The fall semester kicked off with the largest incoming class since the double cohort of 2003.  The sharp increase in BU’s student population presented some issues for the administration, namely, where to situate the incoming class, which had swelled to numbers that could barely be accommodated by the available rooms in residences.

The problem was quickly rectified, but the rise in Bishop’s population gave the university some other issues to consider. Chiefly, if this upward trend were to continue, would Bishop’s be able to uphold the intimate classroom environment it is notorious for?  This, among other issues, are still being weighed by the administration and will continue to be over the coming years.=

In October, the Bishop’s community experienced the worst flood in recent memory.  As the waters of the mighty Massawippi rose, inundating Lennoxville, campus was forced to shut down and the ensuing damage left several Bishop’s students homeless for weeks after their homes had been contaminated by sewer water.  Many of the students found temporary lodging in Bishop’s residence and in the Motel Lennoxville until their houses had been properly cleaned.

The most severe damage on campus was in Centennial Theater.  As sewage water poured into the basement, props, scenery and other Drama Department materials were destroyed.   Power was turned off for the following two weeks as the restoration went on which continued well into November.

Not all news was bad for Bishop’s in October as our beloved school took top marks in the Globe and Mail’s Canadian Campus Survey.  Bishop’s finished first in seven categories among schools of a comparable size.  And of the fifty-nine Canadian schools surveyed, Bishop’s ranked first when students were asked, “Academically, is your university nurturing and supportive?”

As the fall semester came to a close, the SRC made headlines with the firing of Gait Manager Nathaniel Thomas and one of the bartenders over a controversial fundraiser.

In January, Bishop’s welcomed a new Dean of Student Affairs: Bishop’s graduate Jackie Bailey who replaced outgoing Dean, Bruce Stevenson.  Stevenson retired a 35-year career at Bishop’s but agreed to stay on for the fall semester until Bailey arrived in town.

After a quiet start to the winter semester, students across Quebec expressed their discontent with the Provincial Government’s plan to raise university tuition between 2012-15.  Principals from across the province called for an annual increase of $500 over the period to ensure that the standard Quebec’s post-secondary education remained on par with other Canadian institutions.  When the Quebec government issued its budget in late March, tuition was scheduled to rise $325 per year for the next five years.

Finally, on March 14, Bishop’s officially reopened the newly renovated Johnson laboratories.  The building had been fully functional since the start of the winter semester, however, the university held an official re-opening with a press conference in which Senator Pierre-Hughes Boisvenu and Quebec Minister of International Affairs, Monique Gagnon-Tremblay, were present.  The $4.4-million project was funded by the federal and provincial governments.

As one of the students on campus who buys Tim Hortons coffee, I sometimes contemplate the strategy behind this promotion and am blown away by how simple yet effective the whole campaign really is.

The Roll up the Rim contest comes in as an added incentive that students just cannot pass up. Not only is rolling up the rim in itself pretty amusing, but as an added bonus you may just end up winning one of the big prizes such as a car, barbeque or an HD TV. While the chances of winning one of the big prizes are slim, there are plenty of other smaller prizes to get you hooked, such as a free coffee or donut.

In 2010, Tim Hortons advertised their odds on winning as 1 in 9; however in 2011 they have increased their odds of winning all the way up to 1 in 6! This increase in odds definitely attracts new customers and develops customer loyalty – at the very least for the duration of the contest.

While the odds are in your favour to actually win something, some people on campus have been getting lucky or unlucky streaks. When talking to some of the students waiting for their daily coffee, one said that she was on her fifth win in a row, while I have had at least 20 coffees with no winnings in sight.

As of March 26th, two Toyota Matrix, six TV’s, twenty Barbeques and three hundred and twenty-nine one hundred dollar Tim’s cards have been won within Quebec. While there has not been any news of someone winning big at Tim Hortons within Bishop’s University, there have been plenty of smaller prizes being claimed by students.

