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Dalhousie Legal Aid Service was founded as a summer project by the former Halifax Neighbourhood Center in 1970. It was Nova Scotia’s first legal service for people with low income and it is considered Canada’s oldest clinical law program. The clinic was located on Cunard Street until it moved to its current location in the former Royal Bank building, on Gottingen Street.

Donna Franey is the current executive director and is also a faculty member of Dalhousie University’s Law School. The staff also includes five full time lawyers, two community legal aid workers, one office manager and three legal assistants.

The clinic provides third year law students from Dalhousie University’s Schulich School of Law with practical hands on experience. Each term, twelve to sixteen students represent approximately 10 clients with assistance from lawyers on staff for a 13-credit course.

As of January, 2011 Dalhousie Legal Aid only provides legal advice and representation in the areas of Family Law, Social Assistance and Family Benefits, Residential Tenancy complaints, Youth Criminal Justice Act and Debt (Student loans, Nova Scotia Power cut-offs) to persons of low income and non-profit community groups and organizations who would not normally be able to afford a lawyer.

In the 1970s and early 1980s Dalhousie Cultural Activities referred to the department responsible for operating the Dalhousie Arts Centre and the university program of arts related activities it oversaw.

Senate Standing Committee on Cultural Activities

The department originated from a Senate Standing Committee on Cultural Activities created in 1964 to coordinate arts events on campus. The committee worked with three arts advisory sub-committees (one each for music, art, and theatre) and was Dalhousie’s first coordinated approach to cultural activity planning on campus. In addition to organizing specific events such as concert series, exhibitions, and workshops, the committee pressured senior administration to build a university centre for the arts which would house teaching and office space, an auditorium, a theatre, and a gallery.

General Committee on Cultural Activities

The Senate dissolved the committee two years later in favour of creating a formal university committee with a similar mandate. In 1966 President Hicks selected the members of the new General Committee on Cultural Activities which would be directly responsible to him. This committee continued to work with subcommittees who were allocated their own budgets and who were responsible for programming in specific areas: art, music, and theatre (a film subcommittee was also added in 1969). Members of the general committee included the chairmen of the sub-committees, students, alumni, representatives from the theatre and music departments, faculty, and other members from the community.

In addition to developing and overseeing a well-rounded, university wide, cultural activity program on campus, the general committee was also involved with the development of the Dalhousie Arts Centre. The committee provided input on layout and design, set priorities for completion, and helped determine how the new facility would be managed. The committee played a pivotal role in securing a coordinator for the centre and professional director for the gallery. John Cripton was hired to be the university’s first coordinator of cultural activities while Dr. Earnest Smith was appointed director of the gallery.

Dalhousie Cultural Activities

The committee evolved again with the opening of the Arts Centre in 1970. Both administrators were given seats on the general committee as ex-officio members and the department now became known collectively as Dalhousie Cultural Activities. Still responsible for providing a rounded cultural program, the general committee now also determined the policies of the Dalhousie Arts Centre and oversaw the activities of the coordinator. The new coordinator was responsible to the general committee and for administering the arts centre with the teaching programs in mind; cooperating with similar organizations in the community; preparing activity programs for the approval of the general committee; negotiating bookings for visiting performers; managing the daily activities of the centre and its staff; preparing budgets for committee approval; and publishing event calendars.

Although an executive committee was formed in 1976 to help manage the affairs of the centre, the committee structure began to break down by the 1980s. Many of the sub-committees, the general committee, and the executive committee were meeting rarely and lacked enthusiasm, in part due to severe budget cuts and the growing complexity of operating the department. As a result, in 1984 the general committee was dissolved and the coordinator of cultural activities became directly responsible for the Arts Centre, liaising with the Art Gallery and other departments, and reporting to the vice president, finance and development.

Dalhousie Arts Centre

In 1985 Dalhousie Cultural Activities formally changed its name to the Dalhousie Arts Centre. As of 2006, the department continues to be responsible for the administration of the arts centre and remains one of four autonomous departments (the others being the Art Gallery, and the music and theatre departments) within the facility, responsible for managing the Rebecca Cohn Auditorium and three reception rooms. Thirty-five years after opening, the centre maintains a vibrant arts program for the university and greater Halifax community.

