2003 Fredericton Encaenia - Ceremony B
May, Elizabeth
Doctor of Laws (LL.D.)
Orator: Patterson, Stephen E.
Citation:
ENCAENIA, MAY, 2003
ELIZABETH MAY
to be Doctor of Laws
Elizabeth May is one of Canada's leading environmentalists. She has been Executive Director of the Sierra Club of Canada, and for the past five years, a professor at Dalhousie University where she occupies the Elizabeth May Chair in Women's Health and Environment. She has courageously battled governments and corporations to stop environmental degradation, promote sustainable development, and protect the integrity of global ecosystems. While she has not always succeeded, she has won enormous respect as a formidable champion of her cause.
She was born in the United States but came to adulthood in Cape Breton where she mounted her first environmental campaign. She was barely 20 years old when she joined the fight against the forestry industry's use of chemical insecticides. The Cape Breton Landowners Against the Spray had its counterpart in New Brunswick where a group named Concerned Parents similarly challenged the government's aerial spraying against the spruce budworm. As both groups pointed out, the chemicals killed far more than the budworm, while the impact on people's health, especially the health of children, was little known. The May family paid dearly when they lost a costly court battle with the pulp companies, but Elizabeth emerged from the fight a well informed and highly skilled debater, and she was more determined than ever to make environmentalism her life's work.
Despite the fact she had no basic university degree, Dalhousie Law School took a chance on her and admitted her. She graduated in 1983 and immediately turned her attention to public causes. As Associate General Counsel at the Public Interest Advocacy Centre, she provided legal advice to consumer, poverty, and environmental groups. Over the following years, she offered her skills and support to practically every major environmental group in the country. Recognizing her as a force to be reckoned with, Federal Environment Minister Tom McMillan appointed her to be Senior Policy Advisor in 1986, and for a short time, she used her influence to get new environmental legislation and regulations in draft and to create several new national parks. However, when the politics of the infamous Rafferty-Almeda Dam project threatened her principles and her objectivity, she promptly quit.
Elizabeth May is that kind of person. When it comes to what she believes is right, and when the health and safety of the earth and its people are at risk, she is uncompromising. The Sierra Club of Canada recognized that when they appointed her as their Executive Director. In this position she developed a broad-based network of well-informed Canadians devoted to protecting global ecosystems. She has also spoken out tirelessly against mindless consumerism, industrial pollution, and the mismanagement of scarce resources. As recently as 2001, she staged a 17-day hunger strike on Parliament Hill to get help for at-risk families living beside the Sydney Tar Ponds. She has written articles and books attacking clear cutting and indiscriminate spraying of our forests and promoting sustainable development. When in 1998, she was appointed to Dalhousie University's teaching faculty as first occupant of the chair that bears her name, she had come full circle in her drive to educate the public to consume less and demand more of government and industry in protecting our shared space on earth.
While, as she has pointed out, economic growth usually trumps environmental concerns, Elizabeth May remains hopeful. She has found ready recruits among the younger generation, not only in her program at Dalhousie University, but among a growing number of concerned young people across the country. Today's first graduates of Renaissance College include many who have studied environmental issues and considered how they themselves might make a difference in the future. For them and for all who take inspiration from the work of Elizabeth May, her presence here today is deeply satisfying. We at UNB are honoured to include her among our graduates, and we celebrate her courage, tenacity, and commitment to a better world.
From: Honoris Causa - UA Case 70, Box 4
ELIZABETH MAY
to be Doctor of Laws
Elizabeth May is one of Canada's leading environmentalists. She has been Executive Director of the Sierra Club of Canada, and for the past five years, a professor at Dalhousie University where she occupies the Elizabeth May Chair in Women's Health and Environment. She has courageously battled governments and corporations to stop environmental degradation, promote sustainable development, and protect the integrity of global ecosystems. While she has not always succeeded, she has won enormous respect as a formidable champion of her cause.
She was born in the United States but came to adulthood in Cape Breton where she mounted her first environmental campaign. She was barely 20 years old when she joined the fight against the forestry industry's use of chemical insecticides. The Cape Breton Landowners Against the Spray had its counterpart in New Brunswick where a group named Concerned Parents similarly challenged the government's aerial spraying against the spruce budworm. As both groups pointed out, the chemicals killed far more than the budworm, while the impact on people's health, especially the health of children, was little known. The May family paid dearly when they lost a costly court battle with the pulp companies, but Elizabeth emerged from the fight a well informed and highly skilled debater, and she was more determined than ever to make environmentalism her life's work.
Despite the fact she had no basic university degree, Dalhousie Law School took a chance on her and admitted her. She graduated in 1983 and immediately turned her attention to public causes. As Associate General Counsel at the Public Interest Advocacy Centre, she provided legal advice to consumer, poverty, and environmental groups. Over the following years, she offered her skills and support to practically every major environmental group in the country. Recognizing her as a force to be reckoned with, Federal Environment Minister Tom McMillan appointed her to be Senior Policy Advisor in 1986, and for a short time, she used her influence to get new environmental legislation and regulations in draft and to create several new national parks. However, when the politics of the infamous Rafferty-Almeda Dam project threatened her principles and her objectivity, she promptly quit.
Elizabeth May is that kind of person. When it comes to what she believes is right, and when the health and safety of the earth and its people are at risk, she is uncompromising. The Sierra Club of Canada recognized that when they appointed her as their Executive Director. In this position she developed a broad-based network of well-informed Canadians devoted to protecting global ecosystems. She has also spoken out tirelessly against mindless consumerism, industrial pollution, and the mismanagement of scarce resources. As recently as 2001, she staged a 17-day hunger strike on Parliament Hill to get help for at-risk families living beside the Sydney Tar Ponds. She has written articles and books attacking clear cutting and indiscriminate spraying of our forests and promoting sustainable development. When in 1998, she was appointed to Dalhousie University's teaching faculty as first occupant of the chair that bears her name, she had come full circle in her drive to educate the public to consume less and demand more of government and industry in protecting our shared space on earth.
While, as she has pointed out, economic growth usually trumps environmental concerns, Elizabeth May remains hopeful. She has found ready recruits among the younger generation, not only in her program at Dalhousie University, but among a growing number of concerned young people across the country. Today's first graduates of Renaissance College include many who have studied environmental issues and considered how they themselves might make a difference in the future. For them and for all who take inspiration from the work of Elizabeth May, her presence here today is deeply satisfying. We at UNB are honoured to include her among our graduates, and we celebrate her courage, tenacity, and commitment to a better world.
From: Honoris Causa - UA Case 70, Box 4
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