U of S president keeps promise on campus for Prince Albert
When Peter Stoicheff was an English professor at the University of Saskatchewan — long before he became president and vice-chancellor — he was profiled for a piece in Maclean's. The magazine identified him as a professor at the University of Saskatoon.
That mistake stuck with Stoicheff as he ascended the ranks and became dean of the College of Arts and Science, and later U of S president.
“It's the university for the whole province,” Stoicheff said this week.
Still, the institution only had a physical campus in its largest city. In Prince Albert, where the U of S offered arts and science, medicine and nursing courses, the university was spread around P.A., relying on whatever space it could find.
In the early days of his term as president, starting in 2015, Stoicheff attended a luncheon in P.A. and vowed to change that scattered presence.
“I didn't know what that looked like,” he said. “You're always on shaky ground making a commitment when you don't know what the solution to it is, but really, I was just saying it was so important that we knew we needed to find the solution.”
In 2018, the solution presented itself. A building owned by the province had originally been home of the Saskatchewan Forest Centre, but the not-for-profit folded in 2009 and the building was put up for sale in 2015. It sat mostly empty, housing a handful of offices until the university purchased it for $8.125 million in 2018. The official opening of campus was celebrated virtually last week — the COVID-19 pandemic prevented a larger gathering — though the celebration wasn't what the university originally had in mind.
“I've never opened a new campus anywhere before,” Stoicheff said.
“I've opened new buildings and those have always involved lots of people in attendance, and they give me the opportunity to thank people face to face for all the support needed for a big project … to come to fruition. For something as big as a whole campus in a brand new city, the fact that we haven't yet been able to do it in person is a challenge.”
Still, Stoicheff said, the virtual celebration was “extremely moving.” Speakers included university staff, instructors, students, Indigenous leaders, and civic and provincial politicians. While Stoicheff called the alternate celebration somewhat “bittersweet,” the facility still marks a promise fulfilled. The new campus is “one of the ways to make good on that commitment that's right in our title,” Stoicheff added.
The Prince Albert campus also represents a promise to the students and university as a whole. The most important way for the U of S to measure growth for the P.A. campus is to give access to students “who would otherwise be prevented from attending university because they can't make the move to Saskatoon,” Stoicheff said. Putting existing programs together and adding new ones, such as dentistry, business, agriculture and bioresources and the entire first year of kinesiology, helps students and researchers, Stoicheff said. The university may also add education courses in the city. As well, he noted, having a campus in a more northern location will allow for more research opportunities.
Generating plenty of buzz is the new dental clinic, set to open this fall. It will be staffed by U of S dentistry students and is designed to offer services to people who otherwise might struggle to access proper dental care.
The early feedback has been positive, Stoicheff said, expressing hope that the campus “can contribute to the energy, economic and otherwise, of the downtown.”
The Prince Albert campus saw a modest increase in enrolment in 2020-21, about one per cent, Stoicheff said. While that doesn't sound like much, in the midst of a global pandemic, the university expected numbers to shrink, perhaps even by a large percentage. He called it “a huge vote of confidence” to see enrolment trend upward.
“So many people have had a big hand in this,” Stoicheff said. “It's been very, very encouraging.”