University Canada West Closes Victoria Campus

The University Canada West is closing up shop and turning the lights out on the Victoria campus’ degree programs.

British Columbia’s first private-sector university opened its doors in January of 2005 in the old Blanshard elementary school.

David Strong (The former president of The University of Victoria) founded the school in the hopes of providing a chance for students whose schedules or grades kept them out of public universities.

The school opened a second campus in Vancouver and was purchased by The Eminata Group in 2008. The Victoria campus’ enrollment has steadily declined, even while the Mainland’s campus enrolment grew to about 500.

The University Canada West never reached the anticipated enrollment of 3,000 students, nor the onsite school residences it hoped for. That notwithstanding, Eminata still considers the school a success.

“This decision to wind down the degree programs (in Victoria)… was entirely based on the realities of the Lower Mainland, which has shown extraordinarily positive growth,” said Royden Trainor of Eminata.

The Victoria campus’ master’s degrees in business administration and bachelor of commerce degrees, will now be centralized at the Vancouver campus.

The Victoria campus used to be home to 150 students and 100 full-and part-time teaching staff. Now, as they wind down, enrollment is down to a few dozen students and a handful of instructors.