Chief Officers

Known chairmen of the General Committee of Cultural Activities include C.B. Weld (ca. 1966-1968), Malcolm Ross (ca. 1969-1971), George Nicholls (ca. 1972-1974), Rowland Smith (ca. 1975-1976), and Sonia Jones (ca. 1976-1980).

Coordinators of the Arts Centre include John Cripton (1970-1973), Erik Perth (1973-1984), John Wilkes (1984-1987), Murray Farr (1987-1988), Robert Reinholdt (1988-1989), and Heather McGean (200?).

The Board of Governors is responsible for the overall conduct, management, administration and control of the property, revenue and business of Dalhousie University.

On 11 December 1817 Lord Dalhousie made a submission to his Council proposing the establishment of a college in Halifax, naming an interim Board of Trustees made up of the lieutenant governor (himself); the chief justice, the Anglican bishop; the provincial treasurer; and the Speaker of the Assembly (later adding the minister of St Matthews Church).

Two years later, in the face of mounting building debt, it was expedient to incorporate the governors of the college, which comprised Lord Dalhousie (now the Governor General of North America); Sir James Kempt (the current Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia); the Anglican Bishop of Nova Scotia; the chief justice; the treasurer of the province; the Speaker of the Assembly; and the president of the college (who was yet to be named). The 1821 Act was passed, incorporating the governors of Dalhousie College and beginning Dalhousie’s legal existence.

By August 1838, due to deaths, resignations and absences, the board was reduced to three: the lieutenant-governor, the treasurer of the province and the Speaker of the House. Despite disagreement and opposition, the board appointed three professors for the college’s first term, including Thomas McCulloch as president. In 1840 the Dalhousie Act reconfigured the board established by the Act of 1821. The Governor General of North America, the chief justice and all other ex-officio members were dropped, with the exception of the lieutenant governor and the president of Dalhousie College. Twelve new members were named and it was decided that future vacancies would be selected by the Legislative Council, with two members chosen by the Assembly and one by the Council. If cumbersome, the new 17-member board was more representative across political and religious spheres than earlier renditions. In 1842 the board drew up rules of governance, including age of admission and requirements for the Bachelor of Arts, and laid down principles of liberality with regard to religious affiliation. They reduced professorial salaries and tried to clarify their rights to the Grand Parade. Despite their renewed efforts, Dalhousie closed its doors in 1844 following the death of Thomas McCulloch.

The 1848 Dalhousie Act reduced the Board of Governors to between five and seven members to be appointed by the governor-in-council, and William Young, Joseph Howe, Hugh Bell, James Avery, William Grigor, Andrew MacKinlay and John Naylor were named to the board. Their efforts to make Dalhousie useful and solvent included opening it first as a collegiate school, then as a high school, and finally as a small university in union with Gorham College in Liverpool, England. None of these was successful and by 1862 the Board was down to four members and had not met in two years.

Three new appointments were made to the board along with amendments granting it greater authority, and in 1863 a new Dalhousie College Act was passed that gave the board power to appoint all college officers, including the president and professors, and, while internal governance was the responsibility of an academic senate, their rules were subject to board approval. The college was reconstituted as a university, conferring bachelors, master and doctoral degrees. In November 1863 Dalhousie College opened under the new board.

For over fifty years the Dalhousie Art Gallery has been offering a diverse program of exhibitions, films, lectures and artists' presentations, serving as a cultural resource to the university and its community.

Prior to the establishment of the physical gallery, the University Art Group was formed by faculty members and administers in 1943. Housed in an ad-hoc space in the science department, the group sponsored exhibitions, screened films and loaned out its small collections of art reproductions. They also joined the Maritime Art Association, which enabled them to host travelling exhibitions from the National Gallery as well as to promote Maritime artists across other regions of Canada.

The Dalhousie Art Gallery was officially opened in October 1953 in a single room in the Arts and Administration Building, run by a volunteer committee of faculty members. The same year marked the beginning of the annual Student, Staff, Faculty and Alumni Exhibition, which both showcased Dalhousie’s talent and firmly identified the Gallery as a university facility.

