The unique King Campus of Seneca

Yesterday we had a Deans retreat at the very unique King Campus of Seneca College. This was the "Estate" of a very wealthy Canadian family 70-80 years ago (the Eaton family) from whom Seneca bought the land and original buildings about 20 years ago. Seneca build a campus at the estate which is located near King City, about 50 kilometers north of Toronto. One of the unique programs offered at this campus is "vet technician" (assistant to the animal doctors) and Seneca has a variety of large animals living on the original farm land of the estate. After the planning meetings of the Deans and several other staff members we were treated to a tour of the entire campus (so far I had only seen some parts of the campus).

 This is the barn which was built about 100 years ago by the farmer who sold the land to the Eatons and which houses the horses and offers hands-on training space for some of the programs delivered at this campus (which also includes "forensic investigation", a program also making good use of the rural setting of this campus). Police Foundations, Early Childhood Education and Practical Nursing are some of the other programs of Seneca at  this campus housing about 3,000 students.

 On this photo above to the right in the background you can see the 300 room student residence of this campus and behind the residence is the main campus building.

 The campus building seen from the other side of the small lake at the estate. One of the community activities of the King campus are Spring Day camps for elementary and high school students as well as summer camps for individual youngsters. The camp offers all sort of outdoor activities including canoeing, high ropes, and mountain biking (and cross-country skiing during the winter).

 These photos are taken inside the Eaton Hall which was a 25 room small conference center. At the moment it is not functional after a severe ice-storm several years ago broke the water-pipes resulting in flooding in most of the rooms. Renovation work is taking place but Seneca lacks the funds at the moment to fully restore the place as a conference center. It was built about 70 years ago and lends its style from the old European castles. It would be great to find somebody who would want to invest the $7-8 million required to  fully renovate the place and make it operational again.... :-)

A milestone with my blog

My blog has had 20,000 visits since December 2012. I hope that most of the people who had a look at one or more of my posts have enjoyed the photos and short explanation. I make the posts for my friends and family but of course also a bit for general interest.

Last weekend we hosted at Seneca  an interesting workshop  for  members of A.C.C.E. which is the Association of Chinese Canadian Entrepreneurs. Motivated folks to do professional development on a nice sunny Sunday afternoon!

Holland and China in Toronto

Last Friday I attended an event between Canadian and Dutch universities and colleges. The Dutch Royal couple and the Dutch Minister of Education visited Ontario, and about 25 Dutch higher education institutions used that opportunity to meet with Canadian counterparts. It was nice for me to see the Dutch and Canadian flags on the table next to each other...

During the afternoon of the same day I presented at an event organized by Chinese Canadians in Markham (north-east of Toronto) about the "internationalization" of education at Seneca College.

Conference in Winnipeg

Landed today in Winnipeg, capital of the Canadian province of Manitoba, for a conference of four days of all colleges in Canada (Colleges and Institutes Canada). This was another "first" for me in this country that is so large in size. I had some time to walk around this evening...

The conference this year is hosted by Red River College. This is one of their campuses, one that has a focus on culinary skills and food technology.

Manitoba is right in the middle of the country; Winnipeg is close to the US border; they call it the region with a thousand lakes; fishing has to be one of your hobbies if you live here!

A rich history through the past few hundred years of the clashes and the mixing of the races between the "first nations" and the European immigrants, resulting in new cultures such as the "metis".

Winnipeg has a brand-new and sensational Canadian Museum for Human Rights, right next to the Red River, so rich a place of the "meeting of the peoples".

"The Forks" is the historic site where so many peoples met over the years on the shores of the red river. Nowadays the city created a nice area for people to again get together and enjoy each others company and eat & drink....

Back to downtown where the conference begins tomorrow....

Mark to Calgary; Hilary to Europe

Our son Mark (20) is off to Calgary in our little old Honda Civic. He will do four months of co-op  work (internship) at an engineering company there for his electrical engineering study. His sister  Hilary (23) is making the drive with him, so we'll see what kind of trouble  they can get  into together during that drive which  should take them three days. Hilary took a week off from her work at the Niagara Falls hospital. In another six weeks she takes of for two months to travel in Europe with a few of her friends. Mary will  have a quiet summer here in Fonthill....

I had a busy week hosting two small conferences at the same time. At one of the conferences we signed a new agreement with a new partner school in China.

Visit to Central Asia

After doing a few days work in Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan) I was driven to Almaty (Kazakhstan) from where I had a flight to Dushanbe (Tajikistan). Taking off from the Almaty airport...

The scenery over the Central Asian mountain ranges is beautiful and when arriving in Dushanbe the mountains are all around you. The stoplights in the city have a nice "count down" light system which helps the traffic flows. On the photo below you can see an example + also what seems to be - according to the Guinness Book of Records - the largest flagpole and flag (no wind that moment so you have to take a good look...)

The view of the city from my hotel room. Below some shots of the city. The next photo is theTajiki version of their "White House" and they also have what they call the "Twin Towers"....

I visited the Ismaili Center in Dushanbe of the Aga Khan organization with whom we are starting our project work in Central Asia in July. The photos below show the impressive hallways and how the  center functions. There are six such centers in the world (two in Canada in Vancouver and in Toronto)

Finally a photo of the country Tajikistan. Where the person holds his finger is where the University of Central Asia - with whom Seneca will partner - will be built.  It is right on the border with  Afghanistan. The UCA will construct three campuses:  in rural Kyrgyzstan to open in September 2016, in rural Tajikistan in September 2018 and in rural Kazakhstan in September 2020.