An interview with Dr. Jason Dewling
Ben Taylor // Crew Writer (he/him)
Capilano Courier: Questions for President
March 11, 2026
First of all, if you could please introduce yourself and share a little bit about your background for those who don’t know much about you?
I’m pleased to join the CapU community. I come to this community as a higher education
professional with experience in Alberta and British Columbia. I was an instructor in child and youth care and an associate dean at Lakeland College and later served as vice-president of academic and research at Olds College before joining LaSalle College Vancouver (LCV) as president eight and a half years ago. I love engaging with students and have already had the chance to meet many of you. I’ve attended the volleyball and basketball provincial tournaments and an EarthWorks session in my first couple of weeks. In April, I’ll also be meeting with the Capilano Students’ Union. Additionally, I have a number of student events in my calendar in the coming months, so I’ll have the opportunity to hear directly from many of you. Please stop me and say hello if you see me walking the hallways.
What program did you choose when you started your journey in post-secondary education?
I have a couple of theology degrees (a bachelor’s and a master’s) and a PhD in Education,
with my research focused on inclusion for individuals with disabilities.
And, how different did your career path end up being from what you envisioned when
you made that decision?
Growing up in a conservative faith community, the predominant perspective was that you
pursued theology if you wanted to help or serve others. I soon learned that you could help
and serve in a variety of ways. My career path certainly wasn’t a straight line. My story includes many people seeing things in me that I didn’t see in myself. Lots of people gave me a chance when I was still a bit of an unproven entity. Several opportunities also converged at the right time, allowing me to take on exceptional roles. As someone who grew up in a somewhat sheltered environment, I could not have dreamed of the life I’ve lived to this point. That perspective leads me to take on this role with a deep sense of humility and gratitude.
In the official announcement welcoming you to CapU, the board chair mentioned your
“work with Indigenous communities.” Could you expand on what that looked like, and
how do you plan to take that experience into your role at CapU?
I was in my late twenties and early thirties at Lakeland College when I first began working
alongside Indigenous communities. We partnered with a non-profit called Credenda (Cree,
Dene and Dakota: CREe-DENe-DAkota) in Saskatchewan, offering early childhood and
teaching assistant programming directly within remote communities. Lakeland also had a significant First Nations population on the Lloydminster campus, and we worked alongside those communities to include cultural celebrations on campus, such as an annual teepee raising and round dance. I was the liaison between the college and the local Indigenous communities and organizations. More recently, we had Dr. Kim Baird (Tsawwassen First Nation) serve on our board at LCV and she provided great direction for the organization. We provided an 80 per cent tuition discount to Indigenous students to make our programs more accessible and conducted
campus-wide truth and reconciliation training under Dr. Baird’s guidance. At CapU, I’ve already met with the Elders and the Indigenous education & affairs team, and we identified several ways we can move forward with initiatives that support truth and reconciliation. These include developing a process to authenticate Indigenous origins, providing campus training on truth and reconciliation for all employees, and embedding Indigenous knowledge into many of our courses and programs as part of the work connected to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
What is your settling-in timeline looking like? Many decisions were put on hold until
the new president arrived—when are you hoping to be ready to start making decisions,
and which ones are you being asked to prioritize?
I had some time to onboard before arriving, so I’ve hit the ground running. I’m extremely
appreciative of the warm welcome I’ve received from employees, students, alumni and
Community. I have a high capacity for listening, reading and learning, so I’m working hard to gather as much information as possible as we respond to the urgency of this moment. I anticipate
bringing some key decisions to the board before summer 2026.
2 Cents on: The new president’s debut
*The Courier supports critical analysis but does not necessarily endorse the views expressed in this segment
Laura Morales Padilla (she/her) // Co-EIC
On his second day on the job, March 3, Jason Dewling chaired his first senate meeting. Having read University Governance in Canada and the Courier’s December article, Faculty Merger Divides Senate, the new president moderated discussions during one of the most ‘contentious’ meetings this governance body had held in years. With over an hour having passed during the meeting, and still many timely items left on the agenda, the president offered to order pizzas. A round of giggles filled the room when one of the senators looked back at that moment—after a lengthy discussion around program suspensions—wishing they had accepted the offer.
“I’m grateful that things worked out the way they did,” Dewling said during his opening remarks, reflecting on the fact that Paul Dangerfield—the former president—had notified the community of his resignation two years ago. “It’s a long time for an institution to know that a president is leaving and to wait for the next one to come,” he acknowledged. Senators nodded. Many course-remapping, structure-altering decisions had been put into a jar labelled “Do not open unless you are CapU’s new president.”
Understandably, not only senators, but also students, staff and faculty members are paying extremely close attention to the new president’s words. Anyone who has taught or learned in CapU’s small classrooms, or worked behind the scenes to make that possible, knows that we have something special going on, and want to see if the new president can recognize it too and ensure it survives the current financial crisis.
With that in mind, when the president stated, for example, that the university needs to embrace the intent of a teaching university—to be an “applied-learning-focused institution,” according to Dewling—it raises the question of whether fitting this definition leaves room for research initiatives. When he mentioned the importance of programs having “strong labour market connectivity,” it raises two questions: whether that leaves room for programs that offer other types of value and to what extent labour market needs are overlapping with students’ interests. And when he talked about the responsiveness and urgency needed from Senate to address current pressing issues, it raises the question of whether senators are failing to provide required advice to the Board of Governors fast enough, or whether they are delayed because they are having to do the work—gathering evidence, filling consultation gaps—that should have been completed before the Board passed the motion to seek their advice.
To reassure the overthinkers, the new president labelled these as “preliminary comments,” and requested senators to let him adjust them later if he were to come to a different understanding. Although, what seemed like a non-negotiable for the new president is what he called a “core principle” of the university: public trust.
As Dewling mentioned, there is a lot of external pressure: referring to financial pressures, the Avison review, geopolitical dynamics and artificial intelligence. He also said that the situation we are in is not something we can blame on a single person or decision, but rather “external for the most part” and should be seen as an opportunity for everyone to bring their best ideas.
However, there are also internal pressures to address and community trust needs to be rebuilt. After all, it was not that long ago that the Courier asked the former president if CapU was concerned about relying on international enrolment to cover rising operating costs. Halfway through the 2023-24 year—when CapU’s international FTE percentage was 51.63 per cent while the target according to their internationalization plan was between 30 and 40 per cent—Dangerfield’s response was, “At CapU, we are not reliant on international student tuition to deliver quality education.” The broken trust is felt by international students who still don’t know what the full price of their degree will be, as CapU continues to ignore the requirement for transparent tuition fees outlined in the “International Student Enrolment Guidelines” published by the province in 2024. Moreover, this precedent of denying a problem despite the evidence available resonates with the union’s concerns about administrative bloat.
Being elected as president is no small feat. After being short-listed, candidates go through multiple search committees in which faculty, staff and students ask questions and provide feedback on each candidate. If none of the short-listed candidates meet the expected standards, the process has to start all over again, which was the case before a second round short-listed Dewling. Being selected is already a sign of trust from the community, and hopefully, that trust is cultivated under the leadership of the new president.