During the 1950s and 1960s the University Art Gallery underwent rapid expansion in its collections and programming. In 1963 Classics professor Mirko Usmiani served as Honorary Curator, succeeded the following year by Evelyn Holmes, who was appointed as Acting Curator. Since 1972 the gallery has employed a series of professionally qualified directors, curators and registrar-preparators, assisted by part-time staff and volunteers and guided by an advisory committee of individuals from across the university and community.

In the early 1970s the Art Gallery held exhibitions in the Killam Library, but in November 1971 it moved into its current home in the newly built Dalhousie Arts Centre. The permanent exhibition area and work and storage spaces enabled the gallery to establish itself as a credible cultural organization, able to meet international standards for displaying and handling works of art. The move also allowed for the expansion and care for the gallery’s permanent collection.

The University Senate officially approved the gallery as an Academic Support Unit in 1985. In 1994, threatened with closure due to funding cuts, the gallery was saved by a donation from Dalhousie alumnus, John Scrymgeour. Currently the gallery’s operating budget is paid by the university and supplemented by an endowment fund. Additional financial support for programming is achieved through provincial and national grants.

The Faculty of Architecture was established on 1 April 1997 with the merger of the Technical University of Nova Scotia (TUNS) and Dalhousie University. It was the outgrowth of the first school of architecture in Atlantic Canada, which opened at the Nova Scotia Technical College in 1961, sharing a building on Spring Garden Road with the Nova Scotia Museum of Science. During the 1960s the professional architecture program began, consisting of two years of engineering at one of seven Maritime universities, followed by four years at the School of Architecture, leading to a BArch degree. In 1969 the engineering prerequisite was changed to two years in any university subject.

In 1970 the School of Architecture took over the entire building and initiated the trimester system and co-op work term program. In 1973 the architecture portion of the professional program included a two-year pre-professional degree (later called Bachelor of Environmental Design Studies) and a two-year professional BArch degree. The BArch program was validated by the Commonwealth Association of Architects and a one-year, post-professional Master of Architecture program was offered. In 1976 the NSTC Faculty of Architecture was established, with the School of Architecture continuing as a constituent part of the Faculty. The main floor of the building was renovated, including the addition of a mezzanine for faculty offices. The Master of Urban and Rural Planning program was first offered in 1977. In 1978 the Department of Urban and Rural Planning was established within the Faculty of Architecture, becoming the School of Planning in 2001.

In the early 1980s, after the Nova Scotia Technical College had become the Technical University of Nova Scotia, the building's studio level was renovated and mezzanines were added. In the mid-1980s the professional program was transformed, leading to a two-year MArch (first professional) degree with a thesis component. The school began to participate in overseas activities with the International Laboratory for Architecture and Urban Design (ILAUD) and external adjuncts and examiners were appointed. In the late 1980s the Faculty opened a publishing department, Tuns Press, to produce architecture and planning publications. An arrangement with Apple Canada introduced an initial fleet of computers for student use. In 1989 a one-year, non-professional Master of Environmental Design Studies degree was offered.

In 1993, following an international design competition, the first phase of a new addition designed by Brian MacKay-Lyons was built in the rear courtyard of the existing building. In a second phase in 2002, upper floors for studios were added inside the addition. In 1994 the School's professional architecture program became the first in Canada to receive full accreditation from the Canadian Architectural Certification Board. Full accreditation was granted again in 1999, 2004, 2009 and 2015. In 1997, a decision by the Nova Scotia government to amalgamate universities led the three faculties of the Technical University of Nova Scotia (Architecture, Engineering, and Computer Science) to become part of Dalhousie University. In 2001 the Faculty of Architecture was renamed the Faculty of Architecture and Planning.

The Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences was established on 1 July 1988, composed of humanities and social science departments within the former Faculty of Arts and Science. The restructuring of the Faculty began in 1986 with the establishment of a committee to consider its future direction. The Smith Report, drafted in 1987 by Rowland Smith, McCulloch Professor of English and Acting Dean of Arts and Science, recommended the division of the Faculty, which was followed by a faculty-wide referendum resulting in marginal favour of the decision.

