt with nationally advertised products. Instead, after inventing chocolate-covered cod-liver oil pills for children, George established his own company, Dr. G. Halpern (Vienna) Laboratories, which manufactured the product for a short time (ca. 1939-1941).
In May 1941 George joined the Canadian Fishing Company as a research chemist. His role was to develop products, such as vitamin oils and poultry feed, that could be manufactured from fish. Halpern also joined a professional association, the Chemical Institute of Canada, and became chairman of its Vancouver section. In 1953, the Canadian Fishing Company’s management curtailed its research activities, and Halpern had to seek other employment. In 1954, he opened his own business, G.R. Chemicals, Ltd., which manufactured "Ply-O-Seal" plastic patching compounds for the plywood industry.
In 1969, George sold the assets of G.R. Chemicals to the H.B. Fuller Company (Canada) Ltd. He then formed a new company, G.R. Chemicals (1969), Ltd., an investment business which owned some property and whose principal income came from interest and rent. This business existed until 1986.
Ida taught music lessons in the Halperns’ home and also lectured in music appreciation and later in ethnomusicology at UBC. In 1947 she began recording the music of First Nations peoples of the Pacific Northwest, being one of the first to study the subject. In 1948 she helped found, and was first president of, the Friends of Chamber Music in Vancouver. Ida wrote numerous articles and a few books on First Nations music, and also published some sound recordings.
Both George and Ida Halpern were noted benefactors to two of British Columbia's universities, the University of Victoria, and Simon Fraser University (SFU). They were convocation founders of SFU in 1965, and their financial support enabled the construction of the George and Ida Halpern Centre at that institution. George was present at the Halpern Centre's official opening on May 24, 1989. As well, the Halperns donated several important paintings to SFU.
Ida was awarded an honourary doctorate from SFU in 1978, and was made a Member of the Order of Canada in the same year. She continued to lecture, and to consult on First Nations music for films and other productions. In 1986, the University of Victoria also awarded her an honourary doctorate. Ida died in Vancouver on February 7, 1987.
During his later years, George played a broad role in community activities. He served as President of Brock House, a community centre for senior citizens, which he helped to establish, in 1974, in a local heritage building. He and Ida both served on its board of directors for a number of years. He was also elected a member of the Dunbar-West Point Grey-Southlands Community Resources Board in 1973. The Board promoted the general well being of seniors in the area through such projects as the seniors' housing complex at Fourth Avenue and Wallace Street. George Halpern died in Vancouver on November 28, 1989.
Iris Lillian Garland (1935-2002) taught dance from the University’s inception to her retirement as Professor Emeritus from the School for the Contemporary Arts (SCA) in 2000. As a charter member of SFU, Garland established and was involved in the growth of the contemporary dance program, which began as components of the Recreational Program in the Faculty of Education, and ultimately grew to become an academic degree program in the SCA.
Garland was born on June 23, 1935 in Chicago, Illinois. She earned a BS in 1957 at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where she majored in physical education and graduated in the top three percent of her class. She went on to earn her MSc in 1960 at the University of California at Los Angeles. Garland spent the next five years as an instructor in physical education at the University of North Dakota and then the University of Washington, before joining SFU as an instructor in the Physical Development Centre of the Faculty of Education in September 1965. It was at SFU that Garland also met her husband, James Warren Felter, who served as the first Curator/Director of the Simon Fraser Gallery.
Early on, Garland was an outspoken supporter of the creation of an academic unit offering credit courses and programs in the fine and performing arts at SFU. Meanwhile, she grew the contemporary dance program from its humble beginnings within the Faculty of Education into workshops and intensives offered through Kinesiology and a fledgling Centre for Communications and the Arts, bolstered by guest performers and artists in residence as instructors. With the establishment of the Centre for the Arts in 1975, dance was ultimately elevated from non-credit workshops to credit courses alongside those in film, music, theatre, visual arts, and art history. Garland’s continued efforts helped to establish an academic dance minor program in 1976, and a dance major program by 1980. After the Centre became the School for the Contemporary Arts in 1989, dance became an academic BFA degree program and part of an interdisciplinary MFA offered by the SCA.
Throughout her career, Garland continued her dance education, pursuing studies in modern, dance notation, and a voice intensive in theatre. She also studied ballet under Mary Ann Wells in Seattle and Mara McBirney in Vancouver. In 1983, at the University of Washington, she became a Certified Movement Analyst, a program incorporating Laban Movement Analysis, which Garland went on to feature in her teaching. A significant contribution to her teaching was the creation of the unique telelearning course, “Dancing in Cyberspace: Creating with the Virtual Body,” which she co-developed in the 1990s with Lisa Marie Naugle, a PhD student from New York University. The course was offered through SFU's Centre for Distance Education and utilized Life Forms, a software program developed by Dr. Thomas W. Calvert in the SFU Computing Science Department. Life Forms allowed for the study and choreography of animated human figures in dance and movement. The course was popular with distant education SFU students, as well as national and international learners. In 1998, Garland was invited to present “New Technologies for Choreographers: Life Forms Workshop and Seminar” to professional choreographers in Sydney, Australia.
Garland was popular with her superiors, colleagues, and students alike, and commended often for her hard work and dedication not only to the University, but also to the dance community as a whole both locally and nationally. In 1991, she was awarded SFU Teacher of the Year. In addition to her teaching, Garland served on multiple departmental and university committees throughout her SFU career. Within the dance community, Garland participated as an independent choreographer and performer at various dance festivals and concerts, first in the 1970s through the Burnaby Mountain Dance Company, which was originally formed with SFU dancers in 1973. She later showcased her work through the Off-Centre Dance Company, which began in 1985 under the direction of various SFU dance faculty and later absorbed into the SFU dance program to provide advanced students an opportunity to be part of an ensemble and perform publicly. From the late 1980s into the 1990s, Garland featured her work at Vancouver’s Dancing on the Edge Festival of Contemporary Dance, an event which continues today. At the national level, Garland was heavily involved with the Dance in Canada Association as a member of the board in the 1970s and as a conference organizer into the 1980s. Her dedication to the Association earned her an Outstanding Service Award in 1985.
