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Concordia University (
French French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents ** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...
: ''Université Concordia'') is a public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1974 following the merger of Loyola College and Sir George Williams University, Concordia is one of the three universities in Quebec where English is the primary language of instruction (the others being McGill and Bishop's). As of the 2020–21 academic year, there were 51,253 students enrolled in credit courses at Concordia, making the university among the largest in Canada by enrollment. The university has two campuses, set approximately apart: Sir George Williams Campus is the main campus, located in the Quartier Concordia neighbourhood of
Downtown Montreal Downtown Montreal ( French: ''Centre-Ville de Montréal'') is the central business district of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The district is situated on the southernmost slope of Mount Royal, and occupies the western portion of the borough of Vil ...
in the borough of Ville Marie; and Loyola Campus in the residential district of Notre-Dame-de-Grâce. With four faculties, a school of graduate studies and numerous colleges, centres and institutes, Concordia offers over 400 undergraduate and 200 graduate programs and courses. Concordia is a non-sectarian and coeducational institution, with more than 230,000 alumni worldwide. The university is a member of the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada,
International Association of Universities The International Association of Universities (IAU) is a membership-led non-governmental organization working in the field of higher education. It comprises more than 600 higher education institutions and organizations in over 130 countries. IAU ...
, Canadian Association of Research Libraries, Canadian University Society for Intercollegiate Debate, Canadian Bureau for International Education and
Canadian University Press Canadian University Press is a non-profit co-operative and newswire service owned by more than 50 student newspapers at post-secondary schools in Canada. Founded in 1938, CUP is the oldest student newswire service in the world and the oldest ...
. The university's varsity teams, known as the Stingers, compete in the Quebec Student Sport Federation of U Sports.


History

Although the roots of its founding institutions go back more than 160 years, Concordia University was formed on August 24, 1974, through the merger of Loyola College (1896) and Sir George Williams University (1926). On February 16, 2017, Concordia University recognized that it is located on unceded Indigenous lands.


Loyola College

Loyola College traces its roots to an English-language program at the
Jesuit , image = Ihs-logo.svg , image_size = 175px , caption = ChristogramOfficial seal of the Jesuits , abbreviation = SJ , nickname = Jesuits , formation = , founders ...
Collège Sainte-Marie de Montréal (today part of the Université du Québec à Montréal) at the Sacred Heart Convent. In 1896, Loyola College was established at the corner of Bleury Street and Saint Catherine Street. Loyola College was named in honour of Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Society of Jesus. On March 10, 1898, the institution was incorporated by the
Government of Quebec A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is a ...
and became a full-fledged college. The same year, following a fire, the college was relocated further west on Drummond Street, south of Saint Catherine Street. Although founded as a ''collège classique'' (the forerunners of Quebec's college system), Loyola began granting university degrees through Université Laval in 1903. The college moved into the present west-end campus on Sherbrooke Street West in Notre-Dame-de-Grâce in 1916. The School of Sociology opened in 1918. Since Loyola College never became a chartered university, it did not have the ability to grant its own university degrees. In 1920, the institution became affiliated with Université de Montréal, which began granting its degrees instead of Université Laval. Memorial bronze honour roll plaques in the entrance hall near the administrative offices are dedicated to those from Loyola College who fought in the First World War, Second World War and Korean War. The inter-war period was marked by the shift of education in the institution, the ''collège classique'' education was replaced by humanistic education (
Liberal Arts College A liberal arts college or liberal arts institution of higher education is a college with an emphasis on undergraduate study in liberal arts and sciences. Such colleges aim to impart a broad general knowledge and develop general intellectual capac ...
) in 1940, and Loyola became a four-year institution. Theology and philosophy were taught to all students until 1972. In 1940, the Faculty of Science and the Department of Engineering, which became a faculty in 1964, were created. In addition to providing the same undergraduate programs as other colleges, the institution also offered innovative fields of study at the time, such as exercise science and
communication studies Communication studies or communication science is an academic discipline that deals with processes of human communication and behavior, patterns of communication in interpersonal relationships, social interactions and communication in differen ...
. Students could enrol in academic majors starting in 1953 and honours programs in 1958. Students graduating from Loyola could afterwards pursue graduate-level education in other universities, with a few earning
Rhodes Scholarship The Rhodes Scholarship is an international postgraduate award for students to study at the University of Oxford, in the United Kingdom. Established in 1902, it is the oldest graduate scholarship in the world. It is considered among the world' ...
s. Starting in 1958, Loyola also began offering its first evening courses for students not being able to go to school full-time. New courses were given in library science and
faith community nursing Faith Community Nursing, also known as Parish Nursing, Parrish Nursing, Congregational Nursing or Church Nursing, is a movement of over 15,000 registered nurses, primarily in the United States. There are also Parish nurses in Australia, the Baha ...
. Since its creation, Loyola College had welcomed almost exclusively young English-speaking Catholic men as students. It became co-ed in 1959 and became less homogeneous with the ever-increasing number of foreign students. Obtaining a university charter was an important issue in the 1960s. Although many wanted Loyola College to become Loyola University, the Government of Quebec preferred to annex it to Sir George Williams University. Negotiations began in 1968 and ended with the creation of Concordia University on August 24, 1974.


