UBC Okanagan marks milestones for professors and staff

Long service employees at UBC’s Okanagan campus were honoured Thursday. Pictured are: Gary Pearson, Robin Dods, Daniel Dural, Nancy Holmes, Rob Johnson, Bernard Momer and Ian Walker. Missing from the photo are: Briar Craig, Linda Hatt, Carl Hodge, Mark Holder, Patricia Tomic and Linda Falkingham.

It’s been a year of milestones for UBC with the university celebrating its 100th anniversary and the Okanagan campus marking 10 years since it officially opened.

Different milestones were marked last week, as faculty and staff who have served for more than 25 years (at either UBC and at Okanagan College) were celebrated at the university’s Long Service Recognition Dinner.

The annual event is an important way to honour long-serving faculty and employees who have helped shape the university, explained Deborah Buszard, deputy vice-chancellor and principal of UBC Okanagan. While talking about the transition from Okanagan University College to UBC and Okanagan College, Buszard said the two institutions currently provide more than 17,000 post-secondary positions.

“I am in awe of the people who went through that transition and helped create these wonderful institutions,” she said. “We are so lucky that we do have two wonderful institutions in the Okanagan that have both grown to be extraordinarily successful.”

UBC staff and faculty honoured for 25 years of service include:

• Briar Craig, Nancy Holmes, and Gary Pearson — Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies
• Daniel Durall, Linda Hatt, Carl Hodge, Mark Holder, Bernard Momer, Patricia Tomic, and Ian Walker — Irving K. Barber School of Arts and Sciences
• Rob Johnson — Athletics and Recreation

Faculty congratulated for 30 years of service were:

• Robin Dods — Irving K. Barber School of Arts and Sciences
• Linda Falkingham — Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies

Along with music and top television shows and movies from both 1986 and 1991, significant news events, like the space shuttle Challenger tragedy and the gulf war five years later, were also part of the highlight reel.

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