University Of Canterbury

The University of Canterbury (UC; ; postnominal abbreviation ''Cantuar.'' or ''Cant.'' for ''Cantuariensis'', the Latin name for Canterbury) is a public research university based in Christchurch, New Zealand. It was founded in 1873 as Canterbury College, the first constituent college of the University of New Zealand. It is New Zealand's second-oldest university, after the University of Otago, which was founded four years earlier, in 1869.

Its original campus was in the Christchurch Central City, but in 1961 it became an independent university and began moving out of its original neo-Gothic buildings, which were re-purposed as the Christchurch Arts Centre. The move was completed on 1 May 1975 and the university now operates its main campus in the Christchurch suburb of Ilam.

The university offers bachelors, masters, and doctoral degrees in, among others, Arts, Commerce, Education (physical education), Fine Arts, Forestry, Health Sciences, International Relations and Diplomacy, Law, Criminal Justice, Music, Policy and Governance, Social Work, Speech and Language Pathology, Sports Coaching and Teaching.

History

Canterbury College, 1873–1960

On 16 June 1873, the university was founded in the centre of Christchurch as Canterbury College, the first constituent college of the University of New Zealand and was funded by the then Canterbury Provincial Council. It became the second institution in New Zealand providing tertiary-level education (following the University of Otago, established in 1869), and the fourth in Australasia. It was founded on the basis of the Oxbridge college system, but it differed from Oxbridge in that it admitted female students from its foundation. Its foundation professors arrived in 1874, namely, Charles Cook (Mathematics, University of Melbourne, St John's College, Cambridge), Alexander Bickerton (Chemistry and Physics, School of Mining, London), and John Macmillan Brown (University of Glasgow, Balliol College, Oxford). A year later the first lectures began and in 1875 the first graduations took place. In 1880, Helen Connon was the first woman to graduate from the college, and in 1894, Āpirana Ngata became the first Māori-born student to graduate with a degree. The School of Art was founded in 1882, followed by the faculties of Arts, Science, Commerce, and Law in 1921, and Mental, Moral, and Social Sciences in 1924. The Students' Union, now known as the University of Canterbury Students Association, was founded in 1929 operating out of the Arts Centre of Christchurch Old Student Union Building, and the first edition of the student magazine ''Canta'' was published in 1930. In 1933, the name changed from Canterbury College to Canterbury University College.

College House, a student dormitory that maintains its old tradition by adopting the Oxbridge college system, broke away from Christ's College in 1957 and relocated to the Ilam suburb of Christchurch in 1966 as a hall of residence at the University of Canterbury. In 1957 the name changed again to the University of Canterbury.

Independence, 1961–2009

Until 1961, the university formed part of the University of New Zealand (UNZ), and issued degrees in its name. That year saw the dissolution of the federal system of tertiary education in New Zealand, and the University of Canterbury became an independent University awarding its own degrees. Upon the UNZ's demise, Canterbury Agricultural College became a constituent college of the University of Canterbury, as ''Lincoln College''. Lincoln College became independent in 1990 as a full university in its own right and is now known as Lincoln University.

Relocation to Ilam campus

Over the period from 1961 to 1974, the university campus relocated from the centre of the city to its much larger current site in the suburb of Ilam. 1973 saw the university celebrate its centenary, during which the neo-Gothic buildings of the old campus were gifted to the City of Christchurch, which became the site of the Christchurch Arts Centre, a hub for arts, crafts and entertainment in Christchurch. 1974 also marked the opening of the James Hight Library, which at the time, was New Zealand's largest university building. Ilam's three university halls of residence were renamed University Hall in 1974, and the student dormitory was used as the Athletes Village dormitory for the 1974 British Commonwealth Games hosted in Christchurch.

In 2004, the university underwent restructuring into four Colleges and a School of Law, administering a number of schools and departments (though a number of departments have involvement in cross-teaching in numerous academic faculties). For many years the university worked closely with the Christchurch College of Education, leading to a full merger in 2007, establishing a fifth College.

