Dean of School of Agriculture Sciences Josie Van Lent has received the 2018 Gold Award of Excellence for her leadership in agriculture for Lakeland College.
Van Lent received the award on Monday in the leadership excellence for managerial staff category from Colleges and Institutes of Canada (CICan). She says that she was humbled and it was a great honour.
“It was a national award that means that others from across Canada from other institutions, people I have a great deal of respect for, I know I consider to be colleagues were also in the running.”
Van Lent joined the college in 2007 and since then the school’s enrolment has increased from 182 students to almost 500 in 2017-2018 academic year. She says the connections Lakeland has with the agriculture industry is what set them apart.
“Our relationship with industry particularly, New Holland, Alberta Milk with building of our new dairy farm and subsequently now we’re also working with Alberta Milk on additional training for their industry.”
Van Lent says the next steps for her and Lakeland are to keep working on improving the facilities in and around the Vermilion campus.
“We need to continue to upgrade some of our facilities on the farm along with the environmental school and our service center. We’re also upgrading a number of our labs.”
She adds that the school is also working on an applied degree in agriculture sciences that will allow students more opportunity on campus.