2006 Fredericton Encaenia - Ceremony A
McFadyen, Nancy
Doctor of Letters (D.Litt.)
Orator: Burge, Elizabeth
Citation:
ENCAENIA, CEREMONY A, 17 MAY 2006
NANCY MCFADYEN
to be Doctor of Letters
Nancy McFadyen carries energy, not baggage. She gives support in spades and gets it back in spades. She's fearless in digging through the political and economic complexities of organizations to plant and nurture new projects. She relishes direct engagement rather the just a cheque in the mail. In reflecting on her successful and high profile humanitarian work, she does not collect her laurels to rest upon, but offers a new round of enthusiastic assistance to each new worthwhile project.
For nearly 30 years, Nancy McFadyen has used her considerable intellectual, physical, and psychological resources to stay the course. Philanthropy calls for difficult choices among recipients and gift amounts, but sustained unpaid work brings its share of tough times, of uncertain times, when often what is most needed is the courage to persist in the face of territorial resistance, ignorance, or fear of change.
The details of her many projects, from her childhood entrepreneurship in selling I.O.D.E. tickets to her current involvement in large-scale environmental, medical and social science activities, show how Nancy lives out some of her guiding values, expressed by one of her fiends here as “service to her community, being conscious that she and her husband John are very fortunate and have a responsibility (versus an obligation) to give back. [She has] a great well of kindness.”
Her work for this university is multi-faceted. Her current membership on the Forging Our Futures Campaign Cabinet and on the Management Team of the Healthy Living Initiative Project, her extensive UNB alumni work, plus a recently completed eight years of service on the Board of Governors and, earlier, chairing the successful fundraising campaign to save the Maggie Jean Chestnut Residence and restore it for Renaissance College mean that Nancy McFadyen knows an awe-ful lot (that's spelled a-w-e hyphen f-u-l) about how UNB works. She's quite undeterred obviously: flying frequently to Fredericton to attend many Board-related committee meetings, deciding when, where and how her strengths should best be applied, and, with her husband John, donating generously to UNB.
But all that work its into a schedule of other meetings and demands, and here's where you might fasten your seatbelts and look out for the tough assignments in the following organizations. Currently, Nancy is a Board member of the Arthritis and Autoimmunity Research Centre Foundation, Honorary Director of and fundraiser for Sheena's place (supporting people with eating disorders), an Ambassador for Interval house, a hospice for battered women and their children, and a member of the Council of Ambassadors for the very successful programme “Pathways to Education'' that mentors and tutors high school students at risk for dropout. The Enoch Turner Schoolhouse Foundation, the R. Howard Webster Foundation, and the Cabbagetown Youth Centre Toronto are additional beneficiaries of her skills, time and generosity.
In addition to controlling politically related activities for the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada over many years, and the new Conservative Party today, Nancy McFadyen is currently Co-chair of the Evergreen at the Brickworks Project in Toronto. She's not making green bricks but she certainly is building an imaginative and complex adaptive re-use of a large industrial heritage site. Do look up their website: the re-use is directed toward a sustainable social enterprise that helps citizens lend about, use, and respect the interconnections between the natural and the built environments.
In moving from medicine, education, social work, environmental science and heritage to all forms of the arts we see again a broad range of Nancy's interests and commitments. Over the years, for example, she has supported the Art Gallery of Ontario, McMichael Art Gallery, Shaw Festival, Royal Ontario Museum, Royal Botanical Garden, Canadian Film Centre, Canadian Opera House, the National Ballet School, the McLuhan Festival of the Future and last but not least, the Canadian wine industry.
During almost 30 years of volunteerism, her peers have signaled the importance of her contributions with various awards. These include The Queen's Silver Jubilee Award in 2002, The UNB alumni Award of Honor in 2002, and the national “125 Volunteer Award” in 1990. Today, in 2006, we show our respect and admiration with an honorary doctorate degree that will accompany her UNB Bachelor of Arts degree earned in 1967.
In ending this citation for Nancy McFadyen's admission into the Honorary Doctorate of Letters, I refer again to her guiding value of responsibility, rather than obligation. Being responsible means being pro-active, non-self-centred, a critical and creative thinker, and, above all, acutely aware of environmental conditions and dynamics. Canadian society needs people like Nancy McFadyen as never before.