The earliest university calendar lists only a Faculty of Arts. However, to obtain a Bachelor of Arts degree, students were first required to pass matriculation examinations in classics, mathematics and English, while subsequent classes included rhetoric, logic and psychology, natural philosophy (experimental physics), modern languages, metaphysics, chemistry, ethics, political economy, and history. MA degrees were granted on completion of a thesis on a literary, scientific or professional subject.

In 1878 a Department of Science was established in connection with the Faculty of Arts, and in 1880 the university calendar lists a Faculty of Science. By 1906, the university calendars refer to a single Faculty of Arts and Science, a title which lasted until the administrative division in 1988.

The Department of Music had its origins in an affiliation between the Halifax Conservatory and Dalhousie dating back to 1889. The Conservatory offered a licentiate diploma and a Bachelor in Music degree, as did the Maritime Academy of Music, founded in 1934. The association with Dalhousie continued after the two music schools amalgamated in 1954 as the Maritime Conservatory of Music and, from 1949 until the mid 1960s, elective music appreciation classes and ensemble groups at Dalhousie were organized by Harold Hamer.

The Dalhousie Department of Music was established in 1968 and began offering practical instruction and theory: instrumental lessons and voice coaching were expanded in 1975 under the leadership of Peter Fletcher. While the initial aim of the department was to produce students of a high practical ability, by the late 1970s the department's mandate was to train prospective professional musicians, performers, composers and critics. The 1971 opening of the Dalhousie Arts Centre greatly enhanced teaching and performance capacity, as the new building offered performance halls, practice rooms and a piano lab. Imported instructors were replaced with both part-time and full-time faculty, and the department sponsored both professional and community ensembles such as the Dalhousie Chorale, the Dalhousie Opera Workshop and Musica Antiqua.

Beginning in 1977 the department offered four-year Bachelor of Music and Bachelor of Music Education degrees and a five-year integrated degree program. Further academic programs included a pre-baccalaureate foundational studies program and a B Mus curriculum in organ and church music in collaboration with the Atlantic School of Theology and the community churches of the RCCO. Other programs were offered in collaboration with Henson College and the Department of Theatre.

In 2014 the Department of Music became a program in the Fountain School of Performing Arts.

The 1863 appointment of James Ross to the newly created Chair of Ethics and Political Economy marks the early beginnings of the teaching of politics at Dalhousie University. While funding for the chair ended with Ross’s death in 1886, in 1891 George Munro established a Chair in History and Political Economy, which was held by John Forrest, who taught two political economy classes a year until his retirement in 1911. Over the following decade there were no politics classes offered, although constitutional history and economics were taught by series of associate professors of history and political economy.

The study of contemporary political science at Dalhousie began in 1921 with a $60,000 endowment made by the parents of a former Dal student killed in action at Vimy Ridge during World War One. In addition to funding the Eric Dennis Memorial Professorship of Government and Political Science, Senator Dennis gifted $1000 to start a library collection and another $2020 to fund an annual series of Eric Dennis Special Lectures.

Henry Frazer Munro was the first appointed Eric Dennis Memorial Professor, and the 1921-1922 University Calendar lists six courses under the heading of Government and Political Science. In 1926 Government was dropped from the department's name and in 1927 Robert Alexander MacKay became the second Eric Dennis Memorial Professor. He remained the only professor in the department until he left in 1948, although Lothar Richter, who founded the Institute of Public Affairs, served as an occasional Special Lecturer. James Aitchison was hired in 1949, and political science largely remained a department of one until the 1960s; Aitchison was named its first head in 1964.

The Department of Sociology and Anthropology was established in October 1966 after hiving off from the Department of Economics and Sociology. The creation of an independent department was the initiative of sociology professor John Graham, with the support of H.B.S. Cooke, Dean of Arts and Science. The department grew rapidly from 1969-1972, with an increase in teaching staff from six to 22.

It was renamed Sociology and Social Anthropology in December 1977 following a departmental review that articulated the divergences and tensions between the sociologists and anthropologists in terms of disciplinary interests and resource allocation. The change in name from anthropology to social anthropology was seen as an affirmation of the department’s intellectual coherence and unity. The department continues to draw on the strengths of both disciplines—sociology and social anthropology—by recognizing their distinct intellectual and methodological heritages, while emphasizing how they complement each other.