Post-earthquakes, 2010–2022

On 4 September 2010 at 4:35 am local time an earthquake struck the South Island of New Zealand with a moment magnitude of 7.1 several aftershocks followed the main event, the strongest of which was a magnitude 6.3 shock known as the Christchurch earthquake that occurred nearly six months later on 22 February 2011. Although there was no serious injuries to staff or students on campus and only minor damage to buildings, the initial quake closed the university for a week, and the library was shut for months while shelves were repaired and half a million books placed back on shelves. The Student Volunteer Army was a group of around 10,000 university students and others who worked over a period of months to help clean up liquefaction.

In the months following the earthquake, the university lost 25 per cent of its first-year students and 8 per cent of continuing students. The number of international students, who pay much higher fees and were a major source of revenue, dropped by 30 per cent. In October 2011, staff were encouraged to take voluntary redundancies. As well in September 2011, plans were announced to demolish some University buildings that were damaged from an earthquake.

By 2013, the university had lost 22 per cent of its students. However, a record number of 886 PhD students were enrolled at the University of Canterbury as of 2013. Other New Zealand universities, apparently defying an informal agreement, launched billboard and print advertising campaigns in the earthquake-ravaged city to recruit University of Canterbury students who were finding it difficult to study there. In 2013 the New Zealand Government also agreed to provide $260m to support the university's rebuild programme.

Student numbers were steadily on the rise, with a 4.5% increase in students enrolled from 2013 to 2016. International numbers also increased, nearing pre-earthquake figures at 1,134 enrolled in 2016.

In March 2016, Vice-Chancellor Dr Rod Carr said in ''The Press'' newspaper: "In 2014, tudentswanted to leave Christchurch and went to Wellington, Otago and into the workforce. Now we're retaining Christchurch school leavers and we're getting our fair share of provincial students, as well as attracting greater numbers from the Auckland region." "Living on or near the UC campus, and having a lifestyle that can take you from lectures to skifields in 90 minutes or the beach in 20 minutes, is much more appealing and affordable than living in Auckland."

In January 2017, the University of Canterbury released its campus master plan – 50 building and landscape projects proposed over three stages by 2045, the cost could exceed $2bn. In a comment to ''The Press'', Rod Carr said that the plans were proof the university was moving away from the falling enrolments post-earthquake.

150th anniversary, 2023–present

The University of Canterbury celebrated its 150th anniversary in 2023. In the same year the University experienced a surge in enrolments, reaching a record high of 21,361 students by late March, compared to 20,223 at the same period in the previous year. Among these figures, UC counted 19,975 domestic students, witnessing a substantial increase from the preceding year's count. Concurrently, the international student body also expanded to 1,393, marking a rise from 1,098 in the prior year. This growth in enrolment stands in contrast to a decline in domestic student numbers across all five North Island universities during this period. According to a spokesperson for the University, in 2023 every affiliated hall was "at 100% occupancy" and "may be a record-breaker for highest number of enrolments".

Campuses

The University of Canterbury has three campuses spread throughout the city of Christchurch:

*Ilam Campus: The university has a main campus of at Ilam, a suburb of Christchurch about from the centre of the city. The Ilam campus maintains three libraries with the Central Library () housed in the tallest building on campus, the 11-storey Puaka–James Hight Building. The Ilam campus is where the Faculties of Education, Health, Science, Engineering, Business, Law and Arts are based. The University of Canterbury Students' Association is based there in the Haere roa building. The Ilam Campus is home to cafes and restaurants as well as a pharmacy, bookshop, the UC rec centre and the UC Health centre.
*Dovedale Campus: The Dovedale Campus is and became a part of the University of Canterbury when the Christchurch College of Education (a specialist teacher training institution) merged on 1 January 2007. The Dovedale campus is located adjacent to the Ilam campus and is off Dovedale avenue. The campus consists of the old Henry Field Library, The Christchurch College of English, Ilam early Learning Centre and Hayashi and Sonoda student residences. The Faculty of Education also maintains a presence here.
* City Campus: The Christchurch City Campus is made up of the Christchurch Arts Centre and the Manawa building which is a part of the Faculty of Health. Music and Classics are again taught from the Christchurch Arts Centre in the old chemistry building, and within the new Manawa building in Christchurch city health and education are taught. The city campus also includes the Teece Museum of Classical Antiquities – home of the James Logie Memorial Collection.

The university also maintains additional small campuses in Nelson, Tauranga and Timaru, and teaching centres in Greymouth, New Plymouth, Rotorua and Timaru. The university has staff in regional information offices in Nelson, Timaru, and Auckland.