In 2010, there was a sales boom during the annual contest that helped the chain’s quarterly revenue rise by 4.8 percent. To stress the success of this campaign even more, there was also an episode on Dragon’s Den in which someone invented the Rimroller.

Consumers will keep coming back for more to increase their chances to win and at the same time, it creates a fun experience for both first time and long time customers alike. It’s a contest that markets itself through word of mouth and that’s got everyone excited to roll up the rim to hopefully win! At the same time, don’t forget to properly put the losing cups in the garbage and the plastic covers in the recycling bin!

The renovations to the labs, which were completed earlier this semester, were funded by equal donations of $2.2 million by the provincial and federal governments through the Canada-Quebec Knowledge Infrastructure Program Agreement. The program is aimed at improving college and university research facilities and to stimulate economic activity.

Bishop’s Principal, Michael Goldbloom, noted in a press release that, “Thanks to this investment on the part of both governments, students now have access to modern, high-quality laboratories, helping to prepare them for graduate studies and their careers.

“It is an investment in today’s students, who will become tomorrow’s nurses, doctors, researchers and other professionals.”

The labs first opened in 1965 and had not undergone significant renovations since.  They now meet current education and safety requirements, including today’s building and fire codes and improvements have been made to ventilation and energy efficiency.

Over $600,000 has been invested in new laboratory equipment, partly from contributions made by individual and corporate donors like Bristol-Myers Squibb and Merck Frosst.

Present at the re-opening were Senator Pierre-Hughes Boisvenu, representing the Minister of state for Science and Technology, Gary Goodyear, and Member of the National Assembly, Monique Gagnon-Tremblay representing the Minister of Education, Recreation and Sports, Line Beauchamp.

“The Quebec government is very proud to support the growth of universities and assist them in carrying out their essential mission,” stated Gagnon-Tremblay.  “Thanks to this major project, its students and staff now have an optimal learning and working environment, with state-of-the-art technology that increases the potential for scientific innovation by the university’s researchers…”

The new labs are being used to attract prospective students to Bishop’s interested in studying science.  VP Academic Michael Childs noted that there has been an impressive increase in the number of applications to Natural Science programs at Bishop’s.  According to Childs, “… the last count in early March showed that applications in Natural Sciences are up 36% over last year, which is a remarkable statistic.”

He also noted that, “The new labs are of course part of the recruitment message, and I also think that word of mouth from current students may be having an effect.”

This project will bring our facilities up to par with current standards and will include a new double gym and an 800 seat arena that will now be attached to the complex, opposed to being a separate facility located behind the Molson fine arts building.

The upgrades are sure to improve the overall appeal of Bishop’s to prospective students and have been associated with the other major renovation projects the school is undergoing, which include the revamp of the Johnson science building as well as the geothermal heating project.

However, at the Board of Governors meeting on January 28, 2011, Bishop’s Principal Michael Goldbloom announced that the funds from the federal and provincial governments for the Sports Plex renovation have yet to be released to the school.

Goldbloom reassured The Campus that this was nothing to be concerned about, saying we are simply waiting for the final approval from the federal government and he is confident that we will receive approval shortly.  He explained that the process has been slowed but that he has been told this slowing has nothing to do with the Bishop’s project but rather the larger program under which the funding is granted.  Our project has already gone through the first two stages of approval and there is no reason to believe we will not get this final approval.

When the funding and project were announced back in September of 2009, the school was confident that the renovation would be complete sometime in 2012 and have no effect on the 2013 Canada Games in Sherbrooke in which the Bishop’s campus will be the site of some of the events.

With this delay in the release of the majority of the funds from the government, Goldbloom does not believe it will be possible to have the entire project completed by that time.  This will not affect our participation in the 2013 Canada Games however; it simply means the project will have to be worked around them.

Bishop’s won the bid to be the athlete’s village for the 2013 Canada Games based on the existing facilities, which was not contingent on the upgrade.  Goldbloom acknowledged that it would have been ideal to have the new facilities in place for the Games but that this is not necessary.  He also explained how the project will still be able to continue leading up to and during the Games, as it has many parts that can be underway which will have no relation to the facilities needed for the events.

