This material represents the first chapter of my Lakehead University MA Thesis, "The University That Wasn't: The University of Canada North, 1970-1985." While it clearly intends to establish the context of the 1970s attempt to establish a university in the Canadian North, it also serves as a useful overview summary of the history and development of the Canadian northern territory to 1970.
Territorial Society, 1965-1970
For the Canadian North, the late 1960s and 1970s were years of profound change. The two territories had governments that were gradually expanding their jurisdictions through devolution of federal programs. Developers began to focus their attention on the region. Since the 1950s, the North had been touted as the nation's storehouse of wealth. In the late 1960s, the discovery of oil and gas deposits in Alaska added a new impetus to all forms of northern development. This urgency led to proposals for megaprojects, the most famous of which were the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline proposal and the Hydro-Quebec development. Questions about the environmental and social effects of the former led to the appointment of the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry. Justice Thomas Berger's inquiry showed Canadians clearly that northern residents, aboriginals and Non-aboriginals alike, felt their ways of life were personally satisfying and worth protecting from the effects of mega-development.
In the 1960s and through the 1970s Canadians were desperately concerned with discovering a national identity. It seemed vital to our national wellness to know exactly what a Canadian was and what it meant to be a Canadian. A similar identity crisis was occurring in the North. On the one hand, encouraged by the myth of national wealth, most Canadians were coming to see that the North was more than just a cold, dark, isolated place where only the socially dysfunctional, the greedy, the adventurous, and the aboriginal lived. It was a national storehouse of wealth. On the other, northerners, many of whom considered the North their home and homeland, began to realize that things were changing quickly and that a new North was emerging. Many were troubled by the change.
Developing government, expanding businesses and new mining and exploration ventures attracted different kinds of people to the North. By the late 1960s, government had supplanted mining and business as the most attractive force, which changed the face of the urban North. Young professionals saw Whitehorse and Yellowknife as likely places to begin careers, with excellent prospects for advancement. Their numbers were relatively small but their effect would become considerable. The gradual development of a small class of northern urban professionals added a new dimension to the social structure of the larger centres. These people brought southern-bred expectations about quality of life and level of services that could not, at least initially, be easily met. Some embraced the rough "frontier life" with relish, others suffered it. The result was that new forms of northern identity began to be constructed; the newly-arrived needed a way to justify their immigration to and residence in the isolated communities of the territorial North. The residents needed a way to understand the changes. This account of The University of Canada North sheds light on the difficulties a small group of northerners faced when they tried to institutionalise their vision of the northern identity and northern society.
It would be incorrect to suggest that, in 1970, the social situation was identical in both territories. The two territories were and continue to be fundamentally different. Despite the ease with which people talk about "The Canadian North"--meaning the entire territorial North--it was not until the mid-1980s that political development had propelled social development--in the larger communities only--to anything like an equal level. Even today comparisons between the two territories must be drawn with the utmost care.
Despite fundamental differences in the social and physical development of the two capitals, the arrival of the government-employed cadre of workers and their families, their attendant physicians, lawyers, accountants and business people, affected Whitehorse and Yellowknife in similar ways. Their desire for nice places to live, shop and play energized the construction, the service, and the social industries and encouraged additional migration. Their numbers were fairly considerable. In Whitehorse in 1966, after a decline of 5.2 percent since 1961, the population of the city stood at 4,771. It had risen 136.4 percent by 1971, to 11,277.(1) The average annual net migration rate was 28.9 per thousand for the same period, showing that most of this population growth was the result of movement into the territory.(2) In Yellowknife, the population rose only 19 percent between 1961 and 1966. The territorial government was installed in the city in 1967. Census figures show the population increased 56.8 percent between 1966 and 1971, from 3,741 to 5,867.(3) The combined territorial net migration was -1251 between 1961 and 1966 but was +3,355 in the five years between 1966 and 1971.(4) The development that resulted from this growth generally took place without much involvement of the First Nations inhabitants. Under the Indian Act, their social status and political power was negligible. Some newcomers ignored them, others became their advocates.
