Identity area
Type of entity
Authorized form of name
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
- AIE
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
History
The Atlantic Institute of Education (AIE) was a short-lived degree-granting body providing graduate studies in education, curriculum research and development, and training for school board directors. It was conceived in 1969 as a cooperative initiative of the four Atlantic provinces to serve as a research and development arm of the education industry. However, Nova Scotia was the only province to enact legislation around it—the Atlantic Institute of Education Act.
The original idea was the brainchild of Nova Scotia premier and education minister Robert Stanfield and, in 1966, on the advice of the Association of Atlantic Universities (AAU), he commissioned the Fletcher report, which recommended that such an institute be established at Dalhousie’s Faculty of Graduate Studies. Despite the enthusiasm of Stanfield and the Nova Scotia Department of Education, the recommendation was not welcomed by the other provinces, Nova Scotia universities, or even Dalhousie.
Despite this, the institute was chartered in 1970, with a board of directors, an academic council, and offices at 5244 South Street. Joseph Lauwerys was appointed as the first director and Gary Anderson as assistant director. In December 1973 the AIE granted its first degrees. In 1975 W.B. Hamilton took over as director and, in an effort to encourage buy-in from the other provinces, he established representation on the academic council from all the provincial universities. In 1976 the institute joined the Association of Atlantic Universities and received support from a series of Nova Scotia ministers of education.
In August 1982 the new Conservative government withdrew all funding and the AIE was shut down.