He stressed the fact that there is no real time constraint on the renovation and that the most important thing is that it is done properly and will be a proud addition to Bishop’s for the future.

Goldbloom is confident that the Sports Plex renovation will add a great deal to the enjoyment of the Bishop’s population as a whole, as it will allow much greater opportunities for activities like intramural sports.  He told the Campus that he would be very happy to see hockey become a bigger part of the school’s sports program, particularly the possibility of an intercollegiate women’s hockey team.  He also revealed that there has been an expressed interest from some alumni to aid in the re-launch of our hockey program and that this issue will be looked at seriously in the future.

Capturing the presidency was the unopposed Taylor Johnston, the current VP student Affairs.
VP Social went to Doug Jarvis and VP Student Affairs to Adam Peabody. Justin McCarthy won
VP Academic over Jordan Sanchez in the only contended race for a position on the executive.

McCarthy received 355 votes to Sanchez’s 157 in an election that saw 530 of 2102 eligible votes
cast, roughly 26 percent. Johnston received 482 votes and both Jarvis and Peabody claimed 484.
About 20 of the ballots were spoiled.

To run a successful election, 10 percent of the student population has to cast its ballot,
which was more than doubled in this case but the percentage was lower than last year’s 39.1
percent.

The drop in voter turnout didn’t necessarily indicate a decline student voting. SRC Chief
Returning Officer, Laurie Fletcher, told The Campus that because of the rise in Bishop’s student
population from last year, the number of students who voted could comparatively be about the
same from last year. However, Fletcher said that has not yet been determined.

Whether you see it as necessary or not, a rise in Quebec tuition is coming. Principals from universities across Quebec are urging for a $1,500 rise in tuition fees between 2012 and 2015.

The reason for the hike is to keep tuition on par with the rise in the cost of living, which comparatively has students paying in tuition what Quebec students paid in 1969.

In recent years, the low tuition rates have seen universities in the province fall behind their counterparts across the country, and a study conducted by the Conférence des recteurs et des principaux des universités du Québec (CREPUQ) found that the rise in fees is needed if Quebec universities are to catch up.

Bishop’s Principal, Michael Goldbloom, told The Campus that Quebec tuition rates have largely been frozen since 1969 with only a few exceptions.  Before, it wasn’t an alarming issue because Quebec universities could count on substantial funding from the government to pick up the slack.

That’s no longer the case and in 2002, it is estimated that universities in the province needed an extra $375 million in funding to be on par with other Canadian schools; by 2008, that figure had risen to $620 million.

Currently, Bishop’s has close to 868 Quebec students accounting for 43% of the student body, which will translate into a gross of close to $1.3 million by the end of the three-year increase in 2015.   However, 25% of the total revenue will go towards student bursaries, leaving the university with about $1 million in revenue.

The first priority for the increased revenue, according to Goldbloom for Bishop’s administration and faculty, is to address the issue of size of some classes which are becoming too large.  “It is vital that we deliver on our promise of small classes so that the Bishop’s intimate atmosphere will be there,” Goldbloom said.

Another concern is class availability and the ability to offer a broader range of courses, which falls second after class size on a laundry list of other issues the administration would like to address with increased revenue.

A big part of maintaining small class sizes and broad course availability is bringing on more faculty members. This also means not losing professors to other institutions by offering competitive salaries.

Goldbloom is confident that the school has significantly closed the gulf with the last collective agreement, but this is not the consensus at the school and the increase in revenue from the tuition hike could help to cement this.

SRC VP Academic, Elizabeth Robichaud, asserted, “There [is] no debate that Quebec universities are chronically underfunded as opposed to the rest of the country.”

SRC President, Paige Johnson, echoed Robichaud’s remarks and voiced concern that if the rise in tuition does not occur, the outlook for the future of post-secondary education is bleak.

