Our speaker Paul Osborne from Conestoga College.
Our speaker was Paul Osborne who presented to the club results of a recent study into the economic impact of Conestoga College.
Paul is the Associate Vice-President of Marketing and Community Relations at Conestoga College. He has been at the College in various roles for almost 18 years overseeing areas like Athletics, Corporate Communications and he was also the Registrar. A native of Guelph, he has fun as the in-house voice of the Guelph Storm and is a weekly columnist for the Guelph Mercury Tribune.
The study conducted by UW Economics professor Larry Smith updated results of several studies that were completed over the past 15 years. Results of this study concluded that Conestoga College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning is indispensable to the prosperity of the local region and the health and competitiveness of its labour force.
Highlights of the study include:
- Conestoga has provided education and training services to more than half of the local adult population.
- The total number of Conestoga graduates has increased by 108 per cent since 2002: almost 65 per cent of graduates live in the local area (Waterloo Region, Guelph and Stratford), contributing to regional prosperity and the well-being of our community.
- Of the 118,000 alumni, more than 3,500 Conestoga graduates own businesses in the local community: across Ontario, more than 5,000 businesses are owned by Conestoga alumni.
- More than 220,000 individuals have participated in Conestoga’s Continuing Education or Corporate Training courses to build their skills and advance their careers.
- Conestoga graduates contribute more than $2.3 billion each year to the regional economy.
The full report is available at http://www.conestogac.on.ca/about/reports/
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the establishment of Conestoga. The college now delivers a comprehensive range of career-focused programs including diplomas, 14+ degrees and post-graduate certificates to serve the needs of more than 14,000 full-time students. Part-time and Continuing Education attract more than 35,000 enrolments each year. The college operates out of 7 campuses with over 1,100 full time employees and thousands of part time employees. Students are actively engaged working in our community with 3,000 apprenticeship seats offered yearly and 7,200 students in the co-op programs contributing millions of hours of work. Construction is currently underway for the new Waterloo Campus (being constructed by Collaborative Structures owned by our members Dave and Shawna Timlock) which will open in September offering programs in IT, culinary, construction trades and serve as an access hub for new Canadians. On the horizon is a potential campus in Milton in conjunction with a new WLU campus that possibly will be established there.
Conestoga is one of the key educational institutions that helps contribute to the vibrancy and prosperity of our local region and we are fortunate to have it in KW.