By 1970, the two capitals had sloughed off much of their frontier aspect. A tourist, Edward McCourt, wrote, in 1968, that Whitehorse "hardly lives up to the promise of its location and name."(5) The image he had of Whitehorse was of
a rugged frontier community swarming with prospectors and miners, trappers and sporting girls. . ., where every man is as good as his neighbour, and suburbia, the service club, and the Home and School Association have not yet combined to ensnare and crush the ebullient human spirit.(6)He was disappointed to discover that there was "no more evidence of the frontier spirit than is to be found in Moose Jaw or Medicine Hat."(7) Jim Lotz, author of a book on development in the Yukon, wrote that in 1969,
The city and its surrounding areas are still a terrible mess--a scatter of settlements rather than a unity. Bus service was initiated throughout the area, but lasted only three months. But some consolidation has begun, and the worst of the shacks are disappearing; Whitehorse is sprucing itself up, becoming aware of its importance. . . . The city has a splendid site; it could be a good place to live in. Whitehorse is a well-administered city, and while it is not without its problems, these are being tackled at the local level with vigour.(8)Yellowknife, too, was changing. Since 1947, when the New Town site was laid out in response to the opening of the Giant Yellowknife Mine, it had been developing slowly. A hydro-electric power station on the Snare River gave the city a secure supply of electricity.(9) By 1961 3,141 people lived in the city. Its location on the Canadian Shield meant it was possible to erect multi-storied buildings that were not feasible in Whitehorse. The first office tower, the Cunningham Building, was four storeys high. It became the offices of the new territorial government in 1967.(10) In 1969, McCourt described Yellowknife as an "up-and-coming chamber-of-commerce-oriented" community.(11) It became an incorporated city in 1970 and its first highrise apartment building was finished in 1972.(12)
Thus, by 1970, northern society had reached a new stage. More non-Natives were moving to the territories to work for the various levels of government. The Native populations of both territories were becoming politically active. The Indian Brotherhood of the Northwest Territories, the Committee for Original People's Entitlement (COPE) and the Yukon Native Brotherhood were formed in these years and began to fight for redress on a variety of issues--government policy, land claims, and education--of vital concern to them. Even greater changes would occur in the ensuing decade.
Despite the founders' desire to remedy the
near total lack of northern post-secondary education opportunities, The
University of Canada North must not be interpreted solely as an educational
venture. It should also be viewed as an expression of social consciousness,
that is, of a recognition by northern residents that their part of Canada
was worthy of closer scrutiny by its inhabitants and not solely by outside
experts and researchers. The creation of The University of Canada North
demonstrates that at least a small group of northern residents thought
there were important issues that needed examination and vital questions
that needed answering.
The
Territorial Governments
The following narrative provides an overview of the political milieu from which the University of Canada North emerged.
The
Northwest Territories
The development of the government of the
Northwest Territories (NWT) began in 1869 when the federal government passed
the Temporary Government Act. The Manitoba Act of the following
year contained new and permanent provisions for the government of North-West
Territories. Refinements were made in 1875 when the Manitoba Act
was amended and the North-West Territories Act passed. The Act established
Battleford as the seat of government and created a Territorial Council
with five appointed members. Provision was made for elected representatives
when population levels rose sufficiently.(13)
By 1887 the population had increased to such levels that the federal government
created a legislative assembly called the Territorial Council, headed by
the Commissioner, with twenty-two elected members and three appointed legal
advisors. Further amendments to the Act, in 1897, created an executive
council that gave the territory province-like powers over specific legislative
areas.
When the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan were created in 1905, the territory was reduced to its 1870 constitutional status. In 1905 the comptroller of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police, Lieutenant-Colonel Fred White was named commissioner.(14) An arrangement allowed for an appointed council of four members to which no one was appointed until 1921. In 1919, W. M. Corey, the Deputy-Minister of the Department of the Interior (the department then responsible for the Yukon and the Northwest Territories) succeeded White as Commissioner. For the next 44 years, the tradition held; it was not until 1963 that the positions were again separated. Until 1921 the Commissioner single-handedly held the powers of Lieutenant-Governor, Executive Council and Assembly.(15) The work was not that onerous: no legislation was passed between 1905 and 1920.(16) In reaction to a potential for oil exploration, a council was constituted in 1921. It was composed of six members, all of whom were senior civil servants in the departments responsible for various aspects of northern administration.(17)
Between 1930 and the late 1940s, the council increased its activity, primarily due to the beginning of mining ventures in the Yellowknife region, and later the regulation of American military activities in the eastern part of the territory. In 1939 the local administrative district of Yellowknife was created. In 1946 the first territorial resident, J. G. McNiven of Yellowknife, was appointed to the council.
Significant changes were made to the Northwest Territories Act during the 1950s. In 1951 the council was enlarged to eight members, three of whom were to be elected from the western part of the territory. Council meetings were to be held at least twice annually and one meeting had to be held in the territory. The following year saw the establishment of territorial courts and provisions for justices of the peace and police magistrates. In 1954 the electoral district boundaries were redrawn, creating four ridings, and in 1960 three members of the general public were appointed to the council.
