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2024.11.03
Registration is now open for the reunion of faculty, students and support staff of
Nelson BC’s former David Thompson University Centre and its successor institution, the Kootenay School of the Arts, April 25 to 27, 2025.
The registration form is available to either email or mail to the reunion organizing committee. Early bird registration is $65 per person up to Jan. 30, 2025, after which registration is $85 per person.
Socializing is part of any reunion, and the DTUC-KSA one begins with a meet and greet the evening of Friday, April 25 at Mary Hall on the former DTUC site (now Selkirk College’s Tenth Street Campus).
The entire program to date is summarized on the registration form. Events include a month-long art sale and show by reunion registrants, dubbed “Continuum”, at Nelson’s Craft Connection artists’ co-op. An opening reception is planned for Saturday, April 26. And on the same date, a one-day art exhibition of works by faculty and alumni of the two institutions who have passed away, titled “We Wish You Were Here”, will be at the former KSA site, now Selkirk College’s Kootenay Studio Arts building on Victoria Street.
April 26 will also feature three daytime panel discussions and a group author reading, all open to the public, at Shambhala Hall at Selkirk’s Tenth Street Campus (the Hall was known as Studio 80 at DTUC). Details on panel participants will be posted here as they are finalized. The panel topics will be:
“The ripples of the 75 years of arts education in our city has infiltrated far and wide,” said reunion committee member Robin DuPont, an instructor in the Ceramics program at Selkirk College, located in the Studio Arts building. “I look forward to this reunion as a platform to gather and exchange ideas and our experiences once again.”
The 2025 event follows the successful first-ever reunion in May 2023 of former DTUC faculty, support staff and students held at the Prestige Lakeside Resort in Nelson. DTUC, which operated between 1979 and 1984, was a consortium of the University of Victoria and Selkirk College. The novel post-secondary institution was opened in response to the outcry in Nelson over the closure of the province’s second university, Notre Dame University of Nelson, which operated 1950-1977. After DTUC was shuttered, the former DTUC Support Society sparked the creation of KSA, which ran as a municipal initiative from 1991 until it was merged earlier this century into Selkirk College as Kootenay Studio Arts.
Questions about the April 2025 reunion can be directed to the reunion committee at
DTUC.KSAreunion@gmail.com.
Melody Diachun, Robin DuPont, Tracey Fellowes, Eva McKimm, Verna Relkoff, Linda Sawchyn, Tom Wayman, and Calvin Wharton.
2024.08.17
As a follow-up to the successful first-ever reunion in May 2023 of former participants in the David Thompson University Centre, a reunion of faculty, students and support staff of DTUC and its successor institution, the Kootenay School of the Arts, is planned for April 25 to 27 of next year.
The expanded reunion this spring, thanks to the co-operation of Selkirk College, will offer a social evening April 25 at Mary Hall on Selkirk’s Tenth Street Campus (the former Notre Dame University/DTUC campus), and panels and presentations April 26 at the Tenth Street Campus’ Shambhala Music & Performance Hall (formerly Studio 80). Art exhibits by faculty and alumni will be held in Nelson at the former KSA building at Victoria and Josephine St., and at the Craft Connection, 378 Baker St.
As program details are finalised, information will be updated on this website (dtuc-ksa-reunion.ca). Meantime, people interested in attending should contact the reunion committee at DTUC.KSAreunion@gmail.com to ensure they receive the latest news about the event.
“Those of us on the planning committee for the 2023 DTUC reunion were astonished at how much enthusiasm people expressed about the gathering,” said Tom Wayman, a former writing instructor at both DTUC and KSA. “Because lots of people subsequently told us they regretted not attending, the Nelson committee decided to plan for a follow-up.”
Wayman said that the reunion committee decided to include for the 2025 event faculty, students, and support staff from KSA, which grew out of the determination of the DTUC Support Society to preserve arts-oriented post-secondary education in Nelson after DTUC’s closure in 1984.
“I’m excited to learn about and celebrate the incredible accomplishments of DTUC/KSA alumni alongside Selkirk College’s current Kootenay Studio Arts students and instructors,” said Melody Diachun, chair of Selkirk’s School of Arts & Technology.
“This reunion is more than just a get-together; it will be a vibrant exchange of creativity, skills, and ideas between veteran artists and the next generation. I can’t wait to see the spark of inspiration when our community comes together to honour the rich legacy and bright future of these talented individuals.”
Nelson, unique among Canadian municipalities, has conceived and implemented three broad-based post-secondary institutions since the mid-20th Century: Notre Dame University 1950-1977, DTUC 1979-1984, and the Kootenay School of the Arts, which opened in 1991 and earlier this century was merged into Selkirk College as Kootenay Studio Arts.
We are maintaining the Facebook group, which has been updated to DTUC-KSA Reunion 2025
.