Sir George Williams University

In 1851, the first YMCA in North America was established on Ste. Helene Street in Old Montreal. Beginning in 1873, the YMCA offered evening classes to allow working people in the English-speaking community to pursue their education while working during the day. Sixty years later, the Montreal YMCA relocated to its current location on
Stanley Street Stanley Street may refer to: Streets: *Stanley Street, Brisbane *Stanley Street, East Sydney *Stanley Street, Hong Kong *Stanley Street, Liverpool * Stanley Street (Montreal) * Stanley Street, Singapore In fiction: *Stanley Street, the prime setti ...
in
Downtown Montreal Downtown Montreal ( French: ''Centre-Ville de Montréal'') is the central business district of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The district is situated on the southernmost slope of Mount Royal, and occupies the western portion of the borough of Vil ...
. In 1926, the education program at the YMCA was reorganized as Sir George Williams College, named after George Williams, founder of the original YMCA in London, England, upon which the Montreal YMCA was based. In 1934, Sir George Williams College offered the first undergraduate credit course in adult education in Canada. Sir George Williams College received its university charter from the provincial government in 1948, though it remained the education arm of the Montreal YMCA. Sir George Williams expanded into its first standalone building, the Norris Building, in 1956. In 1959, the college requested that the Quebec legislature amend its university charter, changing its name to Sir George Williams University. It established a Centre for Human Relations and Community Studies in 1963. Sir George Williams continued to hold classes in the YMCA building until the construction of the Henry F. Hall Building in 1966. The university gained international attention in 1969 for what is known as the "Computer Centre Incident." Notably in spring 1968, six black West Indian students at Sir George Williams University accused a biology lecturer (later assistant professor) of racism. The complaint was lodged to the dean of students, Magnus Flynn. Dissatisfied with how the administration was handling their complaint, the students decided to make it a public issue in fall 1968. The students occupied and destroyed the Hall Building's ninth floor computer lab after threatening to do so should the riot squad be called. The events forced the university to re-evaluate its policies, leading to the creation of the Ombuds Office and establishment of the University Regulations on Rights and Responsibilities in April 1971. (See Sir George Williams Affair). Following several years of discussions and planning, Sir George Williams University merged with Loyola College to create Concordia University in 1974. Concordia provided students with representative student organizations and greater power over administrative decisions at the university.


Merger

In 1968, in the wake of the Parent Commission Report, which recommended the secularization of Quebec's educational system, the
Government of Quebec A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is a ...
asked Loyola College and Sir George Williams University to consider some form of union. The proposed merger was discussed by the Loyola-Sir George Williams Joint Steering Committee, a committee created to analyze all forms of possible mergers of the two institutions. It was proposed, in 1969, to create a university federation that allowed students to take courses at both campuses without paying additional fees. There was also mention of a
shuttle bus service Public transport bus services are generally based on regular operation of transit buses along a route calling at agreed bus stops according to a published public transport timetable. History of buses Origins While there are indications ...
linking the remote facilities apart. Criticized for the difficulties encountered by the cohesion of the various departments and faculties, this option was set aside, but not totally rejected by the Joint Steering Committee. The Joint Committee of Representatives of the Board of Trustees of Loyola College and the Board of Governors of Sir George Williams University was formed in December 1971 and in fall 1972 produced a document outlining the basis of a university with two campuses. While the committee considered a number of possible models, including that of a loose federation, the solution finally adopted was that of an integrated institution, Concordia University, operating under the existing charter of Sir George Williams University. Following several revisions in November 1972, the document became the main plan of the proposed merger. It was accepted by both institutions, which began the process of consolidating their operations. In early 1973, the two institutions announced the merger would take place that fall. However, legal and administrative procedures delayed the merger for another year. On August 24, 1974, the Government of Quebec recognized the merger, thus creating Concordia University. The name was taken from the motto of the city of Montreal, ''Concordia salus'' (meaning "well-being through harmony").


Post-merger

The legal existence of Concordia dates from August 24, 1974. The integration of the various faculties of the two institutions into a coherent whole took several years. The five faculties of the new university were a combination of existing faculties and departments prior to the merger. There was a Faculty of Commerce, Faculty of Science and Faculty of Arts at Sir George Williams University. Additionally, there was a Faculty of Arts and Science at Loyola College. The Faculty of Engineering of both institutions had previously been combined. The Faculty of Fine Arts was created in 1976. The first phase of combination of the Faculties of Arts and Science began in 1977 and ended in 1985. In the late 1980s, the Georges P. Vanier Library on the Loyola Campus was enlarged, while in 1992, the library on Sir George Williams Campus moved to the new
J.W. McConnell Building The J.W. McConnell Building is an academic building on the Sir George Williams campus of Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec. Built in 1992, it is named for John Wilson McConnell, a Canadian businessman and philanthropist whose foundation contr ...
. The Norris Building was closed the same year. On August 24, 1992,
Valery Fabrikant ) , occupation = Associate professor of mechanical engineering , birth_date = , birth_place = Minsk, Soviet Union (now Belarus) , nationality = Belarusian-Canadian , date = 24 August 1992 , time = 2:30 p.m. ( UTC-4) , targets ...
, a mechanical engineering professor, shot five colleagues, killing four, on the ninth floor of the Hall Building. Fabrikant was convicted of the murders and sentenced to life imprisonment. The university erected a memorial to the slain professors (four granite tables) in the Hall Building lobby. Starting in 1998, the university entered a major phase of expansion to meet its growing student enrolment. In August 2003, Concordia inaugurated the Richard J. Renaud Science Complex on Loyola Campus. In 2005, the university launched a major urban redevelopment project in the neighbourhood surrounding Sir George Williams Campus known as the Quartier Concordia. That same year, the Engineering, Computer Science and Visual Arts Integrated Complex opened its doors on Saint Catherine Street West between Guy Street and Mackay Street. In September 2009, the university marked the opening of the new building for the John Molson School of Business. In September 2015, the university held a ribbon cutting for the District 3 Innovation Center's new space on the sixth floor of Concordia's Faubourg Building.


