John MacDonell (born April 2, 1956) is a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

retired educator and politician. A native of Halifax, MacDonell was educated at

Acadia University Acadia University is a public, predominantly undergraduate university located in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, Canada, with some graduate programs at the master's level and one at the doctoral level. The enabling legislation consists of the Acadia ...

and Saint Mary's University. MacDonell worked on a dairy farm and taught

biology Biology is the scientific study of life. It is a natural science with a broad scope but has several unifying themes that tie it together as a single, coherent field. For instance, all organisms are made up of cells that process hereditary i ...

Hants East Rural High School Hants East Rural High (HERH) is a Canadian high school located in Milford Station, Nova Scotia. The school was opened in 1957 and is administratively part of the Chignecto-Central Regional School Board The Chignecto-Central Regional Centre for ...

from 1985 to 1998.

Political career

In 1998, MacDonell successfully ran for the

Nova Scotia New Democratic Party The Nova Scotia New Democratic Party is a social-democratic, progressive provincial party in Nova Scotia, Canada. It is the provincial entity of the federal New Democratic Party (NDP). It was founded as the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (C ...

nomination in the riding of

Hants East Hants East is a provincial electoral district in Nova Scotia, Canada, that elects one member of the Nova Scotia House of Assembly. Its Member of the Legislative Assembly since 2013 has been Margaret Miller of the Nova Scotia Liberal Party. The ...

. He was elected in the 1998 provincial election and was re-elected in the

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shootin ...

2003 File:2003 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The crew of STS-107 perished when the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during reentry into Earth's atmosphere; SARS became an epidemic in China, and was a precursor to SARS-CoV-2; A des ...

2006 File:2006 Events Collage V1.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2006 Winter Olympics open in Turin; Twitter is founded and launched by Jack Dorsey; The Nintendo Wii is released; Montenegro 2006 Montenegrin independence referendum, votes to declare ...

and 2009 provincial elections. In 2002, MacDonell was a candidate for the

leadership Leadership, both as a research area and as a practical skill, encompasses the ability of an individual, group or organization to "lead", influence or guide other individuals, teams, or entire organizations. The word "leadership" often gets view ...

of the Nova Scotia NDP. At the leadership convention in June 2002, MacDonell was defeated by

Darrell Dexter Darrell Elvin Dexter (born 1957) is a Canadian lawyer, journalist and former naval officer who served as the 27th premier of Nova Scotia from 2009 to 2013. A member of the Nova Scotia New Democratic Party, he served as party leader from 2001 t ...

. On June 19, 2009, MacDonell was appointed to the

Executive Council of Nova Scotia The Executive Council of Nova Scotia (informally and more commonly, the Cabinet of Nova Scotia) is the cabinet of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. Almost always made up of members of the Nova Scotia House of Assembly, the Cabinet is sim ...

, where he served first as Minister of Natural Resources until 2011. He then served as Minister of Agriculture. MacDonell was defeated in the 2013 provincial election.Cabinet of the Province of Nova Scotia Biography
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References

1956 births Living people Members of the Executive Council of Nova Scotia Nova Scotia New Democratic Party MLAs People from Halifax, Nova Scotia Acadia University alumni Canadian schoolteachers Saint Mary's University (Halifax) alumni 21st-century Canadian politicians {{NovaScotia-MLA-stub