Libraries

The UC Library was first established at Canterbury College in 1879. Today there are three libraries on campus each covering different subject areas.Library Locations
University of Canterbury. Retrieved on 21 February 2018

Central library

The Central Library () – is housed in the Puaka–James Hight Building that is designed in the brutalist style architecture. In 1974, the old city campus library moved to the Ilam campus and was housed in the newly constructed James Hight building, originally named after former Canterbury professor James Hight. The building was renamed Puaka-James Hight in 2014, after the brightest star in the cluster Matariki, to reflect the growing strength of UC's relationship with Ngāi Tahu and the mana of Te Ao Māori at the heart of the university's campus. The University of Canterbury Central Library is the largest university library in New Zealand. The Central Library has collections of over 2 million physical items including books, archives, journals and a miscellany of other items that support research and teaching in Humanities, Social Sciences, Law, Commerce, Music, Fine Arts and Antarctic Studies.

* The Henry Field Library (named for the New Zealand Educationalist Henry Edward Field) on the old Christchurch College of Education site joined the fold when the university and Christchurch College of Education merged. However, the Education collection was incorporated into the collections within the Puaka–James Hight Building, and Henry Field is now a library store at the campus off Dovedale Avenue.
* A separate Law library was established within the James Hight building, it was then relocated to the new Law building (Mere Mere). However, after the 2011 Christchurch earthquake it returned to the Puaka–James Hight Building and integrated into the Central Library collection. The Mere Mere Building still operates as the Law and Business Building however it is no longer home to the law library.

EPS library

The EPS Library (Engineering and Physical Sciences Library, ) supports research and teaching in Engineering, Forestry and Sciences. With the move to the Ilam campus, the Library was split. First the Engineering Library, and later the Physical Sciences Library, moving to the new campus however the old Physical Sciences Library closed and its collections moved to the Engineering Library now called the EPS Library.

Macmillian Brown library

The Macmillan Brown Library () is a research library, archive, and art gallery that specialises in collecting items related to New Zealand and Pacific Islands history.History of the Macmillan Brown Library
University of Canterbury. Retrieved on 6 April 2014Heritage Collections
University of Canterbury. Retrieved on 6 April 2014 It holds over 100,000 published items including books, audio-visual recordings, and various manuscripts, photographs, works of art, architectural drawings and ephemera. The Macmillan Brown Library's art collection also has over 5,000 works, making it one of the largest collections in the Canterbury Region. Some notable items in its collections include copies of Māori Land Court Records, official and government documents from various Pacific Islands states, trade union records, and the personal papers of various Members of Parliament and government ministers. The library is named after John Macmillan Brown, a prominent Canterbury academic who helped found the library, allocated a large proportion of his fortune to the Macmillan Brown Library.

Student accommodation

The university has ten student residences throughout its Ilam and Dovedale campuses: five fully-catered halls of residence exclusively for first-year undergraduate students: Arcady, College House, Rochester and Rutherford, Tupuānuku and University Hall; and five other self-catered student accommodation houses which are home to both undergraduate and postgraduate students: Sonoda Christchurch Campus, Hayashi, Kirkwood Avenue, Waimairi Village and Ilam Apartments. The largest, Ilam Apartments, houses 831 students during the academic year. Some of the halls at UC have storied histories; Tupuānuku is named for the star of the same name that is connected to food grown in the ground in the cluster Matariki in Māori Mythology; Rochester and Rutherford is named for former alumni Ernest Rutherford and John Fisher Bishop of Rochester; while Arcady, previously Bishop Julius Hall, was founded by the first Archbishop of New Zealand, Churchill Julius; additionally, College House is the oldest residential college in New Zealand.

Field facilities

The University of Canterbury has the most field stations of any New Zealand university. The Field Facilities Centre administers four of these field stations:
* Cass Field Station – Established in 1914 to give students and researchs access to montane grasslands, scrub, riverbed, scree, beech forest, swamp, bog, lake, stream and alpine habitats.
* Harihari Field Station – Access to native forests, streams.
* Westport Field Station – for study of the West Coast of New Zealand, particularly mining.
* Kaikōura Field Station – Kaikōura represents an important transition zone for flora and fauna, particularly in the marine environment, with Kowhai bush and associated rich bird life close by.

