Events Calendar All events take place at the New Westminster Campus unless otherwise noted. 30® Anniversary Special Events January - December, 2000 This is. a partial list of events for the 30" Anniversary year. Watch for further updates! Noon at New West Douglas College Music Faculty with original music composed by Doug Smith January 13 12:30pm, Performing Arts Theatre Art 2000 Art work by Douglas College employees January 13 Opening reception 1:30- 6:30pm Amelia Douglas Gallery Gallery times: 527-5528 Continuing Education Open House January 27, 7-9pm Performing Arts Theatre Foyer Library Launch of Millennium On-line System January National Badminton Championships March 8-11 New Westminster Campus Employee Dinner/ Theatre Event April Legacy Garden Event: Maple Ridge April 15 Thomas Haney Campus Legacy Garden Event: Coquitlam April 16 David Lam Campus Employee Recognition and Retirement Dinner October 27 30* Anniversary Open House November 3-4 New Westminster Campus A Class Act November 16 Executive Plaza Inn, Coquitlam Douglas College Holiday Celebration and 30* Anniversary closing event December 2000 In 1981, then-President Bill Day and his famous ukelele entertained kids in the daycare during registration. Sing along with Bill In the early 1970s, Canada and Douglas College received many refugees from Vietnam, known as boat people. “At that time Bill Day was the Principal of the New West Campus, and in his older hippy days he used to walk around the College strumming a ukelele and singing little songs,” recalls Vice-President Al Atkinson. “Bill was very attuned to the needs of landed immigrants and refugees and spent a lot of his life working in adult education in that capacity. One day he walked into an ESL classroom with his ukelele, and most of the students there were Vietnamese boat people. He thought that he'd teach them alittle English through a ditty and so he chose a song of rounds, and the name of the song that he chose was ‘Row, Row, Row your Boat.” Bill Day was Principal of the New Westminster Campus and then President of Douglas College for a total of 20 years, retiring in 1995. Al Atkinson has worked at the College for 27 years and is presently the Vice President of Educational Services. Trailer teaching trying Trailers like the one pictured above were home to instructors and students during the early days of Douglas College. They leaked, they were overcrowded, they were home to various rodents, but in the early 1970s students and instructors alike endured the trailers- cum-classrooms that were all a part of going to school and work at Douglas College. Technical difficulties were also a part of the trailer-park life. “The second year I worked at the College they put me into a double-wide trailer divided down the middle,” Chemistry instructor Bob Browne recalls. “Des Wilson was teaching at one end and I was at the other. One day the lights went off, so I went over to the switch and flipped them back on. A few seconds later they went off again. I'd go and turn them on, then they'd go off, so I'd go and turn them on again, and so forth. It took us weeks to figure out that there was only one light switch for the whole place, and that Des had been trying to show a film to his class on that particular day.” Bob Browne has worked at Douglas College for 28 years as a Chemistry instructor. Des Wilson has also worked for the College for 28 years and is presently the Dean of Science and Technology. Douglas College Locations, 1970 On the road again Ask any instructor what it was like to teach at Douglas College in the ’70s and they'll all tell you about the endless driving that was part and parcel of teaching at the College. “T’ve taught everywhere from Richmond to Chilliwack,” says History instructor Jacqueline Gresko. “I developed close friendships with my cars, and each one had it’s own personality. I had a Gremlin that liked to die on bridges. But I worked for Douglas College, so I was prepared! I had plastic bags, duct tape, screw drivers, a shovel....at that time you needed all of that stuff because you went from campus to campus and in those days things were always breaking down and you had to fix them yourself.” Driving was always a the topic of conversation in those days. “In the ’70s we were setting up Fraser Valley College and I was to drive to Chilliwack with a male colleague to do interviews. We got into his car and started to drive and he said to me ina serious voice ‘There's something I’ve been meaning to ask you....’ I wanted to jump out of the car! Then he said “With all of the driving that you do between campuses, how do you stay sane? Some people drink. What do you do?’ Here I am thinking that he’s going to attack me, when he was thinking about the strain of too much driving!” Jacqueline Gresko has worked at Douglas College for 29 years as a History instructor. History instructor Jacqueline Gresko (standing) has taught classes for Douglas College all over the Lower Mainland. Here she instructs a history class at Burnaby's Heritage Village in 1971/72.