Dal’s community connections, front-and-centre during the university’s 200th anniversary celebrations in 2018, were every bit as prominent this past year. Dalhousie marked 40 years of Dalplex as a community recreation destination, and 20 years of Let’s Talk Science’s continuing educational outreach. The launch of the Emera ideaHUB on Sexton Campus represented an exciting new era in fostering innovation and entrepreneurship in Atlantic Canada. We learned about alumni legacies in our own backyard — like in Masstown, in Sackville, and in your plane of vision. The Dal community worked to open its doors in new ways, too — a new space for the Imhotep’s Legacy Academy outreach program, new collaborations to expose African Nova Scotian youth to architecture, and a first-ever “sensory free” performance from the Fountain School of Performing Arts.
That focus on diversity and inclusion was a thread woven throughout the year at Dalhousie. We celebrated African Heritage Month, Pride Week and Mi’kmaq History Month, the latter with Dal’s 10th-annual Mawio’mi. The university welcomed Theresa Rajack-Talley as its first vice-provost of equity and inclusion. Conversations about curriculum diversity were common, culminating in a Senate-hosted forum about how to better embed equity, diversity and inclusion in learning and teaching at Dalhousie. Two Sexton Campus streets were named in honour of diversity trailblazers. And, in early September, Dalhousie received the long-underway scholarly panel report on the entanglements between Lord Dalhousie, the university’s namesake, and race and slavery, with the university apologizing and pledging to work on continuing its work to address this legacy.
