Red Deer College has embarked on a new venture that will see its Donald School of Business expand and move into downtown Red Deer.
College officials made the announcement on Tuesday in front of the business school’s new location in the Millennium Centre at 4909 49th St.
RDC president Joel Ward said the college will expand and offer new programs for students, as well as international and co-op experiences, degree opportunities, executive and corporate training.
Ward said he expects the Donald School of Business will stimulate growth in the downtown, with 600 to 700 new people being there each day. Ward doesn’t expect any parking difficulties, with the college encouraging students to take the bus and with the new parkade nearby.
“When you take a look at business schools across the country and in the United States, it seems like the best location for business schools is in the financial sector of each community,” Ward said. “It enables us now to have our students spend time with folks right in downtown Red Deer, the banks, the stockbrokers, the legal firms, all will be able to come into our facility, talk to our students, meet our students and our students will have a chance to operate and do projects right in the downtown with businesses downtown.”
The Donald School of Business will be housed in the third, fourth and a bit of the fifth floor of the Millennium Centre in more than 36,000 square feet of space. Ward didn’t elaborate on the 10-year rental agreement, but said the college got a good deal. Renovations will begin on the space by December and be completed in time for students in September 2011.
The business school is named after Red Deer entrepreneurs Jack and Joan Donald, who donated $3 million between 2007 to 2010 to Red Deer College’s building expansion. The Donalds moved to Red Deer the same year that RDC opened in 1964 and they co-founded the petroleum company Parkland Industries Ltd., now called Parkland Income Trust.
The Donalds were at the event on Tuesday and said they plan to take an active role in the business school, mentoring young business students.
“I think the students will teach us something,” Joan said.
Joan said when she and her husband Jack started many years ago, their knowledge of the business world was through the jobs they had but they had no formal business education. She said they had a passion to make their lives successful and took a few courses along the way, but they had to learn by doing and somehow made the right choices.
sobrien@www.reddeeradvocate.com