Campuses

The university has two campuses, set approximately 7 km apart: Sir George Williams Campus in the downtown core of Montreal, in an area known as Quartier Concordia (around the Guy–Concordia Metro station), and Loyola Campus in the residential west-end district of Notre-Dame-de-Grâce. They are connected by free shuttle-bus service for students, faculty and staff.


Libraries, archives and galleries

Concordia University has three main library locations. The R. Howard Webster Library is located in the J.W. McConnell Building on the Sir George Williams Campus and the Georges P. Vanier Library is located on the Loyola Campus. On September 2, 2014, the Library opened the Grey Nuns Reading Room, a silent study space for Concordia students located in the former Chapel of the Invention of the Holy Cross. The Concordia Library houses several special and unique collections including the Azrieli Holocaust Collection and the Irving Layton Collection. Most special collections are located in the Vanier Library. The Library also maintains the university's institutional repository, Spectrum. The Library is a member of the Canadian Association of Research Libraries. The Library also has partnerships with the Canadian Research Knowledge Network and the Data Liberation Initiative. Concordia's Henry F. Hall Building houses the Leonard and Bina Ellen Art Gallery Samuel Schecter, an art enthusiast and businessperson, set up two funds in 1962 to be used for the purchase of Canadian art at Sir George Williams University and at Loyola College (Montreal). When Sir George Williams University and Loyola College merged to form Concordia in 1974, their respective art collections were also combined. The collection of the Leonard and Bina Ellen Gallery consists of 1,700 paintings, sculptures, prints, photographs and videos, many of the works by 20th-century Canadian artists. Concordia's Engineering, Computer Science and Visual Arts Complex houses the FOFA Gallery, a primary venue for exhibiting works by faculty, students and alumni of the Faculty of Fine Arts. Concordia's Records Management and Archives stores official records of, or relating to, or people/activities connected with Concordia University and its two founding institutions. The collection consists of manuscripts, texts, photographs, audio-visual material and artifacts.


New buildings

In 2001, Concordia embarked on a mission to develop and expand the quality of the downtown campus, and to revive the west end in Montreal. The university also acquired the historic
Grey Nuns The Sisters of Charity of Montreal, formerly called The Sisters of Charity of the Hôpital Général of Montreal and more commonly known as the Grey Nuns of Montreal, is a Canadian religious institute of Roman Catholic religious sisters, founde ...
Mother House ] A mother is the female parent of a child. A woman may be considered a mother by virtue of having given birth, by raising a child who may or may not be her biological offspring, or by supplying her ovum for fertilisation in the case of gestati ...
near its Sir George Williams Campus, for $18 million. Built in 1871, it would alone double the size of the current downtown campus. From 2007 to 2022, the university will begin occupying the building in four separate phases. The large property will house the Faculty of Fine Arts and possibly the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema, and other departments. Concordia Residence Life currently houses nearly 250 students each year in the Grey Nuns Building. The dorm rooms are among the largest in the country, as many of the rooms have been transformed from when the section of the Grey Nuns Building was occupied by the Grey Nuns. The site was designated a National Historic Sites of Canada, National Historic Site of Canada in 2011. The Engineering, Computer Science and Visual Arts Integrated Complex (EV Building) at Saint Catherine Street and Guy Street was opened in September 2005. The building is directly connected to the Guy–Concordia Metro station and also houses Le Gym, a facility of Concordia's Department of Recreation and Athletics. Across the street, the 100-year-old TD Canada Trust building was donated to Concordia in 2005 by the Toronto-Dominion Bank. Construction of the new John Molson Building (MB), the home of the John Molson School of Business located on the corner of Guy Street and De Maisonneuve Boulevard West, began in February 2007. At a ceremony at Concordia on October 30, 2006, the Quebec Minister of Education, Recreation and Sports, Jean-Marc Fournier, announced an investment of $60 million towards the construction of the new building. The government's $60 million represented about half of the total construction costs. Construction started on January 22, 2006, and the building was completed and opened in September 2009. The 15-story building now houses the John Molson School's 9,200 full- and part-time students under the same roof for the first time. The departments of contemporary dance, theatre and music also moved into the new MB Building. It is connected to the EV Building by a tunnel under Guy Street. In April 2010, a 120-metre tunnel completed the underground connections of the Guy-Concordia Metro station with the Henry F. Hall Building and the J.W. McConnell Building. Concordia opened the Applied Science Hub on the Loyola Campus in December 2020. The $63.1-million state-of-the-art facility — built thanks to $36.7 million in support from the Government of Canada and the Government of Quebec — was strategically designed to enable interdisciplinary collaboration and research between faculty and students in the Faculty of Arts and Science, Gina Cody School of Engineering and Computer Science as well as the District 3 Innovation Centre.


