Canterbury College to build residence
A new three-storey, $6-million student residence being constructed by Canterbury College should go a long way in further attracting graduate and international students to the University of Windsor. Construction will begin immediately in the 100 block of Patricia Road in a location where three homes owned by the college will be demolished and replaced by the new residence. Work is expected to be complete by next August, in time for the 2019 school year. “This has been in development for two or three years where we kept looking at different designs and concepts until we settled on one that we like,” said Gordon Drake, principal of Canterbury College. “This is right in the range in terms of costs and anticipated needs for student accommodations.”
The new building will include 32 single apartments and 30 rooms for shared accommodations. Combined with existing housing units, the new residence will increase capacity at the college to 180 students — up from the current 140.
Canterbury College has been affiliated with the university since 1957 and was created to be an Anglican College tied to what used to be Assumption University, which had roots as a Roman Catholic post-secondary school prior to becoming the University of Windsor. While maintaining that Anglican background, Canterbury College long ago moved to accept students of all nationalities and religious backgrounds. Its focus has been to accept more senior or graduate students at the university. The new Canterbury College residence comes at a great time since the university is expecting record enrolment this fall with international students notably continuing to increase in numbers, said Jeff Berryman, the school acting provost and vice-president academic. Drake noted that Canterbury College has students from at least 33 different nations. Roohollah Etemadi, a graduate student in the computer science program at the university, has been a student living at Canterbury College since 2015. He is originally from Iraq.
“I think this is great,” said Etemadi, of plans to expand with a new student residence. “The students here will be very happy with such a large, new building. “There are lots of good things to say (about Canterbury College), but the most important being when you are here you never feel alone. You have lots of friends. You can communicate with many students from other countries and learn about so many other cultures.” The new student residence will be built by PCR Contractors Inc. Canterbury College’s Board President Bruck Easton said unveiling plans for the new student residence culminates two years of work with designers and architects.
“It’s become a real labour of love for our board,” he said.
“The university is seeing real growth with graduate students with a lot of them coming from overseas. We provide good accommodations for those type of students. The college has become an excellent landing place for people from other countries, so the new residence will increase the University of Windsor’s capacity to take care of those students.”