Frontier College
When established in 1899, Frontier College was the only national, non-denominational organization providing education to workers in remote parts of Canada. It sent idealistic youth to isolated lumber, mining, and railway camps across the country where, as "labourer-teachers," they taught classes, provided social services, and organized recreation. During the 1920s, the College also instituted an innovative extramural, degree-granting program directed at workers. A pioneer in the field of adult education, Frontier College reached generations of Canadians not well served by the traditional education system.
From: Wikipedia
Frontier Collage
Frontier College is a Canadian literacy organization established in 1899 by Alfred Fitzpatrick. Founded as the Reading Camp Association, Frontier College aims to combat illiteracy in Canada by providing non-formal education to those that seek assistance with their learning and have been overlooked or left behind by the formal educational system. To this end, Frontier College runs myriad English-language and French-language literacy programs for children, youth and adults in many places across Canada such as community centers, shelters, farms and prisons. It was renamed Frontier College in 1919
Since 1986, its national headquarters has been located at Gzowski House (named for the celebrated Canadian journalist, the late Peter Gzowski) in Toronto, Ontario.
Frontier College has a hierarchical organizational structure that is centered around its national office in Toronto. It has strong, widespread presence in Ontario and Quebec, and also maintains staff that operate regional and provincial offices in other parts of Canada. It also maintains a large volunteer base through its network of Frontier College campus programs located at many universities across Canada, which recruits university students to volunteer as tutors in its programs.
History
In 1899, the Canadian Shield in northern Ontario was dotted with isolated lumber camps that were cut off from larger society. Alfred Fitzpatrick, a 37 year old Nova Scotian, who was then a young minister of a Presbyterian Church at Nairn Centre (located west of Sudbury, Ontario), saw that many of the young men - who were largely new immigrants - that worked at these camps were denied the benefits of culture, education and enlightenment. Influenced by the notions of the Social Gospel movement and the teachings of Professor George Grant at his alma mater (Queen's University), Fitzpatrick recognized that these men deserved "not charity but social justice.[2]" His prescription was straightforward: after securing the goodwill of the lumber magnates, he would go about from lumber camp to lumber camp, and in each he would erect large tents called "Reading Tents." Each tent was then outfitted with books and stationed by Labourer-Teachers who were university students recruited to volunteer at the tents to teach the workers to read and write. Outside each tent was a sign that said "Reading Tent. All Welcome." Thus, the Reading Tent Association was born. It was later renamed Frontier College.
Over the years, with the changing face of Canada and the nature of its society and industries, Frontier College too adapted its programs in order to meet the learning needs of Canadians everywhere. In 1932, Frontier College began serving in British Columbia 'relief camps'. The range of its programs grew from serving labourers in isolated logging and mining camps or rail gangs, to assisting all constituents of Canadian society from adults working in factories and workshops, to children from low-income families needing help with their homework, street-involved youth who are determined to overcome their circumstances, and Native learners and communities.