“Universities in Quebec are … underfunded and for post-secondary education institutions to survive, the necessary steps need to be taken,” she said.

Not all people are seeing the necessity of a tuition increase.  Thousands of Quebec students protested the meeting of government and university leaders in Quebec City on December 6th.

Isabelle Desmarais, a fourth year political studies student at Bishop’s, is against the rise in tuition.  Her main concern is that after being accustomed to paying such accommodating fees, a rise will leave Quebec students unable to afford their degrees or feeling less compelled to embark on a post-secondary education.

“We have been accustomed to paying these fees and if they go up, fewer students will be able to finish their degrees which could lead to bigger social issues down the road, like unemployment,” Desmarais said.

Robichaud recognized concerns similar to that of Desmarais’, pointing out that, “An increase is not meant to discourage students from gaining a university education due to financial reasons. One of the main topics of discussion at the … Rencontre des partenaires de l’éducation in Quebec City was how to improve the accessibility of post-secondary education.”

There is an aura of passion that seems manifests itself in sport. We see it everywhere. It’s found in a school gymnasium where a basketball athlete calmly sinks one free throw after another, or at a baseball diamond, where players work together to turn flawlessly executed double plays; it is also found in the student athlete.

Meet Harrison Maloney. As a varsity football player for the Bishop’s Gaiters, he is hardly foreign to passion. The defensive back is a Quebec All Star and second-team All Canadian. His main job? “Cover your guy, and try to make a play on the ball,” Maloney says. “If the play is a run, get off your blocks,” he explains.

It may seem simple enough, but what many of us do not always grasp is the amount of work ethic and dedication that goes on beyond the football field. The hard-hitting and brutality on the field is one thing; the preparation is another.

“A lot of people don’t realize how much time we put into it… it’s basically like a full time job.”

Just as with any profession, playing football comes with numerous responsibilities: practices, fitness training, studying film, and special teams meetings, among other things. Dedication translates into results. Have they been there for football? Absolutely. The team has graced the playoffs in two of the past three seasons and while Coach Blugh has molded these athletes so successfully, they’ve pushed on professionally in the CFL while beginning to knock on the door of the NFL as well. There is always work to be done though. “We’re going in the right direction… but we need make that next step,” Maloney remarks. The next step is advancing further in the playoffs. However, when you’re competing against top caliber teams like the Vanier Cup champion Laval Rouge et Or, nothing comes easy.

“I think we might be the most physically talented team in Canada… but we need to be more poised.” Poise means limiting mistakes, Maloney explains, and establishing a deeper mental focus.

Beyond the passion found in Maloney’s character, embedded is the pride. Competing in a small school environment, their team stays close together and is driven to win for Bishop’s. If there is one distinctive edge in being a student athlete with a small school size, it is the tight-knit factor. You’re not a complete team until those friendships are established.

“I know some of the guys I met just even in my first year who left… they’re all across Canada and I still talk to them,” Maloney reflects.

An unshakeable team has all the potential to thrive within a system managed by Coach Blugh, with improved strength and conditioning from Coach Eric Joly. The answer to the call awaits 2011’s season.

Meet Mike Dube. His craft? The game of lacrosse. Dube has not so quietly led the Bishop’s Gaiters in goals scored the past three seasons and collected hardware this year as Most Valuable Player and Most Valuable Attack man. On the surface, he and Harrison Maloney have a lot of common: the passion, dedication, and success in their sport. The difference? Dube plays for a club team. What does this mean for Dube? He must pay his own way to play.

While struggles have been prevalent among other athletic programs at Bishop’s, lacrosse has remained consistent, winning records in ten straight seasons, and a stifling 8-2 regular season showing in 2010. While they suffered a semi-finals loss in the playoffs to McMaster this year, significant progress was made.

They revamped their program, putting more emphasis on fitness as a team.

“It used to be that only a few guys would go to the gym”, explains Dube. “Now everyone has to be there, at least four or five times a week.”