The Spanish Department was established in 1973 and in 2010 its name and teaching mandate expanded to include Latin American Studies.

As early as 1843, the Dalhousie Board of Governors hired a professor of modern languages—French, Italian and Spanish. However, the newly appointed Lorenzo Lacoste met an untimely death shortly before Dalhousie College itself floundered and shut down. When the college reopened in 1863, only French and German were offered under the heading of modern languages. Spanish 1 first appears as a course in the 1921/22 university calendar, although a lecturer in Spanish was hired the year before. It remained a singular course for some time: Spanish 2 was added in 1928/29 and Spanish 3 in 1932/34. Around 1930 the university calendars started to group Spanish along with German and French—and later Russian—under the Department of Modern Languages, which in 1957/58 became the Department of Romance Languages, a department not recognized officially by Senate until 1970. Soon after that a proposal to organize Spanish as an independent department was passed by Senate and the Department of Spanish is first listed in the 1973/74 calendar.

Dalhousie's Department of Theatre developed out of the Dalhousie Drama Workshop, which was formed in 1963 by then recently appointed Professor of English John Ripley, who offered it as an adjunct to his English 9 (History of Drama) class. The following year, Susan Vallance was hired as an instructor, working jointly for the Education and the English departments and teaching Child Drama, the first credit course in any performance-based class. In 1965 theatre historian Lionel Lawrence came to Dalhousie, and in 1966 four credit courses in theatre were offered in the newly established Drama Division within the Department of English. In 1967/1968 a BA in Drama and Theatre was offered, and in 1968 the Senate agreed to separate the study of drama from the Department of English, and Alan Andrews left alongside to serve as the inaugural chair of the new Department of Theatre.

In its first few years, the department's offerings were largely theoretical and not designed to train students for the professional theatre, but with the 1971 opening of the Dalhousie Arts Centre, the capacity for offering practical instruction changed. The new building included a designated wing for theatre studies that housed the James Dunn Theatre, two teaching/performance studios, and costume and set workshops. In the 1973/1974 university calendar, the department description emphasized the nature of theatre as a performing art and offered its first degree credit classes in acting. The department began to develop collaborative relationships with local theatres, including Neptune, and teaching faculty included Canada Council Artists-in Residence such as Fred Allen and Nancey Pankiw (1974) and Robert Doyle (1977).

In 1975 the department began to offer a BA Honours degree in three streams—general, acting and scenography—and by 1976 all theatre students were expected to be involved regularly in either acting or in other areas of production work. With the support of Robert Doyle, in 1976 the department launched a three-year diploma program in Costumes Studies, which in 2005 started to be offered as a four-year Honours BA in Theatre (Costume Studies).

The Department of Theatre, along with the Department of Music, became a program within the Fountain School of Performing Arts in 2014.

In 1975 the newly formed Dalhousie Women’s Organization proposed the establishment of a women’s studies program. It was 1982 before such a program was approved by Senate, and it was further delayed by the Maritime Provinces Higher Education Council (MPHEC), as similar courses were already being offered at Mount Saint Vincent and Saint Mary’s universities. Women's studies classes were first offered at Dalhousie in 1988, with Susan Sherwin as program coordinator and only three enrolled students. Judith Fingard took over as program coordinator in 1989 and introduced classes in science, political science and economics.

By 1992 Dalhousie had an active Women’s Studies Student Society, and the program was gaining attention through its lecture and seminar series. The program was not without detractors, particularly in the wake of the École Polytechnique massacre in 1989, and exams were written with security personnel present after some faculty received death threats.

In 2005, the program adopted a new name in an effort to be more inclusive, and officially became the Gender and Women’s Studies program.

The Faculty of Dentistry is the only dental school east of Montreal and educates over three-quarters of dentists practising in Atlantic Canada. Dalhousie created the faculty in 1908 in affiliation with the recently established Maritime Dental College for the purpose of examining candidates and conferring the degree of Doctor of Dental Surgery. Dalhousie also provided lecture and clinical facilities in what is now known as the Forrest Building; in 1912 Dalhousie also assumed responsibility for instruction, and the four students who graduated that year did so as the first class in the Faculty of Dentistry. Teaching continued to be carried out by part-time dental practitioners; with the exception of a brief period in the late forties, until 1953 there was only one full-time faculty member, J. Stanley Bagnall, who himself had graduated from Dalhousie in 1921.

