To him it is an example of the provincial government’s intention to not give the institution the degree of autonomy as recommended in the report he and John Davies, a professor at Anglia Ruskin University, submitted three years ago.
The report said the college should be granted full university status with its own senate, its own budget but share a board of regents with Memorial in St. John’s.
The province, which had originally accepted the recommendations, has stepped back from granting full status and a senate to the Corner Brook campus, even going so far as to challenge the institution to “earn it.”
Kelly, who is a professor at University College Dublin, believes the word campus in the moniker that amounts to the same thing as the old one. He said Grenfell Campus will be seen as much the same as Sir Wilfred Grenfell College.
“I don’t understand why Premier (Danny) Williams and his government didn’t grant the university senate to Grenfell College,” he said. “Even though they have their own budget ... the expenditure and setting of the budget is totally dependent on St. John’s. In fact, even with this title ‘Grenfell Campus,’ it’s still just a department of Memorial in St. John’s. I think this is difficult to understand.”
He believes Grenfell could be competitive if it was given the tools, and a name of its own is one of them.
In fact, even with this title ‘Grenfell Campus,’ it’s still just a department of Memorial in St. John’s. - Professor John Kelly
He’d hoped a new name would give Grenfell a chance to get better students nationally and internationally and go after the best faculty, but now it’s handicapped by being a satellite of St. John’s.
A prepared statement announcing the name change noted documented confusion among prospective students, faculty and other stakeholders about the nature of the campus’s offerings due to the use of the word college. It says this has resulted in difficulties in student and faculty recruitment, and in attraction of research and other funding reserved for universities.
Kelly believes students from China or the Middle East will see the word campus in a similar fashion as they would college in this situation.
“The Marine Institute has a far higher degree of independence and status than Grenfell will with this title,” he said. “Across Canada in recent years premiers were upgrading colleges to university status in pretty substantial numbers. These colleges had not the status that Grenfell had and they’re now thriving. Look at Cape Breton University, that is thriving.
“It’s a hen and egg situation. The government and Premier Williams might be thinking ‘we can’t give university status to Grenfell until it improves its enrolment. It can’t improve its enrolment until it’s given university status.”
Sure, Andrew. If it became SWG university, it would be all kudos to Danny. But now it's confirmed that SWG will only ever be a part (and a small and dependent part at that) of the larger MUN. Despite the very clear promise from Danny for academic and financial autonomy. I guess this is all outside Danny's ability to do anything? Yeah, very effective for sure.