This year, we say goodbye to Principal Janet Paterson after a ten-year term at Innis College. As principal for one fifth of the life of the college, she speaks about the ways she’s changed Innis life, her future involvement at U of T, and a few words of advice for the incoming principal.

Innis Herald: When and how did you begin getting involved in Innis College?

Principal Paterson: Before coming to Innis, I had been Chair of the French department as well as the Associate Dean of the Humanities. I was on my sabbatical, and the provost called me about two positions, one as the Innis principal. We decided together that I would interview for both of them. Although it was a smaller college, I chose Innis. I knew professors who taught film here, and when I saw how happy it made them to come and teach in this warm environment I finalized my choice.

IH: So it was automatically a step into a principal’s position?

PP: Yes, I wasn’t teaching at Innis nor had I done administration here, but that does happen with the position of principal. Sometimes they find a principal within a college, but if not, they look elsewhere.

IH: Now that your term is completed, what are your plans? Any particular future endeavours?

PP: After being here for ten years, of course I’ve become attached to Innis College. I feel that it’s my home. I’m actually going to teach a first-year course at the college, which I’m really looking forward to. I’ve been teaching only graduate students for the past ten years. I’m also going to teach a mini-course in Brazil for 10 days in the fall. So, I have exciting plans for the first few months after the end of my term. I also look forward to doing some research.

IH: So you’ll be around to observe how everything at Innis is going. When the new principal of Innis steps into his or her term, what would you advise in order to be a good leader of Innis College? What challenges do you think he or she will face?

PP: From your perspective as a student, you probably see that colleges are different and that they have different cultures. This is a very friendly college, a very non-hierarchical one where the student voice is important. So, I think that the new principal has to fit within that mould and be interested in students. That person should understand that he or she is coming into a really good college where there’s no need to shake everything up. We need someone who is going to uphold this strong tradition of collegiality and of outreach with all the communities that are important to Innis. One challenge for the new principal is going to be that the college needs more space. I know that there will be plans for some expansion. That’s why it’s good that Town Hall is finished, so someone can take on a brand new project.

IH: That leads into my next question- I wanted to ask what you believe you’ve accomplished at Innis.

PP: It would be hard for me to identify just accomplishment. I came in with several goals. The vice-principal was nice enough to tell me I’ve reached all those goals, which makes me very happy. Helping to get Cinema Studies to have a PhD and become an Institute was wonderful, and one day they’ll probably be the best Cinema Studies in North America. At the same time, I wanted to work on strengthening our other two programs, Urban Studies and Writing and Rhetoric. That was my academic mission. Then, it was to work with students and make student life a priority in the college. Leadership is a big thing at Innis College and we have many leadership awards, something I always encouraged. We also have amazing student leaders. Space has been another aspect that I thought had to be improved. I thought that students who pay a lot to be here don’t deserve to be in shabby surroundings. So in the past couple of years, we’ve repainted much of the building and we finally have a rooftop garden, which is small but beautiful. The big thing was of course Town Hall, where so much activity for students and the community take place. One of my other goals had been to expand scholarships to students. Because Innis College is younger than especially the federated colleges, we really did not have the same number of scholarships, and have a lot more now than we did ten years ago. I think that ten years later, the programs are stronger, the building is a lot better, there’s a much richer and broader student life.

IH: How would you best encapsulate the difference between Innis and other colleges?

 PP: There’s one key component- parity. That we have a parity system of governance is really important because there’s no other body on campus that has an equal distribution of students to staff and faculty. Our student leaders and faculty take turns chairing the College Council and this parity system is also in a number of our committees. That’s really symbolic as a way of viewing students and of viewing the college.

 IH: The way you see student life at Innis now, how does that compare to your personal university experience?

PP: I didn’t have a particularly good experience at university. I was a commuter student who mostly just came down for classes and went home. It amazes me to this day that no one really spoke to us about student clubs or activities. I think I just knew there were sports. I didn’t have the rich life I think a lot of students can have today. Of course, they have to choose to do it and I try to strongly encourage students to get involved. I think I would be a much happier student if I were a student today. As a principal, you of course have to be an extrovert; so you can imagine how much I would get involved. I did in high school, but somehow I didn’t get to have that experience in university. In general, I believe that there’s also been a much stronger focus on good teaching at U of T. I remember a lot of courses being quite disappointing.

IH: It’s great that you’ve been able to come back to U of T and reshape your experience in some way- and help reshape the experience of a lot of other students.

PP: That’s true! I think that the size of the college also really makes a difference. With the commuter students, they now have a representative- but we still realize that some people may be heavily involved in their own community or family. So really, all they can manage to do is come to classes. The least we can hope for is that they’re getting good classes with great teaching quality that they enjoy. The teaching aspect is one of the most vital bases of the university experience.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and length.

Featured image courtesy of John Horvatin