The geographical imbalance in population and development in the Northwest Territories led to a suggestion, advanced in 1961, that the territory be divided in two to permit the western portion to have resident self-government. The proposal was earnestly debated at the federal level and the question reached the House of Commons in 1963 as Bills C-83 and C-84, the former creating the Mackenzie Territory and the latter the Nunassiaq Territory. In the months between the first and second readings, opposition was raised to the bills and they were sent to the Standing Committee on Mines, Forests and Waters for review.(18) The bills were so delayed by the Standing Committee that they were not presented to the House before Parliament rose and so died on the Order Paper.
In April 1963, the newly-elected Pearson government established an advisory commission to report on the whole question of government in the Northwest Territories and appointed Dean A. W. R. Carrothers of the University of Western Ontario its chair. In his report, Carrothers advised against any form of administrative division of the territory. More importantly, the commission recommended a course of action that would grant the NWT powers of self-government.
In 1967, in response to the Carrothers report, the federal government transferred the seat of NWT government to Yellowknife. It devolved responsibility for education, small business, public works, social assistance and local government to the fledgling Government of the Northwest Territories (GNWT).(19) The GNWT delayed transfer of authority for education until 1969 and 1970 partly because it lacked employees.(20)
By 1970, the GNWT apparatus was beginning
to take shape. That year was designated as the territorial Centennial Year.
Events related to the theme of "Territorial Unity" were held all over the
territory. The NWT received a great deal of publicity when the Queen and
Prince Philip paid an official visit and the first Arctic Winter Games
were held in Yellowknife. Yet, despite the enthusiastic celebrations, there
were realities to be faced: The federal government still firmly controlled
the territory. It would not be for another four years that all members
of the territorial council were elected and another sixteen before the
Northwest Territories achieved a degree of responsible self-government.
The
Yukon
The Yukon was elevated from the status
of district of the North-West Territories(21)
to territory by the federal government in 1898 in response to the unwillingness
of the North-West Territory's Regina government to share liquor tax revenues.
Ottawa felt it should realize any profits of the gold rush as it was paying
for the policing and administration of the district. Regina thought that
any revenues should belong to it as Dawson City and the Klondike gold fields
lay within the boundaries of the Yukon District of the North-West Territories.
Ottawa disagreed and passed the Yukon Act in 1898 (assented to on
13 June 1898), creating a new territory with most of the same powers as
the N-WT and governed by a federally-appointed commissioner and council.
The Commissioner-in-Council was allowed to pass ordinances affecting the regulation of local matters. In August 1898, the Act was amended to permit the election of two members out of six to the council. In May 1902 the Yukon Act was further amended to increase elected representation to five. In July 1908 the council was expanded to ten members all of whom were elected.(22) After 1912, with declining gold revenues, a need for austerity forced the federal government to trim the size of the territorial government. In 1918, in the face of serious post-war inflation, the office of Commissioner was, for reasons of economy, amalgamated with that of Gold Commissioner. All local affairs were then handled by only three officials, the superintendent of public works, the superintendent of schools (also the principal of the Dawson school and the high school teacher) and the treasurer (who also had a portfolio of other titles and functions). Government representation in Whitehorse and Mayo was in the person of the agent who sold liquor in the community.
Through the "Lean Years," the situation remained more or less unchanged. In 1942, however, the territory was overwhelmed by the arrival of the 30,000 or so military and civilian builders of the Alcan (Alaska) Highway. During the construction, the territorial government was forced to expand its staff and to move temporarily many of its offices to Whitehorse. In 1948 the position of Commissioner was revived as chief executive officer of the Yukon. After the completion of the highway and the end of the war many of those who had come North remained. The population of Whitehorse jumped from 754 in 1941 to 2,594 in 1951.(23)
In the 1950s, as the Yukon's population continued to grow, the government expanded. The method for funding the territorial government changed. Negotiated financial grants from the federal government gave the territory greater control over its financial affairs and discussions were soon underway to transfer the responsibility for welfare. Government business was, however, hampered by a reliance on river transport. In 1950, the seat of the territorial government was still at Dawson City. In 1951 DIAND approved the relocation of the government to Whitehorse, which was finally completed in March 1953. Until then, much of the territorial government's growth was in fact a reactivation and testing of the old structures, which soon proved inadequate in the face of the increasing population.