The results have shown. With improved endurance on the field that comes from extensive fitness training and hard practices, the lacrosse squad now has the ability to wear down their opponents. “We may not always be the most talented team in the league… but we have the ability to outwork the other guys.”

Often, the extra drive is needed in order to succeed. As a club team, lacrosse misses out on many of the privileges provided to varsity athletics. The cost of equipment is one factor, but the biggest challenge comes from travelling for games on the road.

“A lot of other teams in the league are varsity… so other teams can travel as a team, whereas, sometimes we have to go up in vans separately.”

While this disparity exists, lacrosse simply uses it as fuel to add to the fire. They remain tight knit, work their tails off, and play to win. “On the field we’re willing to battle for each other,” Dube says bluntly.

The only thing that might be separating them from varsity status is that championship.

Dube understands where they are, and where they need to be. “Our team goal the whole way was to win… and we came up a little short.” Dube himself has one more season with his team to prove their worth.

While both Mike Dube and Harrison Maloney continue driving forward in different athletic programs, they both know who they play for: Bishop’s University. To put your heart and soul into battle each day is a testament to dedication; to do it for your school is a show of pride.

As Harrison Maloney told me: “That’s what’s special about sports.”

The widely known National Geographic photographer and anthropologist Wade Davis graced Bishops University with his exotic stories and enlightening knowledge. His photographs and inspiring tales captured the audience in Bandeen Hall.

Along with his success in photography and anthropology, Wade is also known as an ethnologist, author and filmmaker. He graduated from Harvard University with a degree in biology and anthropology as well as a PhD in ethnology. Following his education, Wade spent three years as a plant explorer in the Amazon, living with 15 different ethnic groups. He is most recently known for his 2009 CBC Massey Lectures called The Wayfinders.

His work is focused specifically on the indigenous cultures around the world. He studies their belief systems, values and ethnicity that still lingers across the world to this day. It has taken him from the Arctic to the Amazon, and from day to day he learns more about the cultures of the world and how they keep their spirit alive.

His devotion to his work is obvious as Wade speaks about the importance of ancient wisdom and keeping the old ways alive. His photos lit up the darkened room with colors of different landscapes and people that allowed the audience to have a glimpse into his life.

Our planet is a web of life; it is filled with various cultures and indigenous people as well as holding 7000 different languages across the globe. Wade explained that we were all cut from the same “cultural cloth”, yet it would be impossible to settle amongst one language or one culture. We need diversity.

He explained how the people he came across in the Amazon are still keeping their moral and ethnic values alive. They measure their wealth by their social status, for there is no need for material values. Comparing this to the North American way of life is beyond.

“Culture doesn’t die. Culture can be transformed” were powerful words that Wade left with the audience. The amount of experiences and knowledge he shared with Bishops is overwhelming, but he did manage to leave us with the idea that we should embrace the different people and lands across the world. Every part of our planet should be valued and culture exists within every human being on it.

Bishop’s students gave their university top marks in a slew of categories in the 2011 Canadian University Report, released on October 25 by the Globe and Mail.

Bishop’s finished first in seven of the 17 categories: most satisfied students, studen-faculty interaction, quality of teaching, class size, campus technology, campus atmosphere, and satisfaction with town/city.

In a new a portion of the survey that measures the ‘personality’ of the university, students were asked, “Academically, is your university nurturing and supportive?”

Bishop’s finished first out of the fifty-nine universities included in the report.

One day after the report was released, Principal Michael Goldbloom sent an email out to Bishop’s students to report the good news.

Goldbloom’s email also highlighted some of the areas where Bishop’s didn’t do so well, coupled with a pledge to work towards bettering Bishop’s marks in these areas.

“I am … writing to assure you that the University will continue to work hard on the areas in which we did not receive top grades,” the principal wrote.

These areas include food services, career preparation and recreation/athletics.

With regard to food services, Bishop’s improved from a D to a C-, putting it in sixth place in the ‘Very Small’ category.