The introduction of government grants as well as private donations and gifts from the Kellogg Foundation enabled the dental school to expand dramatically throughout the 1950s, including the number of full-time faculty, the creation of a school of dental hygiene, and the building of the current Dentistry Building at the corner of Robie Street and University Avenue. By 1967 there were 15 full-time academic staff and 31 part-time faculty members, supported by 20 administrative and technical personnel.

In 1969 the faculty, which, since its beginnings, had operated as a single administrative department, established four departments: Oral Biology; Oral Medicine and Surgery; Restorative Dentistry; and Paediatric and Community Dentistry, with independent department heads or chairs. Today the faculty comprises the School of Dental Hygiene and the departments of Dental Clinical Sciences, Applied Oral Sciences and Oral and Maxillofacial Sciences, each made up of its own internal divisions.

The School of Health and Human Performance was established in 1966 as the School of Physical Education in response to the need for PE teachers in Nova Scotia. The program was situated in the Faculty of Health Professions and the first class graduated with their Bachelor of Physical Education in 1970. A Health Education major and a Human Movement option were introduced in the early 1970s; in 1977 a Bachelor of Recreation program began and the first student with a BSc (Health Education) graduated. After Dalplex was completed in 1979, the School moved to Stairs House and a year later Athletics and Recreational Services separated from the School of Physical Education.

In 1984 a five-year Bachelor of Physical Education/Bachelor of Education integrated program started, and in 1986 a BSc (Kinesiology) was created. The graduate programs expanded to include three separate degrees: MA (Health Education), MSc (Kinesiology), and MA (Leisure Studies).

When teacher training was dropped at Dalhousie in 1993, the school was renamed the School of Health and Human Performance. By 2004 the BSc (Health Education) was renamed BSc (Health Promotion), a new stream in Research and Policy was introduced, the Community Health Promotion stream was strengthened, and an Honours degree in Health Promotion began.

Dalhousie's School of Nursing was opened in 1949 in response to the need for post-graduate education for hospital-trained registered nurses as well as nurse educators and administrators across the Maritimes. A Red Cross-sponsored course in public health nursing for graduate nurses was initiated in 1920 (after the Halifax Explosion), but applicants and university support had waned by the middle of the decade. However, the Registered Nurses Association of Nova Scotia (RNANS) persisted in their attempts to persuade Dalhousie to establish a nursing program. They gained the support of the Dean of Medicine, H.C. Grant, and in 1946 the Senate endorsed the plan, but it wasn't until the federal health grant program came into being in 1948 that Dalhousie agreed to provide a course leading to a BSc in nursing in coordination with the hospitals, which would continue to provide clinical training.

Initially the school offered an entry level nursing degree, postgraduate certificates in public health, and nursing education and administration programs for nurses holding a diploma from a hospital-based program. In 1961 the School of Nursing and the College of Pharmacy were both folded into the new Faculty of Health Sciences. In response to a Royal Commission on Health Services in the early sixties, the School developed an Outpost Nursing program, designed to train nurses to work in remote areas, primarily in northern Canadian Aboriginal communities where they were no resident physicians.

A Masters program was established in the mid-seventies as diploma programs were beginning to be phased out and the program began a restructuring process. Currently the School offers a Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BScN), a Masters of Nursing (MN), a Masters of Science in Nursing (MScN) and a Doctor of Nursing (PhD). Students can receive their degree at either the Halifax or Yarmouth site. The School has also teamed up with the Nunavut Arctic College, allowing residents of Nunavut to enrol in a BScN and receive their degree from Dal.

The Maritime School of Social Work was incorporated in April 1941 as an independent school in response to a long recognized need for professionally educated social workers in the region. In the early years classes were taught by a cadre of volunteers drawn from various related professions under the supervision of the school’s first director, Samuel Henry Prince. Professor of Sociology at Dalhousie and the University of King’s College, Prince created the school’s official emblem—a lighthouse emanating rays of light—a symbol of what he called “the epitome of the two-fold character of all social service: prevention and rescue.”