By the late 1960s, the territorial government had been granted new areas of responsibility. A vocational school and correctional facilities had been built and a regional library system created. New government departments had been established to handle tourism and municipal development. Negotiations had begun with the federal government to transfer responsibility for such matters as justice, health care, and fresh-water fisheries along with the funds to support them. In 1966 the territorial Council passed an Autonomy Motion urging the federal government to implement a plan that would lead to provincial status within twelve years and control of Crown lands more immediately.(24) In response to this territorial agitation, the federal government authorized the formation of an Executive Committee that gave elected officials a role in overseeing the administration of government departments.
By 1970, the Yukon Territorial Government (YTG) had gained a modicum of control over territorial affairs and was poised for greater developments. The Commissioner continued to be appointed, though in the 1960s a precedent was set when two Yukon residents were consecutively appointed to the position.(25)
In 1971, then, the territorial governments
were at somewhat different levels of maturity yet there were some similarities
between them. The federal government transfer payments were increasingly
essential to both governments. In 1971, revenues from the territories amounted
to only about 45% of total expenditures(26)
and much of this money--tax revenue from alcohol sales for instance--came
from the incomes that depended on federal transfer payments to individuals
rather than directly to the Yukon Territorial Government (YTG).
Education
in the Canadian North
The story of education in Canada's North begins in the nineteenth century with the missionary activities of the Protestant and Roman Catholic churches. Later, local schools were established at the sites of mines and trading posts. The final stage of this evolution is the assumption of control over education and the provision of facilities by various levels of government.(27)
The North-West Territories Act of
1875 granted the territory authority over the education of non-Native school-age
children. The federal government, under the provisions of the British
North America Act and the Indian Act, was responsible for the
education of Natives. As the Yukon Act was largely a copy of the
North-West Territories Act, it too controlled non-Native education
from its creation. In practice, though, the territories lacked the financial
resources to provide much of an education system. Until World War II the
Yukon was able to do little more than provide a modest public school system
and an even more modest separate school system paid for from tax revenues
and through arrangements with the federal government. The Northwest Territories
did not have resident government until 1967 and was unable to assume total
responsibility for education until 1970.
The
Northwest Territories
Until the 1950s, there was no coherent system of education in the Northwest Territories. With the seat of territorial government at Ottawa and a small non-Native population, education was generally left in the hands of the missionaries. Local public schools were established in the late 1930s in Fort Smith and Yellowknife, where small mining communities had sprung up.(28) With regards to Natives, the policy of the Department of Indian Affairs was "to provide token education to Indians at minimum cost."(29) Until the end of the Depression, the churches, assisted by grants from the government, were the sole providers of education in the territory. Their efforts were inspired by a goal of assimilation and directed at teaching Indians vocational and agricultural skills. Much of this education was carried out in residential schools, where students were isolated from their families and their culture. The residential system did not reach every child of school age and in many areas, day schools were established to provide an opportunity for children and adults to acquire rudimentary English language and arithmetical skills.
The federal government began to acknowledge its responsibilities towards Indians and Inuit more completely during World War II. American military projects in the North exposed, to the nation and to the world, the desperate social and medical conditions of some northern Natives. The government's solution was to plan "to bring Native northerners to a position of being able to participate in the coming industrialization of the North."(30) Programmes were launched to improve Native standards of living by concentrating them in new settlements and providing medical care, welfare and Mothers' Allowance payments, and education.
By 1950, education in the Northwest Territories was under the control of some eight different authorities: "mission, the Federal Government, the Territorial Government, municipal groups, private citizens' groups and mining companies, were operating schools at various points."(31) In 1952, the Department of Resources and Development was renamed the Department of Northern Affairs and National Resources (NANR) and was made responsible for northern development in all its aspects. It established the Eskimo Affairs Committee to investigate the participation of Inuit in development. Its Sub-Committee on Eskimo Education decided, "that the Inuit should no longer be permitted to remain illiterate."(32) As a result the NANR approved "a number of school and educational initiatives."(33)
A major integrated federal school program was introduced to the Northwest Territories in 1955.(34) For reasons of efficiency, a decision was made that "the Federal Government, through the Department of Northern Affairs and National Resources, would operate the entire school system on behalf of the Government of the Northwest Territories."(35) Schools and student residences were built, first in the Mackenzie, and then across the territory to replace the church schools, though the churches were contracted to operate the student residences. In 1956 all mission school teachers became federal employees. The government aimed to have the infrastructure in place to provide education to all school-aged children by 1970.(36) By 1957 vocational training was being provided to Natives above school age, often as a substitute for basic education.(37)
There were problems with this system. The curriculum and much of the teaching material was initially imported directly from Alberta.(38) By the early 1960s, the government was attempting to use more culturally-relevant teaching materials but only at the elementary level.(39) The curricula for secondary students were "closely related to those of the adjacent provinces in order to maintain a comparable graduating standard."(40) Despite the welter of curricula, the government thought the results encouraging:
The comparatively new school system has already had tremendous impact on the native peoples in the Territories and it has made the North a much more attractive place in which to live. …Even now, the average native is staying longer in school and is attaining a level of education far beyond what was possible a few years ago.(41)
The program, however, was expensive. In 1963 the NWT education program alone cost 118.8 percent of total territorial revenues and the following year that figure had risen to 145.5 percent.(42)
In 1967, arrangements were made for the
creation of a Northwest Territories government and the transfer of some
federal powers to it. While some jurisdictional transfers began almost
immediately, the new government delayed the take-over of Western Arctic
education until 1 April 1969. Control of Eastern Arctic education was transferred
the following year. The transfer did not solve all the long-standing problems.
