Heather Munroe-Blum
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Heather Anne Elyse Lilian Munroe-Blum, OC (born 1950) is the Principal and Vice-Chancellor of McGill University in Montreal, Quebec.
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Munroe-Blum was born in Montreal and raised in Ontario. She received her B.A. and B.S.W. from McMaster University, M.S.W. from Wilfrid Laurier University, and Ph.D from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Prior to her appointment as Principal of McGill, she was a professor at York University, McMaster University, and the University of Toronto, where she later served as the Vice-President of Research and International Relations) between 1994 and 2002. In January 2003, Munroe-Blum replaced outgoing Principal Bernard Shapiro as McGill's Principal, the first woman to occupy the position. Shapiro later served as the federal ethics commissioner in Canada.
Trained as an epidemiologist, Professor Munroe-Blum has led large-scale epidemiological investigations related to psychiatric disorders. She is the author or co-author of over 60 scholarly publications, including four books. She has served on the Board of Directors of the Medical Research Council of Canada (now the Canadian Institutes of Health Research) as well as on international reviews of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), the Swiss National Science Foundation, and the National Institute of Mental Health (USA).
Munroe-Blum is a member of the Faculty of Medicine at McGill and a Professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics.
As Principal, Munroe-Blum has demonstrated a number of priorities. Chief among these is rectifying what she often cites as systemic underfunding of McGill. Examples of this can be seen in her attracting of Canadian philanthropists such as Marcel Desautels and Seymour Schulich to make notably large donations to the University, resulting in the renaming of the faculties of Management and Music respectively. Throughout her first terms she has received sharp criticism, and constant opposition from the student body for what they see as unscrupulous policies. These include attempting to evict the sexual assault centre and the Muslim students' prayer center, selling ad space in bathrooms, revoking the right to protest on McGill property, forcing all SSMU clubs to remove "McGill" from their name (though she did offer to sell them the right to use it), "illegally" increasing international student tuition by charging a "fee processing fee" of well over a thousand dollars, and most notably restricting the size of student protests and limiting where they can take place on campus, although this rule has been ignored on several occasions. Some student organizations have also criticized Blum for her corporate ties, most notably her spot on the Board of Directors of Alcan.
Munroe-Blum has received many accolades from the Academic community including honorary degrees from the Université de Montréal, University of Edinburgh, the University of Toronto, Wilfrid Laurier University, and École Normale Supérieure de Lyon. She is also an Officer of the Order of Canada and Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. She is married to screenwriter Len Blum. They have a daughter, Sydney Blum.
In 2005, she attended the elite international Bilderberg conference. See List of Bilderberg attendees.
- Biography from the McGill University Administration and Governance site
- Brief biography from the Canadian Olympic Committee
- Canadian Who's Who 1997 entry
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| Mountain • Bethune • Meredith • Dawson • Peterson • Geddes • Currie • Morgan • Douglas • James • Robertson • Bell • Johnston • Shapiro • Munroe-Blum |
Categories: 1950 births | Living people | Canadian university and college vice-presidents | Fellows of the Royal Society of Canada | McGill University faculty | McMaster University alumni | Officers of the Order of Canada | People from Montreal | Principals of McGill University | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill alumni | University of Toronto faculty | York University faculty