In 1944 Phyllis Burns became the school’s first full-time employee; she was appointed as Assistant Director and Registrar and was responsible for teaching classes in child and family welfare. In 1949 Lawrence T. Hancock was appointed as the first regular Director of the School, a position he held until 1973. It was during his tenure that the school amalgamated with Dalhousie University in 1969 and received accreditation in both Canada and the United States.

Initially falling under the auspices of the Faculty of Administration, the Maritime School of Social Work is currently one of eight schools and a college grouped within the university's Faculty of Health. The political, social, cultural and economic conditions of the region continue to give direction to the school's teaching; specifically, its degree and certificate programs were designed to meet the needs of the region's Mi'kmaq population. It has maintained an affirmative action admissions program since the mid-1970s and makes special efforts to accommodate the diversity of its student population.

In the early 1980s the school added a Bachelor of Social Work (BSW) degree program, while the Masters program (MSW) was reorganized into a one-year course of study for BSW graduates. With the advent of the BSW program, an off-site program was developed to reach students in Sydney, Saint John and Charlottetown. Since 2001 the school has offered distance delivery to students across Canada via the Internet. It also provides a continuing education program for practising professions, including workshops and certificate courses in the practice of social work.

Between 1891-1902 the Dalhousie calendars sporadically listed a two-year course in “Subjects Bearing on Commerce,” along with the suggestion that it be supplemented by practical training at a business college during summer vacations. Commerce then disappeared from the Dalhousie curriculum for two decades, until the university received a gift of $60,000 to endow a chair in business studies. Bishop Carleton Hunt was appointed the first William Black Professor of Commerce in 1921 and courses were offered leading to a Bachelor of Commerce degree. Following several years of staffing challenges, in 1930 James MacDonald replaced Hunt and was appointed the inaugural head of a Department of Commerce.

The School of Business Administration replaced the Department of Commerce on 1 July 1976, a year after the establishment of the Faculty of Administrative Studies, which was an initiative designed to bring together business and public administration under one umbrella, and also included the schools of library services and social work. The BCom became a four-year program and a Centre for International Business Studies was created. In 2012 the school was renamed the Rowe School of Business after Kenneth C. Rowe in recognition of his business leadership and his transformative gift to Dalhousie’s business program. The school is among the five percent of business schools around the world accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business.

The School for Information Management was established in 1969 as the School of Library Service, and it awarded its first Master of Library Service (MLS) degrees in May 1971. Originally administered by the Faculty of Graduate Studies, the school became affiliated with the Faculty of Administrative Studies in 1975, which became the Faculty of Management Studies in 1984, and later simply the Faculty of Management.

Between 1979-1985 the library services curriculum was subject to ongoing revision, and in 1987 the school was renamed the School of Library and Information Studies. In 2005 it changed names again and became the School of Information Management, moving out of its longtime home on the third floor of the Killam Library to new digs in the Kenneth C. Rowe Management Building. It continued to offer a Master of Library and Information Studies (MLIS) degree, which in 2019 became a Master of Information (MI). In 2008 the school launched a graduate program for mid-career professionals leading to a Master of Information Management (MIM). The school has been continuously accredited by the American Library Association (ALA) since 1971.

The School of Library Service Associated Alumni Association was founded in early 1974 after being approved by alumni from the school and accepted as legitimate entity by the Dalhousie Alumni Association. The Associated Alumni Association's founding mission was to promote the best interests and professional objectives of the individual members of the association, and among those involved in its founding were Norman Horrocks as Director of the School and John Murchie as the President of the School of Library Service Associated Alumni. The first officers (1974-1975) were John Murchie, Chairfellow; Elaine Rillie, Co-chairfellow; and Bernie Coyle, Secretar

The Associated Alumni meet on a regular basis and sponsor social gatherings, professional workshops, and other events of interest to members. The alumni also elect representatives to serve on committees within the School; in the early days these included the curriculum, admissions and scholarships, non-print media, grievance, and work experience committees. As the association has evolved, it has maintained its close ties to the School.