Quartier Concordia

Quartier Concordia is a neighbourhood redevelopment project centred around Concordia University's Sir George Williams Campus in downtown Montreal. Bordered by Sherbrooke Street to the north, Saint Mathieu Street to the west, René Lévesque Boulevard to the south and Bishop Street to the east, the district is designed to be a green urban campus that will improve the use and quality of public places and spaces, student life on campus and transportation. As part of the redesign, the small Norman Bethune Square was redesigned and enlarged. Sidewalks in the area were also be widened, with additional trees. As of September 2010, a tunnel links the university's Henry F. Hall and J.W. McConnell buildings with the Guy-Concordia Metro station. The hallway was completed in Spring 2010. However, a project to create a green space on Mackay Street was put on hold.


Administration and governance


Governance

Concordia is led by its president and vice-chancellor (referred to as the president), provost and vice-presidents. The Board of Governors and the Senate manage the university's affairs and academic integrity. The president and the senior leadership ensure transparency and accountability of the administration. The administration is supervised by the Board of Governors and Senate. Under the Charter of Concordia University, the university's highest governing body is the Board of Governors, which has final authority over the affairs of the university. The Senate derives its authority from the Board of Governors.


Academic units

The university has four faculties — Faculty of Arts and Science, Faculty of Fine Arts, Gina Cody School of Engineering and Computer Science and John Molson School of Business — as well as the School of Graduate Studies. The respective faculties supervise the academic departments/institutes. For example, the Faculty of Art and Science oversees the Department of Applied Human Sciences and Simone de Beauvoir Institute.Academic units
''Concordia.ca''


Finances

In 2020–21 year, Concordia received $523.1 million in revenue. Fifty-three per cent of the university's revenue comes from grants of the
Government of Quebec A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is a ...
, which are given based on the student population.Financial Services, Concordia University
/ref> As of 2022, the university's foundation has $344.004 million in its endowment. In November 2017, Concordia launched the Campaign for Concordia. The campaign's main target is to raise $250 million to support the university's nine strategic directions that will advance Concordia's position as "Canada’s next-generation university". In January 2018, Concordia President Alan Shepard reported that the university had already reached "more than halfway" of its goal. As of 2021, the campaign is still ongoing.


Academics

Students begin their university studies in September or, in some cases, in January or May. An undergraduate degree normally requires three or four years of full-time study, a master's one to three years, and a PhD at least four years. Diplomas and certificates usually take no longer than a year and a half to complete. Concordia has more than 400 undergraduate programs under the Faculty of Arts and Science, the
Gina Cody Gina Parvaneh Cody is a Canadian-Iranian engineer and business leader. In 1989, Gina became the first woman in Canada to earn a PhD in building engineering. In 2018, following her donation of $15 million, Concordia University renamed its facul ...
School of Engineering and Computer Science, the Faculty of Fine Arts and the John Molson School of Business. Students are normally enrolled in one of these faculties but may take courses from any of the others as part of their studies. Class sizes vary from 30 to 400 students. The School of Graduate Studies offers about 70 programs leading to master's and doctoral degrees, as well as graduate diplomas and certificates for professionals seeking to upgrade their knowledge and skills. Concordia Continuing Education offers university-level studies and training to those from diverse backgrounds and stages of life. The Institute for Co-operative Education administers more than 45 bachelor's and master's programs in an alternating co-op work-study format. Concordia's co-op programs enable students to enrich their learning by participating in career-relevant 12–17-week full-time, paid work terms. Depending on their faculty and major, co-op students will usually graduate with a minimum of 12 months of academically relevant work experience. There are also Industrial Experience and Professional Experience options in certain disciplines that enable students to participate in a summer-only work term. Concordia is a member of the Canadian Association for Co-operative Education (CAFCE). During the 2020–2021 academic year, there were 37,272 undergraduate students, 9,539 graduate students and 4,442 continuing education students enrolled at Concordia.


Faculty of Arts and Science

Concordia's Faculty of Arts and Science consists of 21 departments and seven colleges, schools and institutes in the humanities, sciences and social sciences at the undergraduate and graduate levels. There are 279 programs, offering more than 2,400 courses. There are 851 full-time and part-time faculty members. During the 2019–2020 academic year, there were 19,724 undergraduate and graduate students enrolled in the faculty. In addition to regular academic programs, the Faculty of Arts and Science also includes three colleges, two schools and two institutes. These are the Liberal Arts College, the Loyola College for Diversity and Sustainability, the School of Community and Public Affairs, the School of Canadian Irish Studies, the Science College, the
Simone de Beauvoir Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist, and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even th ...
Institute and the Concordia Institute for Canadian Jewish Studies. The Loyola College for Diversity and Sustainability (formerly Loyola International College) is an interdisciplinary college on the Loyola Campus, the original site of Loyola College. It offers minor programs in Diversity and the Contemporary World and Sustainability Studies. At the undergraduate level, the Faculty of Arts and Science offers both Bachelor of Arts (BA) and Bachelor of Science (BSc) programs with majors ranging from economics, political science and sociology to actuarial mathematics, biology and ecology.