The university and its project partners also operate an additional field station in the Nigerian Montane Forests Project; this field station stands on the Ngel Nyaki forest edge in Nigeria.

The Department of Physical and Chemical Sciences runs its own field laboratories:
* Mount John University Observatory at Lake Tekapo for optical astronomical research
* Birdlings Flat radar facility
* Scott Base radar facility
* Cracroft Caverns ring laser facility

The Department of Physical and Chemical Sciences also has involvement in the Southern African Large Telescope and is a member of the IceCube collaboration which is installing a neutrino telescope at the South Pole.

Teece Museum of Classical Antiquities

The University of Canterbury Teece Museum of Classical Antiquities opened in May 2017, and showcases the James Logie Memorial Collection, a collection of Greek, Roman, Egyptian and Near Eastern artefacts in New Zealand. The Teece Museum is run as a part of the faculty of Arts. The museum is named for University of Canterbury Alumni Professor David Teece and his wife Leigh Teece, who donated a substantial amount of money to the city for earthquake recovery. The money was used by the university to install the classics and music school in the Old Chemistry building at the Christchurch Arts Centre.

The James Logie Memorial Collection was established in 1957 as a result of Miss Marion Steven, a Classics faculty member, donating Greek pottery to Canterbury University College. Steven established the James Logie Memorial Collection to honour her husband, who served as registrar of the college from 1950 until his death in 1956.

The Logie Collection includes a wide range of pottery, beginning with the Bronze Age cultures of Cyprus, Crete and Mycenae it also includes vases that come from Corinth and Athens, the islands in the Aegean, East Greece and the Greek colonies in South Italy and Sicily.

Organisation and administration

Governance

The university was first governed by a board of governors (1873–1933), then by a college council (1933–1957), and since 1957 by a university council. The council is chaired by a chancellor. The Council includes representatives from the faculties, students and general staff, as well as local industry, employer and trade union representatives.

The original composition of the board of governors was defined in the Canterbury College Ordinance 1873, which was passed by the Canterbury Provincial Council and named 23 members who might serve for life. Initially, the board was given power to fill their own vacancies, and this power transferred to graduates once their number exceeded 30. At the time, there were discussions about the abolition of provincial government (which did happen in 1876), and the governance structure was set up to give board members "prestige, power and permanence", and "provincial authority and its membership and resources were safely perpetuated, beyond the reach of grasping hands in Wellington."Original members of the Board of Governors were: Charles Bowen, Rev James Buller, William Patten Cowlishaw, John Enys, Charles Fraser, George Gould Sr, Henry Barnes Gresson, William Habens, John Hall, Henry Harper, John Inglis, Walter Kennaway, Arthur C. Knight, Thomas William Maude, William Montgomery, Thomas Potts, William Rolleston, John Studholme, Henry Tancred, James Somerville Turnbull, Henry Richard Webb, Joshua Williams, and Rev William Wellington Willock.

Professor Roy Sharp assumed the position of Vice-Chancellor on 1 March 2003. In May 2008 he announced his imminent resignation from the position, following his acceptance of the chief executive position at the Tertiary Education Commission (TEC) which he took up on 4 August 2008. The then current Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Professor Ian Town, assumed the role of acting Vice-Chancellor on 1 July 2008. On 15 October 2008 the university announced that Rod Carr, a former banker and the CEO of a local software company, would begin a five-year appointment as Vice-Chancellor on 1 February 2009.

Council member and former Pro-Chancellor, Rex Williams, became Chancellor in 2009. Council member John Wood became the new Pro-Chancellor. On 1 January 2012, Wood became Chancellor after Williams retired from the role. In 2019, a new Vice Chancellor, Cheryl de la Rey, was appointed from the University of Pretoria, and Susan McCormack took over as Chancellor.

Board of Governors, chair of the College Council, and chancellor

The following table lists those who have held the position of chair of the Board of Governors, chair of the College Council, and chancellor.

Coat of arms

An explanation of the arms appears on the universit
website
, where it is explained that the fleece symbolises the pastoral, and the plough at the base the agricultural background of the province of Canterbury. The bishop's pall and the cross flory represent Canterbury's ecclesiastical