April 2, 2009
Media contact: Anne Russell
Cell: 604-798-3709
Office: 604-795-2826
anne.russell@ufv.ca
UFV marks 35 years on April 4
This past year has been one that focused on the present and the future for the University of the Fraser Valley. Since the long-awaited university status was granted last April, much energy and hard work has been put into defining what kind of university the Fraser Valley wants and needs.
But UFV is also quietly celebrating a significant anniversary. This Saturday, April 4, marks 35 years since Fraser Valley College was proclaimed into existence. UFV got its start as Fraser Valley College, was transformed into the degree-granting University College of the Fraser Valley in 1991, and achieved university status in 2008.
Once provincial education minister Eileen Dailly made the proclamation on April 4, 1974, five senior employees of local school districts (Eric Woodruff, Betty Urquhart, Frank Dolman, Roy Craven, and Bill Sharp) were seconded to work on planning the college at a frenzied pace, as it was to open five months later in September.
And open it did, offering university transfer, career and vocational studies, and continuing education classes to several hundred students in a variety of storefronts, church basements, and spare classrooms at high schools. A number of faculty and staff members were hired on an interim basis; some ended up staying for decades.
Valley citizens had long been advocating for some sort of post-secondary institution in the Fraser Valley. The Fraser Valley branch of the UBC alumni association sponsored a conference on the matter in Chilliwack in 1960. The education committee of the Chilliwack Chamber of Commerce then took up the cause, recommending the establishment of a community college and possibly also a vocational school in its 1961 annual report.
In 1962 the provincial government established the MacDonald commission, tasked with looking into post-secondary needs in B.C. Several Fraser Valley communities got together to advocate for a community college located between Abbotsford and Chilliwack, but the idea was rejected by the government in 1966.
Education lobbyists then tried to get a vocational school off the ground. The provincial government wanted communities to provide separate proposals so six potential Chilliwack locations and three Abbotsford ones were proposed. The provincial government chose a site at Lickman Road in Chilliwack and plans were put into place to build the facility.
Plans were drawn up for a vocational school that included a library and classroom block, so that it could be expanded into a community college. But when the provincial government changed hands in 1972, the Lickman Road site was rejected, with flood plain worries cited as the reason.
Fraser Valley communities didn’t give up on the dream of local post-secondary education, and continued to lobby the provincial government vociferously. The government appointed a task force on a college for the Fraser Valley in 1973. The task force members worked with a local steering committee, and recommended the development of an instant college, to be open in rented facilities by September, 1974, with permanent buildings to come later.
The provincial government approved a plebiscite to gauge local support for a college. Public meetings were held to publicize the plebiscite, with the community of Chilliwack showing the most overwhelming support.
When the plebiscite votes were counted, 89 percent of voters had approved of a community college for the Fraser Valley.
Provincial Education Minister Eileen Dailly came to Abbotsford and proclaimed Fraser Valley College into existence on April 4, 1974. Fraser Valley citizens had at long last achieved a goal they'd been working toward since 1960.
UFV is working on a history book project to mark the 35th anniversary. If you have some memories you’d like to share, visit www.ufv.ca/MarCom/UFV_History_Book_2009.htm
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