Gina Cody School of Engineering and Computer Science

The Gina Cody School of Engineering and Computer Science, formerly known as Faculty of Engineering and Computer Science, is named after Concordia alumna
Gina Cody Gina Parvaneh Cody is a Canadian-Iranian engineer and business leader. In 1989, Gina became the first woman in Canada to earn a PhD in building engineering. In 2018, following her donation of $15 million, Concordia University renamed its facul ...
, who donated $15 million to the university in 2018. In response, the university renamed its faculty of engineering and computer science in her honour, making it the first engineering school to be named after a woman in Canada and globally. In 2018, '' Maclean's'' ranked its programs as one of the best in Canada. The faculty offers 19 undergraduate and 34 graduate-level programs in the following departments: Building, Civil and Environmental Engineering; Centre for Engineering in Society; Computer Science and Software Engineering; Concordia Institute for Information Systems Engineering; Chemical and Materials Engineering; Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Mechanical, Industrial and
Aerospace Engineering Aerospace engineering is the primary field of engineering concerned with the development of aircraft and spacecraft. It has two major and overlapping branches: aeronautical engineering and astronautical engineering. Avionics engineering is si ...
. The engineering programs are all accredited by the Canadian Engineering Accreditation Board (CEAB). During the 2020–2021 academic year, there were 10,158 undergraduate and graduate students enrolled in the faculty. ;Troitsky Bridge Building Competition The
Troitsky Bridge Building Competition The Troitsky Bridge Building Competition is an annual event that takes place at Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada in the spring. Participating teams of engineering students come from universities across Canada and the United States. ...
brings together engineering students from across Canada and parts of the United States. Teams of students representing their universities must build a 1-metre-long bridge using only regular popsicle sticks,
toothpick A toothpick is a small thin stick of wood, plastic, bamboo, metal, bone or other substance with at least one and sometimes two pointed ends to insert between teeth to remove detritus, usually after a meal. Toothpicks are also used for festive ...
s, dental floss, and white
glue Adhesive, also known as glue, cement, mucilage, or paste, is any non-metallic substance applied to one or both surfaces of two separate items that binds them together and resists their separation. The use of adhesives offers certain advant ...
. A panel of judges grades the bridges based on originality and presentation while a hydraulic loading device is used to determine the maximum load and performance.


Faculty of Fine Arts

The Faculty of
Fine Arts In European academic traditions, fine art is developed primarily for aesthetics or creative expression, distinguishing it from decorative art or applied art, which also has to serve some practical function, such as pottery or most metalwork ...
offers 60 programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels. It includes nine departments and four research institutes. During the 2019–2020 academic year, there were 3,964 undergraduate and graduate students enrolled in the faculty. Among the departments is
The Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema The Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema, a division of the Faculty of Fine Arts at Concordia University, is a film school located in Montreal, Quebec. Informally known as MHSoC, the school accepts around 250 students a year for programs in animation, ...
. It is informally identified as MHSoC, and accepts 250 students a year for study in the fields of film animation, film production and film studies. It is the largest, university-based centre for the study of film animation, film production and film studies in Canada.


John Molson School of Business

The John Molson School of Business (formerly the Faculty of Commerce and Administration) offers 18 different programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels from five different departments. The departments are Accountancy, Finance, Marketing, Management and Supply Chain and Business Technology Management. During the 2020–2021 academic year there were 9,915 undergraduate students and graduate students enrolled, and John Molson School has 56,000 alumni. The John Molson School is accredited by the
Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, also known as AACSB International, is an American professional organization. It was founded as the American Assembly of Collegiate Schools of Business in 1916 to provide accreditation to ...
(AACSB). The business school is located in a
LEED Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) is a green building certification program used worldwide. Developed by the non-profit U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), it includes a set of rating systems for the design, construction ...
silver-certified building.


Reputation

Concordia University has placed well in postsecondary school rankings. In the 2022 ''
Academic Ranking of World Universities The ''Academic Ranking of World Universities'' (''ARWU''), also known as the Shanghai Ranking, is one of the annual publications of world university rankings. The league table was originally compiled and issued by Shanghai Jiao Tong University ...
'' rankings, the university ranked 501–600 in the world. The 2023 '' QS World University Rankings'' ranked the university 551–560 in the world. The 2023 '' Times Higher Education World University Rankings'' placed Concordia 601–800 in the world. In '' U.S. News & World Report'' 2022–23 global university rankings, the university placed 653rd in the world. The university was also ranked by '' Maclean's'' Canadian university rankings. In October 2022, ''Maclean's'' ranked Concordia 10th in Canada under its comprehensive universities category, tied with Wilfrid Laurier University. The university's John Molson School of Business was ranked among the top 10 Canadian business schools and the top 100 worldwide by '' The Economist'' in 2022. Moreover, Concordia was ranked seventh in Canada and 229th among world universities in the International Professional Classification of Higher Education Institutions, a worldwide ranking compiled by the École des Mines de Paris that uses as its sole criterion the number of graduates occupying the rank of chief executive officer at
Fortune 500 The ''Fortune'' 500 is an annual list compiled and published by ''Fortune'' magazine that ranks 500 of the largest United States corporations by total revenue for their respective fiscal years. The list includes publicly held companies, along ...
companies.