In addition to her main research interests in early modern dance history, dance and technology, and dance analysis and choreography, Garland developed an interest in Spanish dancer Tórtola Valencia (1882-1955). She began researching the life of this early modern dancer in earnest, travelling to Spain to conduct further study, and presenting several conference papers on the topic in the 1990s. Garland had begun writing a biography of Tórtola Valencia when she was diagnosed with cancer in early 2002. She passed away in North Vancouver, BC, on October 29, 2002.
Fraser Valley University Society
The Fraser Valley University Society was established on February 5, 1991. Founding members of the Society included members of several Canadian Federation of University Women's clubs, particularly Karen Yong and Sharon Shilliday of the Delta University Women's Club; members of the Fraser Valley Real Estate Board; as well as individuals and representatives of organizations from communities throughout the Fraser Valley. Many of these individuals had been involved in a predecessor group, the Fraser South University Society, which had been established by Yong and Shilliday in November 1990.
The Society's mandate was to "ensure the development of appropriate legislation creating a new university in the Fraser Valley." The main purposes of the Society were: to further the development of university education in the Fraser Valley by encouraging the Provincial Government to legislate the establishment of an independent, degree-granting institution; to foster public education initiatives promoting the social, economic and cultural value of a university; to actively pursue excellence in university education for all communities in the Fraser Valley; and to improve access to university education.
The Society was headed by an elected Board of Directors. The Board of Directors appointed the following officer positions: President, Vice-President, Treasurer, and Secretary. Committees, headed by a Chair, were created to carry out the objectives of the Society. The original five committees of the society were the Public Relations Committee, Community Relations Committee, Fundraising Committee, Membership Committee, and the Government Committee. The first President of the Society was Karen Yong. She was succeeded in 1993 by Robert (Bob) Lowe, who remained President until the Society's dissolution. At its height, membership in the Society was over 1,100 members.
The Society enlisted the assistance of local government and community organizations in its efforts. From its inception, the Society received financial and other support, including office space in Surrey, from the Fraser Valley Real Estate Board. Other funds were obtained through government grant applications, membership fees, donations, and fundraising events. The Society also concentrated on promotional and community relations activities. Members collected over 7,000 petition signatures, set up information kiosks in malls and at public events, made presentations to local groups, solicited media coverage of Society events and activities, and distributed promotional material. The Society created and collaborated on several reports concerning the need for post-secondary education in the Fraser Valley, and established relationships with members of local and provincial governments.
In 1994 the Society began to place increased pressure on the Provincial Government and, after many meetings and much correspondence, Premier Mike Harcourt announced in February 1995 his government's support for the creation of a Technical University in the Fraser Valley (the Technical University of British Columbia). In May 1995 Society Board member Sharon Shilliday was appointed to the Interim Planning Council for the University; the Council became part of the Technical University Society of British Columbia when it was registered on August 10, 1995.
As a result of the Government's commitment to the creation of a new university, the Society evolved into a public foundation responsible for raising funds for the Technical University of British Columbia and its students. The Society's constitution was amended in August 1996 to reflect this change in mandate. In February 1998, a unanimous decision was made to dissolve the Society and transfer its fundraising responsibilities, as well as accumulated funds, assets, and records to the Technical University of British Columbia. Fundraising responsibilities were assumed by the University's new Vice-President External Affairs and Research. At an extraordinary meeting of the Society on April 28, 1998, the Society was dissolved.
Thelma Finlayson is a distinguished entomologist who served as a professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Simon Fraser University from 1967 until her retirement in 1979. Her research interests have centered on the classification of immature stages of insect parasites of forest and agricultural pests. Since 1979 she has been Professor Emerita and continues to be actively involved with the university, contributing time, counsel and private funds. The university established the Thelma Finlayson Society in 1989 in honour of her many contributions to SFU.
John Ellis came to SFU as a charter faculty member in the Faculty of Education. He received his Ed.D degree from the University of California at Berkeley and had a twenty-year career in public education before joining the University to direct the Professional Foundations Program. He served as temporary acting president of SFU for four days following the resignation of Patrick McTaggart-Cowan in May 1968.
In November of that year, a series of protests against Simon Fraser University's admissions policies and inconsistent accreditation for courses taken at other institutions culminated in a 65 hour "sit-in" in the University Administration Offices. The University Senate responded by charging Professor Ellis with the responsibility of "the development of a definitive and comprehensive admissions and standings policy in consultation with an advisory committee..." (Simon Fraser University Senate. Minutes of Meeting held November 20, 1968. Although there was an "advisory committee" named by Senate, the final report is the product of Dr. Ellis' research, reflection and writing. Admissions and Standards: A Suggested Policy was released late March 1969. In June 1969, Senate adopted the recommendations of the report with only minor revisions. The admissions controversy was effectively defused.
The Ellis Report as it was re-titled by the university community, was widely applauded in post-secondary education circles in British Columbia, and played an important role in the development of Simon Fraser University.
Robert Dunham (1939-1990) was a professor of English at Simon Fraser University. His specialty was the literature of the Romantic Period. A graduate of Stanford University, Dunham joined SFU in 1966. He was a gifted teacher who won the University's excellence in teaching award in 1986 as well as the 3M Fellowship in 1988, a national award which recognized excellence in teaching and educational leadership.