People at Laurier

Bruce Arai has been appointed to the new role of assistant provost: strategy for a one-year term. Arai will be responsible for developing and enacting strategies for enhancing not-for-credit and for-credit programming at Laurier. Arai has previously served as associate dean and dean of the Brantford campus and most recently, as dean of the Faculty of Human and Social Sciences. During Arai’s term as assistant provost: strategy, Lauren Eisler will serve as acting dean of Human and Social Sciences.

Former Deloitte executive John Bowey has been named the new chair of Laurier’s Board of Governors, succeeding Jamie Martin, who served as chair since 2009. Bowey, who enjoyed a 37-year career at Deloitte, has served on the Laurier board as a community-at-large representative since 2011. Previously, he served as vice-chair and chair of the audit and compliance committee, and as a member of the executive and governance, finance and investments, and HR and compensation committees. He remains a member of the Laurier Senate.

Longtime Laurier employee Jennifer Casey (BA ’89) was appointed to the position of assistant vice-president: enrolment services and registrar. Casey held the role in an acting capacity since July 2014, successfully leading the development of stronger evidence-based decision-making in Enrolment Services, particularly in recruitment and admissions activities. Most recently Casey served as director: university community relations at Laurier and has held increasingly senior positions within the university, including manager: liaison services, director of development operations, and university secretary.

Kathryn Carter (BA '88) has been appointed Laurier’s acting associate vice-president: Teaching and Learning. Carter previously served as associate dean: Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies and inter-faculty associate dean: academic coordination. In the latter role, she reported directly to the vice-president: academic and provost and was responsible for central advising at the Brantford campus and for supporting collaboration between and within multi-campus academic programs.

Robert Gordon has been named Laurier’s new vice-president: research. Gordon previously served as the dean of the Ontario Agricultural College and a professor in the School of Environmental Sciences at the University of Guelph since 2008. Prior to his role at the University of Guelph, Gordon spent a decade at the Nova Scotia Agricultural College (now part of Dalhousie University), where he held a Canada Research Chair in Agricultural Resource Management and served as dean of research, department head, and associate professor in the Department of Engineering. In addition to his five-year appointment as vice-president: research, Gordon will hold a faculty position in the Department of Geography and Environmental Studies.

Former Ontario cabinet minister John Milloy has joined Laurier and the Waterloo Lutheran Seminary in a dual appointment. Milloy, former member of provincial parliament for Kitchener Centre and senior adviser to former prime minister Jean Chrétien, will serve a two-year term as an assistant professor of public ethics and co-director of the Centre for Public Ethics at the Seminary, a federated college of Laurier. He will also hold a one-year appointment as the inaugural practitioner-in-residence in applied political science at Laurier.

Marlin Nagtegaal was appointed interim director of the Beckett School at Wilfrid Laurier University. The Beckett School of Music, which was gifted to the university in April 2015, became part of a new Laurier Conservatory of Music in the fall. Nagtegaal has taught at the Beckett School of Music for over 25 years, and in Laurier’s Faculty of Music for over 15 years. His one-year term runs until June 15, 2016.

Richard Nemesvari has been appointed dean of Laurier’s Faculty of Arts, joining the university from St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, Nova Scotia, where he served as dean of Arts since 2010. Nemesvari, originally from Waterloo, had a long, decorated career at St. FX, teaching in the university’s English department for 20 years before being named dean of Arts. Among his many accomplishments while heading St. FX’s Faculty of Arts, Nemesvari was responsible for leading the development of the Arts Pathways website, which links academic choices in Arts disciplines with career opportunities. He also oversaw the development of a first-year Social Justice Colloquium, modeled after St. FX’s successful Humanities Colloquium.