In the email Goldbloom mentioned that he and SRC President, Paige Johnson, would be accompanying Deb Langford, Director of Residence & Conference Services, on a tour of New England schools which receive top marks for food services to see which practices could be implemented at Bishop’s in the future.

As far as career preparation goes, Bishop’s improved from a B- to a B (3rd place).  Goldbloom’s email stated that, “We will continue to focus on this area, both in terms of enhancing awareness of our services and increasing their range and quality.

“One of our initiatives in this area will be the Building on a Bishop’s Degree Bootcamp which will [be] held on January 7 & 8, 2011.”

Goldbloom reported that for the Recreation/Athletics category Bishop’s placed 4th with a B+ rating and stated that he hoped the $30 million renovation and expansion to the Plex “… will merit an improved grade in the future.”

The survey, which is in its ninth year, breaks schools down into four groups: large (enrollment over 22,000), medium (12,000 – 22,000), small (4,000 – 12, 000) and very small (under 4,000).

This year, the Canadian University Report surveyed the opinion of more than 35,000 current undergraduate students from fifty-nine universities across the country, deriving its answers from approximately 100 questions.

The report noted that a continuing trend in the survey is that undergrads from small universities report higher levels of satisfaction than their counterparts at large schools.

It is not always, as the report finds, in areas where one would expect a smaller school to do better like in the “education” and “atmosphere” categories.  This is to be expected because in the former, there are smaller class sizes and in the latter, a stronger school spirit.

An example of smaller universities unexpectedly outstripping large schools is in the “libraries” category.

This suggests, that even though larger universities have far more resources and money to pour into their libraries, at the undergraduate level, “libraries are (more than anything else) places for quiet and/or collaborative study,” which is certainly not uncommon at Bishop’s.

The report did mention that large universities had the advantage when it came to technology and career preparation, areas, as previously mentioned, in which Bishop’s received a top score in its category (technology) and a mediocre score (career preparation).

It’s been roughly two years since Michael Goldbloom was installed as Principal of Bishop’s University.  His coming was a welcome sign of change to the university administration after a disorderly period causing uncertainty in its future.

After two years on the job, Goldbloom sat down with The Campus to reflect on his time here and discuss his vision for the school’s future.

Bishop’s was suffering serious financial and administrative problems.  During the spring of 2007, there was a staff strike and faculty lockout over pension agreements and the Quebec government was withholding $8 million in annual grant money because of the deficit the school was running with no recovery plan.

Further concern was the steep decline in enrollment in September of 2007, down 14%, with Bishop’s full time student population numbered 1740.  Had this trend continued, Goldbloom noted, “the viability of the school in jeopardy.”

Goldbloom only spoke broadly about the state of Bishop’s before his time and did not point any fingers seeing it as not “useful or necessary to go into great detail about the challenges, conflicts and problems that Bishop’s had experienced in the previous couple of years.” He felt that when he arrived in the August of 2008 that the school needed to turn forward and that looking back was not going to be important.

He noted that before he had arrived that the Bishop’s community had already pulled together, forming a “new nucleus of academic leadership” to put Bishop’s on the right path and “dig it out of the hole it had dug.”

The problems that needing to be addressed were self-evident and that’s what his first initiatives were built on.  First and foremost the decline in enrollment had to be tackled or else “nothing else was going to matter.”

The school went about reversing the trend by focusing on three things: ambition, confidence and alignment.  When it comes to alignment, Goldbloom commented that because Bishop’s is such a small school it can get itself into trouble quickly and get itself out of trouble quickly, and it is critical for everyone to be working together to make things work.  He likened the school to a scull “where, if everyone is rowing in the same direction things run smoothly, but if they’re not, it’s disastrous.”

