CAPE BRETON

CBU celebrates BASE grads

SYDNEY — Two Cape Breton University professors have more than the usual reasons to be proud of their students when they graduate today.

Professors Dana Mount and Deanna van Rooyen are co-founders and co-directors of the bachelor of arts and science in environment degree program and the first four students to complete the program will be graduating today.

Along with being proud of the graduating students — Drew Maclean, Brittany Lawrence, Rory Mcneil and Hannah Kosick (who is this year's valedictorian) — the professors are proud of how quickly they created and launched the program four years ago.

"That may seem like a while but things in academia can move very slowly," Mount explained.

"We had to go through the Maritime Provinces Higher Education Council. We had to have our program extremely reviewed by experts, internally reviewed of course and then by that regional council."

During a university meeting in 2013, CBU'S thenpresident David Wheeler asked professors if they could think of any new courses or programs the university could offer.

Mount and van Rooyen had been speaking about the advantages of having a program focused on the environment and decided this was the time to put their ideas into action.

Along with creating new courses, the professors also drew on the number of environment courses already being offered by the university.

The program is the first at the school which is interdisciplinary — with courses from the arts and sciences departments.

"The main motivation for this program is what makes it unique in that environmental problems, they are multifaceted. There are technical aspects, they have, obviously, ecological aspects. But then they exist in a social, political and cultural framework," said Mount.

"Our real vision for this project is to prepare students to confront environment issues from that whole range of access points. To equip students with that scientific and political, cultural knowledge to really step up and address the problems holistically."

Since the first intake in September 2017, student enrolment has been seven or eight students yearly.

The program includes a co-op work placement with students working in areas like community and public education, lobster technician and environmental assessments.

Mount said the program is also advantageous to people looking to become journalists specializing in green issues.

For more information about the program go to cbu. ca.

The virtual graduation ceremony for some 2,000 students can be accessed at cbuconvocation2021.ca, beginning today at 2 p.m. AST.