There was uncertainty about the new government's educational policy. In
addition, local involvement in education remained quite limited: Yellowknife
had the only school board until 1985 and communities outside the capital
had to rely on education committees that reported to regional councils
that, in turn, provided recommendations to the government.(43)
The
Yukon
The education situation in the Yukon was
different in some ways and similar in others. As in the NWT, the Yukon
had been nominally responsible for the education of all school age citizens
within its boundaries since the passage of the Yukon Act in 1898.(44)
Again, as in the NWT, in reality, due to the provisions of the Indian
Act, there was a division of responsibility and the federal government
left Native education in the hands of the churches.(45)
Though, as a result of the gold rush, the Yukon the was more economically
developed territory, the federal government believed that the Yukon had
no real future and "did not want to train Yukon Indians for social roles
that did not exist, especially when traditional hunting and subsistence
economy remained healthy."(46) The education
of the non-Native children was provided by the territory through a flexible
system of partial assistance and complete funding, depending upon the number
of students enroled in each school.(47)
Through the "Lean Years," from 1906 to 1940, the territorial public school system operated on a shoestring. Almstrom notes that in Whitehorse
meagre facilities were supplemented in a number of ways. For example, former pupils tell of the generosity of townspeople and teachers who lent books from their personal libraries and pay tribute to the encouragement given to the girls in the home economics' classes by certain ladies of the community who opened their homes so that the girls might learn to cook and entertain.(48)
Generally, though, because of the financial constraints, education in the Yukon concentrated on academic subjects. Any additional "curriculum enrichment," such as sewing, cooking, or carpentry, had to be "provided through the generosity of concerned parents."(49) Almstrom points out that such education was not much different from that being offered in small communities elsewhere in Canada during these years.(50) As in the Northwest Territories, the Yukon education system had adopted a southern curriculum, in its case that of British Columbia.(51) Partly for reasons of economy, integration of Native students began to be encouraged in the late 1940s and became the territory's unofficial policy by 1964.(52)
The construction of the Alaska Highway "propelled the Yukon into the twentieth century."(53) Education became a much more important issue. Schools sprang up wherever there was a concentration of non-Natives, at highway maintenance camps and at mines. At the same time the federal government began to transfer of responsibility for the delivery of all primary and secondary education in the territory. Thus, after the early 1950s, the federal government gradually withdrew its support of the church-operated residential schools.(54) It began delegating its responsibility for Indian education to the territorial government(55) under a series of formal tuition agreements that included cost-sharing of capital costs.(56) By 1967 all schools in the Yukon were under the control of the Yukon Department of Education, though much of the funding for them still came directly from the federal government.(57)
Yukon Natives, like those in the Northwest
Territories, found much of what was being taught in the schools of little
real use and, indeed, culturally damaging. Many, from personal experience,
thought the entire school system was "irrelevant and unresponsive."(58)
Part of the problem was that, for a variety of social and cultural reasons,
Native parents had generally been unable to gain a loud enough voice on
the school committees and councils to effect a change in the curriculum.
Where school committees existed, Native parents often felt unwelcome at
the meetings. Cross-cultural misunderstandings and different codes of public
behaviour also made it difficult for Natives to participate.
Providing
For Post-Secondary Education
Despite its constitutional responsibilities
in the territorial North, the federal government's support for northern
post-secondary education had generally been confined to guaranteeing student
loans and funding vocational training. The division of jurisdiction laid
down by the British North America Act, 1867, places education in
the hands of the provinces. The acts that created the Yukon and the Northwest
Territories gave jurisdiction over education to the territorial governments.