Student life


Student housing

Four residence buildings are available for students who wish to live on campus: Grey Nuns Residence, Jesuit Residence, Hingston Hall (HA) and Hingston Hall (HB). For students who choose to live off campus, the
Concordia Student Union The Concordia Student Union (usually referred to as the CSU) is the organization representing undergraduate students at Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Its membership totals around 30 people and is elected by students, in recen ...
's Off-Campus Housing and Job Bank (HoJo) offers classified ads, legal advice and safety resources.


Sustainability

Concordia's "sustainability hub" promotes sustainable development. In February 2019, Concordia became the first university in Canada to issue a sustainable bond. According to the university webpage the bond will "generate environmental and social benefits as defined by the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals". According to Denis Cossette, the university's chief financial officer, "the $25-million senior unsecured bond offers investors a 3.626 per cent yield and has a duration of 20 years." Because of this bond, Concordia would be able to issue sustainable bonds instead of green bonds.


Athletics

Concordia University's athletic teams are called the Concordia Stingers. They compete with other schools in Canadian Interuniversity Sport, and more specifically, in the Quebec Student Sports Federation and the
Quebec University Football League The Quebec University Football League was the Canadian football conference for Quebec universities who participate in CIS football until the completion of the 2010 football season. It has since been renamed Réseau du sport étudiant du Québec foo ...
. The university has 10 varsity teams. In the fall, teams compete in Canadian football, men's and women's soccer, men's and women's rugby union and sport wrestling. There are female and male wrestlers on the team from year to year, and they compete as one team. In the winter, teams compete in men's and women's ice hockey and men's and women's basketball. The Concordia Stingers women's ice hockey team won the Canadian national championships in 1998 and 1999. The Stingers baseball club beat Cape Breton University Capers 12–2 to win the 2009 National Baseball Crown.


Student organizations

The Concordia Student Union (CSU) represents undergraduate students. Its membership totals more than 35,000 students. Concordia students voted in favour of accreditation of their student union in a referendum in December 2000. As a result, the CSU is now legally accountable only to its student constituents. The Graduate Students' Association (GSA) represents the collective interests and promotes the general welfare of the graduate students of Concordia University. Its membership stands at around 9,675 students for the 2018–19 academic year. Another noteworthy aspect of Concordia University is the number of longstanding fee-levy groups which provide numerous services, funded by the student population in the form of per-credit fees. These include the People's Potato, which offers a four-course vegan meal, the anti-capitalist grocery store, The Frigo Vert, and the Coop Bookstore . Concordia University is home to local and international fraternities and sororities: * - Delta Phi Epsilon sorority, represented by the ''Beta Pi chapter'', was established at Concordia in 1994. * - Zeta Tau Omega sorority was founded in 1968 by six women studying at Montreal. * - Mu Omicron Zeta fraternity (MOZ) was founded in 1992. * The Brotherhood of Omicron is another locally based fraternity at Concordia, formed in 1965. * - Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity has its ''Kappa Chi chapter'' at Concordia, which was founded in 1967 at Loyola College. * - Alpha Epsilon Pi (ΑΕΠ) — the largest fraternity in Canada—established its ''Gamma Lambda chapter'' at Concordia in 2015. :: ''ΣΘΠ'' -
Sigma Thêta Pi Sigma Thêta Pi (, STPi), is an international student fraternity based in Quebec, Canada and France, established in 2003. History Sigma Thêta Pi was founded by four students at in Grenoble Alpes University, in Grenoble, France, on September 21 ...
fraternity founded its ''Mu chapter'' on the Concordia campus in 2015?, but this has since gone dormant.


Student media

Concordia University has a
campus radio Campus radio (also known as college radio, university radio or student radio) is a type of radio station that is run by the students of a college, university or other educational institution. Programming may be exclusively created or produce ...
station,
CJLO CJLO is the official campus and community radio station for Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec and is operated almost entirely by its volunteer membership. The station broadcasts from the Loyola campus, and it can be heard at 1690 AM in M ...
, and television station,
CUTV CUTV can refer to: * Coventry University Television, Television Station of Coventry University in Coventry, UK. * Concordia University Television, Television Station of Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. * California University Tele ...
. Concordia also has three student-run newspapers, '' The Link'', '' The Concordian'' and
French-language French ( or ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European family. It descended from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire, as did all Romance languages. French evolved from Gallo-Romance, the Latin spoken in Gaul, and more specifically in Nor ...
''L'Organe''. ''The Concordian'' and ''L'Organe'' are members of Canadian University Press (CUP); ''The Link'' left the CUP network in 2012. The university also assists in the publishing of the only student-run, bilingual literary/arts magazine, ''The Void'', founded in 2002, as well as arts magazine ''Interfold''.


