Faculty of Education

Previously named: Department of Philosophy and Education, Department of Psychology and Education, Department of Education

Established: 1950 (as Department of Education), 1964 (as Faculty of Education)

History: The study of Education at UNB had existed well before the establishment of the Faculty of Education. Before 1944, Education had existed within the Philosophy Department as elective Education courses. For the next four years, it existed within the Psychology Department in much the same way. During this time, one could earn a Bachelor of Arts in Education by completing 6 ch of Education courses in the 3^rd and 4^th years of the degree. Only beginning in 1950 did Education separate from other departments, and a Bachelor of Education became available, which was significantly more centered on Education courses. It could be achieved by completing four required Education courses and one required Psychology course, any two additional Education courses, and electives to meet the required credit hours.

Prior to 1958, the study of Physical Education existed within the study of Education, when one could earn only a Bachelor of Education. Starting in 1958, though, a Bachelor of Physical Education was offered. This new Bachelor of Physical Education was 4 years in length, and required many more Physical Education classes than did the Bachelor of Education that came before it. The Bachelor of Physical Education granted its recipient a New Brunswick teacher’s license (in Physical Education), and certificate IV. Physical Education became its own faculty in 1976: the Faculty of Physical Education and Recreation. This specific faculty was short-lived though, as it only ran from 1976-1996. It went through three Deans of Physical Education: Garth A. Paton (1976-1981), William W. MacGillivary (1981-1992), and Terry Haggerty (1992- 1996). However, the Faculty of Physical Education was not abandoned; it was merely reimagined into the Faculty of Kinesiology (1996). Terry Haggerty continued as Dean of Kinesiology, and the Faculty of Kinesiology continued to offer the 4 year program leading to the Bachelor of Physical Education.

The study of Education changed greatly when the New Brunswick Teacher’s College (known previously as the Normal School) was relocated to the UNB Fredericton campus in 1964, although much of the planning had taken place the year before in 1963. This was the same year that the Department of Education changed to the Faculty of Education at UNB, and a year after the appointment of the Faculty’s first Dean, Robert J. Love. Members of the Teacher’s College staff were invited to attend UNB’s faculty meetings, and a banquet was hosted by UNB for the Teacher’s College staff to indicate their goodwill. Around this time, the welcome news reached UNB of a French-speaking Teacher’s College to be opened in Moncton. This allowed the possibility of bringing English-speaking Teacher training under general university control, while French-speaking Teacher training would be affiliated with the University of Moncton.

Nearly a decade later, on September 1^st, 1973, the Teacher’s College and the Teacher Education section of the New Brunswick Institute of Technology amalgamated with the Faculty of Education at UNB Fredericton. This amalgamation resulted in an enlarged Faculty containing five administrative divisions: Elementary and Secondary Division, Fifth year and Graduate Studies, Physical Education, Vocational Education, and Practical Studies. These divisions were dissolved in 1999, resulting in a single, cohesive Faculty. The amalgamation was finalized by the completing ceremonies of the Teacher’s College and the Institute of Technology, and by the renaming of the old Teacher’s College building as d’Avray Hall. The name d’Avray Hall was chosen to honor the first principal of the Normal School, and later professor at UNB, Joseph Marshall, Baron d’Avray.

The amalgamation prompted much change for the faculty. From 1973-1978, there was an intense focus on the development of a new 4-year undergraduate program, which included the phasing out of courses and certain programs that had existed before the amalgamation. Included in this phasing out was the courses of the Teacher's College, the courses of the New Brunswick Institute of Technology, and the Bachelor of Teaching, which was a program unique to UNB.  Prior to 1973, the Bachelor of Education (BEd) was an 8-month post-degree program. After the amalgamation, this 8-month program continued, and a 4-year program that could be taken directly after high school was added. These programs existed until they were dissolved in the Fall of 1993, and replaced by a 2-year post-degree program, and the option to complete a BEd concurrently with another degree. In the fall of 2008, these two options were replaced with a single 11-month post-degree program leading to a BEd. This program is still in use currently. 

Once the urgency to develop a new undergraduate program after the amalgamation had abated, there was a pressure to further develop the Graduate program. Some faculty members from pre-1973 had had keen interest in working on the Graduate program, but most of them hadn't the time to really focus on it until the late 1970s and early 1980s. In 1975, each division of the faculty took responsibility for the development of its own graduate program, and so three directorates of graduate studies were established in the faculty: Foundations of Education (included all the Foundation areas, Psychology, and Administration), Curriculum and Instruction (included most subjects taught in public school), and Vocational Education (included subject areas in Business, Industrial, and Home Economics). Before 1974, most Graduate students tended to register for one of the programs in the Educational Foundations area because staff in that Division had managed and taught in the program prior to the amalgamation. The Graduate program continued picking up in popularity, and due to a backlog of students registered in the Graduate program in 1977, two new ways were developed in which the Masters of Education (M. Ed.) could be obtained. These two additions were an M. Ed. Full course, and an M. Ed. part-time course or thesis, and they were added to the existing M. Ed. full-time thesis. The graduate degree had gone through some change over the next few decades, and today an M. Ed. can be concentrated in seven different areas: Adult Education, Counselling, Critical Studies in Education, Curriculum (F2F), Educational Administration and Leadership (online or F2F), Exceptional Learners, Instructional Design, and Curriculum (online). The three options to earning an M. Ed. now are: course work, project with report, or a thesis. The thesis option is recommended for those wanting to pursue doctoral studies, which has only become available at UNB in relatively recent years. UNB’s PhD degree in Education first became available in September of 1997, and was developed in response to the closure of the only two institutions in the Maritimes that had offered a PhD program in Education: the Atlantic Institute of Education, and the Faculty of Education at Dalhousie. Since these closures left the Maritimes without an institute offering a PhD in Education, there were more potential students, and so UNB was able to step in to provide the degree option.

The Faculty of Education is also involved with several projects outside of UNB. Since 1975, the faculty has contracted with a number of agencies for the delivery of educational projects in Kenya, Bhutan, and Trinidad. The faculty is also partnered with several externally funded research centres which are housed in the faculty. These centres include: The Early Childhood Education Centre (1991), The Mi’kmaq-Maliseet Institute (1980), Health and Education Research Group (HERG), CRYSTAL Project, Second Language Research Institute of Canada (1987), and the Canadian Research Institute for Social Policy (1996).

Physical location: Marshall d'Avray Hall

Deans:

Deans of Education

• 1963-1972 Robert J. Love
• 1972-1984 Donald A. MacIver
• 1978-1979 Dugald C. Blue (Acting Dean)
• 1984-1989 Andrew S. Hughes
• 1989-1994 Gerald M. Clarke
• 1994-1997 Laverne Smith
• 1997-2000 Henry E. Cowan
• 2000-2006 Marian Small
• 2006-2010 Sharon Rich
• 2010-2017 Ann Sherman
• 2017-2020 Katherine Winslow
• 2020-present Sharon Wahl

Deans of Physical Education

• 1976- 1981 Garth A. Paton
• 1981- 1992 William W. MacGillivary
• 1992- 1996 Terry Haggerty

Notes:

Source(s):

• UA Case 94; Sections 1, 3.
• UNB Calendars (UA RG 86), 1963-1964, 1964-1965, 1939-1940, 1943-1944, 1946-1947, 1950-1951, 1957-1958, 1958-1959, 1964-1965.
• Oral History Program: R. J. Love (UA RG 153)
• A. Sears (personal communication, November 11, 2014)

© UNB Archives & Special Collections, 2014