From: Honoris Causa, UA Case 70
NANCY MCFADYEN
to be Doctor of Letters
Nancy McFadyen carries energy, not baggage. She gives support in spades and gets it back in spades. She's fearless in digging through the political and economic complexities of organizations to plant and nurture new projects. She relishes direct engagement rather the just a cheque in the mail. In reflecting on her successful and high profile humanitarian work, she does not collect her laurels to rest upon, but offers a new round of enthusiastic assistance to each new worthwhile project.
For nearly 30 years, Nancy McFadyen has used her considerable intellectual, physical, and psychological resources to stay the course. Philanthropy calls for difficult choices among recipients and gift amounts, but sustained unpaid work brings its share of tough times, of uncertain times, when often what is most needed is the courage to persist in the face of territorial resistance, ignorance, or fear of change.
The details of her many projects, from her childhood entrepreneurship in selling I.O.D.E. tickets to her current involvement in large-scale environmental, medical and social science activities, show how Nancy lives out some of her guiding values, expressed by one of her fiends here as “service to her community, being conscious that she and her husband John are very fortunate and have a responsibility (versus an obligation) to give back. [She has] a great well of kindness.”
Her work for this university is multi-faceted. Her current membership on the Forging Our Futures Campaign Cabinet and on the Management Team of the Healthy Living Initiative Project, her extensive UNB alumni work, plus a recently completed eight years of service on the Board of Governors and, earlier, chairing the successful fundraising campaign to save the Maggie Jean Chestnut Residence and restore it for Renaissance College mean that Nancy McFadyen knows an awe-ful lot (that's spelled a-w-e hyphen f-u-l) about how UNB works. She's quite undeterred obviously: flying frequently to Fredericton to attend many Board-related committee meetings, deciding when, where and how her strengths should best be applied, and, with her husband John, donating generously to UNB.
But all that work its into a schedule of other meetings and demands, and here's where you might fasten your seatbelts and look out for the tough assignments in the following organizations. Currently, Nancy is a Board member of the Arthritis and Autoimmunity Research Centre Foundation, Honorary Director of and fundraiser for Sheena's place (supporting people with eating disorders), an Ambassador for Interval house, a hospice for battered women and their children, and a member of the Council of Ambassadors for the very successful programme “Pathways to Education'' that mentors and tutors high school students at risk for dropout. The Enoch Turner Schoolhouse Foundation, the R. Howard Webster Foundation, and the Cabbagetown Youth Centre Toronto are additional beneficiaries of her skills, time and generosity.
In addition to controlling politically related activities for the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada over many years, and the new Conservative Party today, Nancy McFadyen is currently Co-chair of the Evergreen at the Brickworks Project in Toronto. She's not making green bricks but she certainly is building an imaginative and complex adaptive re-use of a large industrial heritage site. Do look up their website: the re-use is directed toward a sustainable social enterprise that helps citizens lend about, use, and respect the interconnections between the natural and the built environments.
In moving from medicine, education, social work, environmental science and heritage to all forms of the arts we see again a broad range of Nancy's interests and commitments. Over the years, for example, she has supported the Art Gallery of Ontario, McMichael Art Gallery, Shaw Festival, Royal Ontario Museum, Royal Botanical Garden, Canadian Film Centre, Canadian Opera House, the National Ballet School, the McLuhan Festival of the Future and last but not least, the Canadian wine industry.
During almost 30 years of volunteerism, her peers have signaled the importance of her contributions with various awards. These include The Queen's Silver Jubilee Award in 2002, The UNB alumni Award of Honor in 2002, and the national “125 Volunteer Award” in 1990. Today, in 2006, we show our respect and admiration with an honorary doctorate degree that will accompany her UNB Bachelor of Arts degree earned in 1967.
In ending this citation for Nancy McFadyen's admission into the Honorary Doctorate of Letters, I refer again to her guiding value of responsibility, rather than obligation. Being responsible means being pro-active, non-self-centred, a critical and creative thinker, and, above all, acutely aware of environmental conditions and dynamics. Canadian society needs people like Nancy McFadyen as never before.
From: Honoris Causa, UA Case 70
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