Student activism


Strike of 1999

As the 1990s progressed, student activism began growing, coming to a head in 1999 with the election of the first in a series of radical slates to the Concordia Student Union. Under the presidency of Rob Green, a referendum regarding a strike garnered 2,284 votes of support. This was an unusually strong show of support, as student governments at Concordia are often elected on the basis of less than 1,000 votes in their favour. The strike lasted from November 3 to 5 and targeted a range of issues, including student representation in the university senate, corporate presence and advertising on campus, and government. There were several demonstrations, where both protesters and police were reported to be injured.


Anti-Netanyahu riot

On September 9, 2002, a scheduled speech from the former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was cancelled following violent pro- Palestinian riots inside the Henry F. Hall Building. Protestors noted that he is a war criminal and there should be no free speech for
hate speech Hate speech is defined by the ''Cambridge Dictionary'' as "public speech that expresses hate or encourages violence towards a person or group based on something such as race, religion, sex, or sexual orientation". Hate speech is "usually thoug ...
. Netanyahu accused protestors of being supporters of terrorism. The event is depicted in a documentary named ''
Confrontation at Concordia ''Confrontation at Concordia'' is a documentary film by Martin Himel which documents the 2002 Concordia University Netanyahu riot at Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The film chronicles how pro-Palestinian student activists staged ...
''.


Notable alumni and faculty

Concordia's alumni and faculty have achieved fame for their accomplishments in many fields. Distinguished alumni include: * Mohan Munasinghe, Vice-chair of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is an intergovernmental body of the United Nations. Its job is to advance scientific knowledge about climate change caused by human activities. The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) a ...
*
Barbara Davidson Barbara Davidson is a Pulitzer Prize and Emmy award winning photojournalist. She is currently a Guggenheim Fellow, 2019-2020, and is travelling the country in her car, with her two dogs, making 8x10 portraits of gun-shot survivors using an 8x10 fi ...
,
Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made h ...
and
Emmy Award The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...
winning photographer and filmmakerBarbara Davidson's "Stray Bullets"
'' The Oregonian''
* Fashion maven
Steven Cojocaru Steven Cojocaru (; ; born July 4, 1970), is a Canadian television fashion critic. He was born in Montreal, Quebec to Romanian parents. Cojocaru started out as a magazine columnist and eventually began working on American television shows as a c ...
* Former Governor General of Canada Georges Vanier * Presidents and chief executive officers of major businesses Dominic D'Alessandro,
Mireille Gingras Mireille Gingras, Lady Gillings, (born 1962) is a US-based Canadian neurobiologist and entrepreneur. She founded HUYA Bioscience International, a biotech consulting firm in 2004, and is the San Diego, California, company's CEO and Executive Chai ...
,
Gerald T. McCaughey Gerald T. McCaughey (born 1956) is a Canadian businessman who was formerly president and CEO of the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. Early years McCaughey was born and grew up in Winnipeg and attended parish schools before moving to Montrea ...
and the late L. Jacques Menard * Philosopher Keith Heron * Authors
E. Annie Proulx E is the fifth letter of the Latin alphabet. E or e may also refer to: Commerce and transportation * €, the symbol for the euro, the European Union's standard currency unit * ℮, the estimated sign, an EU symbol indicating that the weig ...
, Mordecai Richler and
Nino Ricci Nino Pio Ricci (born 1959) is a Canadian novelist who lives in Toronto, Ontario.Nino Ricci's
...
* Academic
Kim Sawchuk Kim Sawchuk (born 1960) is a professor in the Department of Communication Studies, Research Chair in Mobile Media Studies, and Associate Dean of Research and Graduate Studies (Faculty of Arts and Science) at Concordia University in Montreal Ca ...
* Actors James Tupper, Adam Kelly,
Patrick Kwok-Choon Patrick Kwok-Choon (born 19 November 1988) is a Canadian actor, best known for his recurring roles as Perry Crofte in the television adaptation of the horror Western comic book miniseries '' Wynonna Earp'' and as lieutenant commander Gen Rhy ...
, Mylène Dinh-Robic and Annie Murphy * Filmmakers
Moyra Davey Moyra Davey (born 1958) is an artist based in New York City. Davey works across photography, video, and writing. Early life Moyra Davey was born in 1958 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. She grew up in Montreal, where she studied photography and r ...
,
Jorge Thielen Armand Jorge Thielen Armand (born 1990, in Caracas, Venezuela) is a film director, screenwriter and Film producer, producer. He studied communications at Concordia University in Montreal, and later, with Rodrigo Michelangeli, founded the Canadian-Venezu ...
, René Balcer,
Peter Lenkov Peter M. Lenkov (born 9 May 1964) is a Canadian television and film writer, producer, and comic book author. He is best known as the showrunner of the reboot series ''Hawaii Five-0'', '' MacGyver'', and ''Magnum P.I.'', all of which aired on CBS ...
,
Alex Rice Alexandrea Kawisenhawe Rice (born September 16, 1972) is an Aboriginal Canadian actress. She grew up in Brooklyn, New York. Early life Rice was born September 16, 1972, into a Kanien'kehaka ( Mohawk) family on the Kahnawake reserve in Quebec, ...
