The following statement was given today in the House of Assembly by the Honourable Kevin O’Brien, Minister of Advanced Education and Skills:

Memorial University Accomplishments Celebrated in President’s Report

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to talk about the latest President’s Report from Memorial University. On Monday, November 5, I was taken on a virtual tour of Memorial’s annual retrospective called Face Forward: President’s Report 2013 by Dr. Gary Kachanoski. For the first time, the report is a standalone multimedia website, which provides an overview of the university’s accomplishments.

Back in 2003, the Provincial Government capital investment in Memorial was $1.2 million. Today, in 2013, this government Mr. Speaker is investing $40.8 million, an increase of 3,300 per cent. This substantial funding is paying for research, new labs, residences, teaching and research space. This support also includes planning for the new core sciences building, which will create nearly 1,440 direct and indirect person years of employment and approximately $94 million in labour income during its construction phase.

Today, at Memorial’s campuses in St. John’s, Corner Brook and Harlow, England, plus online education, there are 18,678 people enrolled at our university – an impressive number.

I’d also like to include a story of accomplishment from Labrador, where 17 students in Happy Valley-Goose Bay completed a customized, four-year, Bachelor of Social Work program this past June. This partnership between Memorial, the Labrador Institute, the Nunatsiavut Government and College of the North Atlantic has resulted in over 90 per cent of graduates being employed. The program also won the national Changemakers Initiative: Inspiring Approaches to First Nations, Metis and Inuit Learning award in 2012.

Mr. Speaker, as announced in Budget 2013, Memorial is undertaking an efficiency review. The review will help position the university for the future and tell us how to best target investments to continue to support innovative growth and programming. Any efficiencies the university finds will be reinvested into its post-secondary programming, students and other priorities as the province’s only university continues to deliver world-class post-secondary education. With an ongoing tuition freeze, millions invested in research funding and infrastructure and planning for the future, Memorial University continues to set a course as a leader in post-secondary education across Canada and the world.

Thank you.

2013 11 28                                     1:50 p.m.