Their tiny populations, however, effectively limited the provision of education
in the territories to the primary and secondary levels.
In the early 1960s, vocational schools with a narrow range of training options were established at Fort Smith and Whitehorse. They were created to offer pre-employment trades training, specific skills development (truck and equipment driving), upgrading for adults, and classes in selected trades that would lead to apprentice status but not to inter-provincial journeyman certification. The federal government assisted these through vocational training agreements with the territorial governments. University-level courses were not available and students who wished to pursue higher education attended universities outside the territories.
Recognising the impossibility of offering the range and depth of courses comparable to southern institutions, the territorial governments offered a unique scheme that provided funding to eligible students to cover the cost of tuition and books, living, transportation and miscellaneous expenses.
The Northwest Territories government offered both bursaries and grants.(59) The 1971 eligibility requirements for a $1500 bursary were a two-year residency, or a resident out of school for over three years or a resident seeking a degree at the Bachelor's level or beyond at an Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada member institution. Eligibility requirements for the grant were more stringent. The student had to be a dependent child of an NWT resident, have "three months residency immediately prior to the commencement of the next semester of the university," and must not been out of school for a period longer than three years. The grant covered
tuition fees, transportation to and from the place of residence in the N.W.T., books, supplies, and board and lodging for persons enroled in a degree course in an institution which is a member of the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada
and was renewable for up to four years.(60) Similar grants were available from the Yukon Government. In 1967 (First Session) the Legislative Council passed An Ordinance To Provide for the Making of Grants to University and Vocational Students. It provided students with a grant of approximately $1,100 to defray the costs of transportation, books, and board.(61) The government enacted the ordinance for three reasons. First, a funding agreement it had with the federal government for vocational training was soon to expire. A new arrangement granted the territory a per capita amount for "continuing education." Some of the money, it was thought, "should be used to assist students to attend universities, institutes of technology, community college, and schools of nursing."(62) Second, students attending the Whitehorse Vocational and Technical Training Centre were receiving allowances of between $35 to $90 per week under the federal Training Allowance Act, 1966. University students, in contrast, were given territorial assistance only for transportation to and from school. This arrangement was clearly "financially biased in favour of students taking vocational training." This, the commissioner suggested, was not encouraging high school students to go on to university.(63) Third, the Northwest Territories arrangement was superior. While the Yukon Government was not going to match the NWT grants, it did feel that it could not be any less generous with university students than it was being with vocational students.(64)
Into the mid-1960s, almost all the high school graduates who took advantage of these programs were non-Aboriginal. For them it was a very satisfactory arrangement because many keenly wanted some inexpensive way of leaving the North.(65) Many Yukon students went to the University of Alaska, where a formal arrangement between the state and the territories permitted students from the Yukon and the Northwest Territories to attend at the Alaska-resident tuition rate.(66)
New attention to the resource potential of the North, however, soon caused some to consider the feasibility of offering university programming in the North. In 1967, Arthur Laing, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND) addressed the delegates of the First National Northern Research Conference. He proposed that a southern university should examine the feasibility of offering correspondence courses.(67) In the same year, as part of its bid to become territorial capital,(68) Jim Lotz suggested that a university be organised at Fort Smith.(69) The escalation of interest in northern research, encouraged by the discovery of oil and gas deposits at several places off the Arctic coast in the Beaufort Sea, and the federal government's goal to improve quality of life in the North, provoked other suggestions for a northern university. A university located in the North would be valuable. It would have a vested interest in the North, would attract academics and students with northern interests and would provide higher education to qualified northerners. The idea was good but it remained only that. Foundations, governments and the southern universities were unwilling to undertake the task of turning the idea into a reality. The expense seemed prohibitive and unnecessary.
This, then, was the social background against
which and out of which The University of Canada North was conceived. In
a changing political and social landscape, the North's tiny population
struggled to create a modern, full-service society in the region. They
worked to advance the North, to enhance its services, to improve its inter-cultural
relations and to modernise its society. Many thought the answer lay in
economic development. More mines, more people, more economic activity would
generate the kind of benefits that would lead to a stable, but uniquely
northern, society. A small group thought part of the solution would be
to establish a northern university.
1. Bureau of Statistics, Yukon Statistical Profile (Whitehorse: Executive Council Office, n.d.), Table 2.4 "Yukon Population Figures, by Census Years, Yukon and Communities, (1901-1981)."