, Lynne Stopkewich,
B. P. Paquette Benjamin Patrick Paquette, commonly known as B. P. Paquette, is a Canadian film director, screenwriter, film producer and academic. Background Born in London, Ontario, Paquette spent his childhood and adolescence in Greater Sudbury. Shooting ...
,
Donald Tarlton Donald K. Tarlton, CM (born 12 May 1943) is a Canadian record producer and promoter. He promoted many concerts and Canadian musicians under the name Donald K. Donald. Early life and education Tarlton graduated from Rosemere High School in the ...
,
Steven Woloshen Steven Woloshen (born 1960) is a Canadian film animator and a pioneer of drawn-on-film animation. Biography Born in Montreal, Quebec, Woloshen first attended Vanier College, where he worked with Super-8 film and video, later Woloshen specializ ...
, Louise Archambault, Maziar Bahari,
Simone Rapisarda Casanova Simone Rapisarda Casanova is an Italian experimental filmmaker currently living in Canada. In 2014 he won the Leopard for Best Emerging Director at the Locarno International Film Festival. Life Rapisarda Casanova was born in Catania, Italy. H ...
, and
Yung Chang Yung Chang is a Chinese Canadian film director and was part of the collective member directors of Canadian film production firm EyeSteelFilm. Chang is a graduate of Concordia University's Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema in Montreal (BFA 99), the ...
* Musicians Emily Haines, Régine Chassagne,
Sarah Neufeld Sarah Neufeld (born August 27, 1979) is a Canadian violinist who is known for her work with indie rock band Arcade Fire, with whom she is a former core member and currently a touring member. She has contributed to each of the band's studio alb ...
, Michael Laucke,
Richard Reed Parry Richard Reed Parry (born October 4, 1977) is a Canadian multi-instrumentalist, composer, producer, best known as a core member of the Grammy Award-winning indie rock band Arcade Fire, where he plays a wide variety of instruments, often switch ...
,
Amy Millan Amy Millan (born December 3, 1973) is a Canadian indie rock singer and guitarist. She records and performs with the bands Stars and Broken Social Scene as well as having a successful solo career. Her second solo album, '' Masters of the Burial'' ...
and Matthew Otto of
Majical Cloudz Majical Cloudz was a Canadian music group from Montreal consisting of singer-songwriter Devon Welsh and Matt Otto. The group disbanded in March 2016. History Welsh, the son of actor Kenneth Welsh and Corinne Farago,Cammi Granato, Jim Corsi,
Garry Kallos Garry Kallos (born 5 March 1956) is a Canadians, Canadian former Amateur wrestling, wrestler who competed in the 1984 Summer Olympics and won five gold medals at the Maccabiah Games in Israel, and Sambo (martial art), sambo competitor who won a g ...
, and Andy Borodow * Dance artist
Lara Kramer Lara Kramer is a Canadian dancer and artist. Kramer lives and works on territory of the Kanien'kahá:ka Nation. She is Oji-Cree (Ojibwe and Cree) and she closely links her work to memory, examining issues of social, political and cultural importa ...
* Attorney Kathleen Zellner * News anchors
Dareen Abu Ghaida Dareen Abughaida ( ar, دارين أبو غيدا) is a Palestinian-Lebanese broadcast journalist. Currently working as a presenter for Al Jazeera English, she has also worked for big establishments such as Bloomberg news, CNBC, World Bank, and Qa ...
and
Mutsumi Takahashi Mutsumi Takahashi is a Japanese-Canadian journalist. Since 1986, she has been one of the lead news presenters of CFCF-DT in Montreal, Quebec. Early life and education After emigrating to Canada in 1963 from Shiroishi, Japan by way of Boston, ...
* Mountaineer and speaker Theodore Fairhurst * Actor, comedian and producer Will Arnett * Cultural anthropologist
Theresa H. Arriola Theresa Hill Arriola (also known as Isa Arriola) is a Northern Mariana Islander cultural anthropologist and indigenous rights activist from Saipan, who lectures in critical Indigenous studies in the department of sociology and anthropology at C ...
* Internet persona and animal rights activist Kadie Karen Diekmeyer


See also

* Bishop Street * Canadian government scientific research organizations * Canadian industrial research and development organizations *
Canadian university scientific research organizations Expenditures by Canadian universities on scientific research and development accounted for about 40% of all spending on scientific research and development in Canada in 2006. Research in the natural and social sciences in Canada, with a few importa ...
* Space Concordia * Higher education in Quebec * List of Jesuit sites * List of universities in Quebec * Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema


References


Further reading

* Austin, Kevin
"[Institutions] Concordia University (Montréal)."
''eContact! 11.2 – Figures canadiennes (2) / Canadian Figures (2)'' (July 2009). Montréal: CEC. * * Hall, Henry F. ''Georgian Spirit: The Story of George Williams University''(Montréal) Peake 347.H.03.0


External links

* *
Concordia University fonds (R9641)
at
Library and Archives Canada Library and Archives Canada (LAC; french: Bibliothèque et Archives Canada) is the federal institution, tasked with acquiring, preserving, and providing accessibility to the documentary heritage of Canada. The national archive and library is th ...
. Fonds consists of oral history interviews conducted by the Concordia University Oral History Program. {{Authority control 1974 establishments in Quebec Educational institutions established in 1974 English-language universities and colleges in Quebec Universities and colleges in Montreal Journalism schools in Canada