Conestoga alumni extend official welcome to the college’s newest graduates

Caps and gowns can be seen at the Bingeman’s Conference Centre this week in Kitchener.

Conestoga College kicks off their Spring 2017 Convocation and President John Tibbits says the college is involved in the community in a large way.

“53 per cent of the work force in this community has taken at least a course at Conestoga, and if you look at the last 20 or so years, about a quarter million people have taken Continuing Education courses,” he says.

Tibbits says the college is much more important than people realize.

“50 per cent of the health care workers outside of doctors are Conestoga graduates in this community,” he says.

Tibbits says there has been three big demographic changes within recent graduating classes.

“One is an age change because 65 per cent of our first year class does not come directly from high school, the other is ethnicity as we now have 2500 international students, and the third is we have more women attending our programs,” he says.

Tibbits says we need to encourage more males to get involved in post-secondary.

Tibbits adds the college is a very important part of economic development in the community.

Roughly 4,600 students are graduating from 250 programs.

Top Stories

Top Stories

Most Watched Today