2. Yukon Statistical Profile, Table 3.4, "Average Annual Net Migration Rate Per Thousand."
3. Government of the Northwest Territories, Bureau of Statistics, "Census population, by Region and Community, 1961-1991."
4. Industry Trade and Commerce, Canada Year Book 1974: An Annual Review of Economics, Social and Political Developments in Canada (Ottawa: Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce, 1973), Table 4.5, 161.
5. Edward McCourt, The Yukon and Northwest Territories, The Traveller's Canada (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1969), 28.
8. Jim Lotz, Northern Realities: Canada-U.S. Exploitation of the Canadian North (Chicago: Follett, 1971), 226.
9. Outcrop Ltd., Northwest Territories Data Book: A Complete Information Guide to the Northwest Territories and its Communities, 1990/91 (Yellowknife: Outcrop, The Northern Publishers, Limited, 1990), 226.
10. Erik Watt, Yellowknife: How a City Grew (Yellowknife: Outcrop Ltd., The Northern Publishers, 1990), 70.
11. McCourt, The Yukon and The Northwest Territories, 127.
13. The Act stipulated that would be when any area of 1,000 sq. mi. had at least 1,000 male British subjects over the age of 21.
14. Mark O. Dickerson, Whose North?: Political Change , Political Development and Self-Government in the Northwest Territories (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1992), 29.
15. Gordon Robertson, Northern Provinces: A Mistaken Goal (Montreal: Institute for Research on Public Policy, 1985), 3.
16. Northern Affairs and National Development, The Northwest Territories Today: A Reference Paper for the Advisory Commission on the Development of Government in the Northwest Territories (Ottawa: Queen's Printer, 1965), 80.
17. Ibid., and Dickerson, Whose North?, 30.
18. 18NANR, The Northwest Territories Today, 82.
19. Gurston Dacks, "Political and Constitutional Development in the Yukon and the Northwest Territories: The Influence of Devolution" in The Northern Review, No. 5 (Summer 1990), 114.
20. In the mid-1960s the territorial public service consisted of only the staff of the territorial liquor distribution structure and a tiny number of contract employees.
21. It had been created a district by Order-in-Council No. 2640 on 2 October 1895 and further established as a Judicial District 16 August 1897 by the Governor in Council.
22. Steven Smyth, The Yukon's Constitutional Foundation, Volume I: The Yukon Chronology (Whitehorse: Northern Directories Ltd., 1991), 7-9.
23. Yukon Statistical Profile, Table 2.4, "Yukon Population Figures, by Census Years, Yukon and Communities, (1901-1981)."
24. There were also other demands. See Steven Smyth, The Yukon's Constitutional Foundations, Volume 1, 34.
25. In 1967 the Territorial Council defeated a motion calling for the voters of the Yukon to elect the Commissioner.
26. DIAND, A Northern Political and Economic Framework (Ottawa: Supply and Services, 1988), 13.
27. "Education in Canada's Northern Territories" ([ca. 1970]), 1.
29. Robert E. Johns, "History of Administration of Schools, N.W.T." (musk-ox, 18, 1976), 42.
30. Morris Zaslow, The Northward Expansion of Canada, 1914-1967 (Toronto: McClellan and Stewart, 1988), 311.
31. "Education in Canada's Northern Territories," 42.
32. R. J. Diubaldo, "You Can't Keep the Native Native" in Ken Coates and William R. Morrison, eds., For Purposes of Dominion: Essays in Honour of Morris Zaslow (North York, Ont.: Captus University Publications, 1989), 173.
34. National Archives of Canada (hereafter NAC), Records of the Northern Affairs Program, RG 85, Acc. 1989-90/233, Box 21, DIAND, "Senior Education Staff Conference, 1967, Summary of Proceedings."
35. "Education in Canada's Northern Territories," 44.
36. NANR, The Northwest Territories Today, 68.
37. Bernie Hughes points out in his MA thesis, "Adult Education and Northern Development" (UBC, 1987), 27, that "the educators' knowledge of linguistics, language development in children, and second language acquisition was minimal; however sincere the educators in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s were, they still did not appreciate, nor fully comprehend the language and culture issue. Consequently, native students--adults and youth--were streamed into vocational programs as a convenient alternative to providing appropriate language instruction in English."
38. NAC, Records of the Northern Affairs Program, RG 85, Acc. 1989-90/233, Box 21, file "Educ N, Education in the North," Report of D.R. MacNeill, Native Liaison Section, 17/4/1978.