In order to remedy the fall in enrollment, the school needed to hire someone with real expertise in enrollment management.  He noted that recruiting students was a more complex issue than it was before because of the way electronic media had evolved, the different analyses and rankings done and that the process on the whole had become far more sophisticated which Bishop’s had not caught up with.  Enter Jock Phippin, a recruitment professional with extensive experience, who helped revitalize the way Bishop’s goes about attracting new students.  Goldbloom regards hiring Phippin as one of the best decisions he’s made in his two years at Bishop’s.

Students, professors and alumni were also asked to come on board with helping with recruitment.  In December 2008, many BU students participated in the “Bishop’s goes home” program in which a number of students went back to their high schools and CEGEPs over the winter break to talk about their Bishop’s experience and what it meant to them.  A number of professors helped out by giving guest lectures and speaking with prospective students about what their academic life at the university would be like.  Bishop’s alumni also helped get the word out about the school.

It was from this consolidation of efforts that Goldbloom attributes to the revitalization of Bishop’s enrollment: “a single minded focus of the whole community we understand this is an absolute priority.  We went from being into a downward spiral into a virtuous circle where more good things that happen, the more students want to come, and the more students that come the more good things can start to happen on campus, [then] we start[ed] to feel more confident and more ambitious.”

It was so critical to boost enrollment because that’s is where the bulk of Bishop’s revenue comes from and Goldbloom said, “We live or die on the number of students coming to Bishop’s.” The goal was to get to 2200 full time students which was accomplished this September.

In addition to boosting enrollment, it was crucial to get Bishop’s financial house in order.

The first step was to construct a plan that they could present to the Quebec government so that they would have confidence in the school’s ability to balance its budget otherwise, the government would not give 15% of the schools grant money, which it only releases after the institution can prove its running a balanced budget at the end of the year.  Faculty and staff made a significant contribution agreeing to a salary and hiring freeze

As of right now, it is projected that bishop’s will have an annual balanced budget by 2013 and is currently running a $1 million deficit when it was project to be $1.4 million in the red.

A third issue that needing to be addressed was the governance at Bishop’s.  The problem here according to Goldbloom was the Bishop’s was effectively “over governed” with a board of directors (called the corporation), numbering 63 members, “was not a deliberative body that was able to have intelligent and informed discussions and make effective decisions.”

That has since been changed after a unanimous decision which created a new board consisting of seventeen members from the faculty, staff, student and external populations. Goldbloom commented that, “It will be a smaller board and … more engaged…”

A fourth initiative that was accomplished much sooner than was expected was the improvements to the campus infrastructure.  Such improvements include the renovations to the Johnson labs; the installation of a geothermal heating system which will reduce the school’s energy costs and use; and the renovations and expansion of the sports plex.  Goldbloom credits the economic recession for the ground breaking of these projects as the school was able to receive funds from the federal government as part of its Economic Action Plan.

Now that Bishop’s has overcome the problems that nearly sunk it two years ago, Goldbloom had indicated that the community is now entering a planning phase for the future.

The chief priority are academic initiatives.  First is to identify where Bishop’s could excel in research areas and to have a serious discussion to define what a liberal arts education is.  Though Goldbloom recognized that it may not need to be changed but wants to explore “any changes that would want to make relative to [Bishop’s] approach to a liberal arts education in 2010 versus thirty years ago,” and that, “this is something every generation has to question.” Moreover, he spoke of coordinating efforts and the importance to constantly ask ourselves “what to we need to be the best?”   This is very important because it helps demonstrate to prospective students that though Bishop’s is small it is not limited in delivering a first rate education and university experience.

There are also a number of campus development priorities.  Such priorities include making the campus more transparent; reducing the number of cars on campus or making it more of a “walking” campus; transform the hill area in between Mackinnon and the SUB as the hub of student activity to tie in the entire campus; capitalize on the plex renovations; and reconnect with the forrest and the rivers surrounding the campus.

Apart from these future projects there are a number of other areas that Principal Goldbloom said that Bishop’s could grow to excel in and that because we have now have the confidence to achieve ambitious goals.  He noted that when he arrived in August, 2008, “We could only plan ahead ten days in advance, but now we’re planning ten years in advance.”