After 10 years, Robert MacKinnon will be retiring as vice-president of the Saint John campus at the end of this month. He reflects on his time as vice-president and shares his thoughts on the future of the campus.
Contributing to a stellar learning culture and environment at UNB Saint John in a number of different ways has been, I believe, my biggest achievement as vice-president Saint John. Establishing the Promise Partnership program, which now has a robust high school tutoring program, with more than 100 high school students participating, as well as a mentoring program supported by UNB Saint John student volunteers at Hazen White-St. Francis School, is one of the initiatives that, as vice-president Saint John, I am extremely proud of. This touches so many lives and has created many positive experiential learning opportunities for our UNB Saint John students.
The successful completion of the Hans W. Klohn Commons building, which created a fabulous state of the art learning space for our students, is another. And, the development of partner relationships with Dalhousie Medicine New Brunswick and the New Brunswick Community College, who have co-located their programs on our campus during my term as vice-president Saint John, has laid the foundations for new research and teaching opportunities in a variety of health-related areas in the future, in collaboration with the Saint John Regional Hospital located close by.
Our deliberate focus on making improvements to our buildings and teaching spaces on campus every year has resulted in improved classrooms, more accessible washrooms and better public and learning spaces for our students. I believe connections between the campus and community have increased during my term as vice-president. It makes me very proud to see many how members of our UNB Saint John academic community are involved in Saint John and provincial affairs. With the recent completion of an academic planning process at UNB, the Saint John campus now has an academic plan that can help guide new future academic initiatives.
I would have liked to complete the renovation of, or rebuild of, the former Ward Chipman Library Building. Since the completion of the Hans W. Klohn Commons building, we have developed detailed plans for the former library building, which occupies prime real estate on campus. The potential for this space to be, yet again, another transformational research and teaching space for UNB is huge! I’ll look forward to seeing what happens on this site in the near future.
I would have liked to have been able to maintain my externally funded-research program during my tenure as vice-president. Because I was able to maintain this when I was dean of arts, I was able to create many research opportunities for our students, both undergraduates and graduates, and I was very proud to be able to do so.
I have many favourite memories. Two that stand out, in particular, are participating in the campus’ 50th anniversary celebrations in 2014-15, with many former students coming back to campus to share their memories of their years at UNB Saint John; and seeing the sculpture, entitled First Day, by Jhon Gogaberishvili (Johnny G) go up in a prominent location in our quad.
My advice to vice-president Hauf is to become engaged in your new community and continue to promote, and enhance, the unique characteristics of the Saint John campus that have made it such a special place for many, including students, faculty, staff, alumni, members of the Saint John community, as well as university administrators.
I’m looking forward to getting back to some research projects that were placed on the back burner during my tenure as vice-president, spending more time with my family, especially our twin grandsons, and having a slightly slower day-to-day pace, which will allow me time to think more about what’s next.
Photo caption: UNB President Eddy Campbell and Dr. MacKinnon