39. "Education in Canada's Northern Territories," 59-60.
40. NANR, The Northwest Territories Today, 70; see also "Education in Canada's Northern Territories," 59.
41. NANR, The Northwest Territories Today, 70.
43. Kenneth Coates and Judith Powell, The Modern North: People, Politics and the Rejection of Colonialism (Toronto: James Lorimer and Company, 1989), 134.
44. The Yukon Act of 1898 granted broad and general powers to the Governor-in-Council: "Subject to the provisions of this Act, the Governor in Council may make ordinances for the peace, order and good government of the territory. . . ." (Sect. 8). Countering the apparent expansiveness of the legislation, the Act permitted the federal government to disallow any legislation within a period of two years.
45. Much has been written on the education of Indians in the Yukon. For example, see: Jon Pierce, "Federal Indian Policy in the Yukon," paper prepared for KWIYA, The Joint Commission on Indian Education and Training, 1987 (Whitehorse: KWIYA, 1987); Marjorie E. Almstrom, A Century of Schooling: Education in the Yukon, 1861-1961 (Whitehorse: Privately printed, 1991); Edward Lester Bullen, "A Historical Study of the Education of the Indians of Teslin, Yukon Territory" (Unpublished MA Thesis, University of Alberta, 1968); Nelson Ireland, "Indian Education in Yukon: A Matter of Policy" (Unpublished MA thesis, University of British Columbia, 1988); and Kenneth S. Coates, "A Very Imperfect Means of Education: Indian Day Schools in the Yukon Territory, 1890-1955" in Indian Education in Canada: Volume I, The Legacy, Jean Berman, Yvonne Hebert and Don Askill, editors (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1986), 132-149.
46. Pierce, "Federal Indian Education Policy in the Yukon," 16-17.
47. Almstrom, A Century of Schooling, Chapters V, VI, and VII.
51. In earlier years, however, the secondary school curriculum model had been that of Ontario. Ibid., 87.
52. Ireland, "Indian Education in Yukon," 18, 20.
53. Pierce, "Indian Education Policy in the Yukon," 30.
54. "Education in Canada's Northern Territories," 9.
55. Ireland, "Indian Education in the Yukon," 22.
56. Pierce, "Indian Education Policy in the Yukon," 38.
57. "Education in Canada's Northern Territories,"; also Pierce, "Indian Education Policy in the Yukon," 30.
59. There seems to be no consensus on why the GNWT offered this benefit to NWT residents. It may be that it was offered as an inducement to workers with families to move north.
60. Garth Graham personal files, Guelph, Ontario, [file 7] "Flo Whyard." Government of the Northwest Territories, "Meeting the Challenge through Education Grants," October, 1971. Used with permission. Mr. Graham's files have been subsequently donated to the Yukon Archives (1994). References here are to the files of the collection examined prior to its donation.
61. Chapter 5, 1967 (First Session). May also be cited as the Students Grants Ordinance. The regulations that fixed the amount of the grant, the residency conditions and eligibility were changed as conditions warranted it. These figures apply to 1967-8. Yukon Archives (hereafter YA), The University of Canada North Records (hereafter UCN Records), COR 0321, file 1, "Students Grant Ordinance, Administrator's Order 1967-110, 24 July 1967."
62. Yukon Territorial Government, Sessional Paper No. 46-1967, 1.
65. Many non-Native young people in Whitehorse in the late 1960s were inclined to believe that the Yukon was a backwater and that nothing exciting ever happened there. Many anxiously awaited graduation and applied to university merely to leave the territory. One assumes that similar attitudes prevailed in the Northwest Territories.
66. Immigration and student visa requirements were not affected by the agreement.
67. YA, Hoyt Collection, MSS 216, file 6. "Text of speech, 'Research in the Unknown Land,' given by Hon. A. Laing to First National Northern Research Conference, at University of Saskatchewan, 30 October 1967."
68. It had been the administrative centre for the District of Mackenzie since 1906.
69. YA, UCN Records,
COR 0321, file 1, "Discussion Paper: A University for Fort Smith, NWT."
The conclusion read: "I am convinced. . . of the need for and the value
of a northern university. Such a university, at Fort Smith, would, in time,
attract students and staff from all over the world. I am convinced that
much of the future of the north lies in developing the area as a vast outdoor
laboratory where processes can be understood, [and] studied. . . for the
benefit of all mankind," 11.
http://www.yukoncollege.yk.ca/nost202/ucnintro.htm
Posted 26 December 1998.