Environment Minister, MLAs honour Acadia alumna Sheila Cole (’70) at Province House


Sheila Cole (’70) with Nova Scotia Environment Minister Iain Rankin. (Photo: courtesy Sheila Cole)

It was a historic day in the Nova Scotia Legislature on April 11, 2018, when Minister of the Environment Iain Rankin and MLAs rose to recognize Acadia University alumna Sheila Cole’s three decades of work on environmental issues.

Cole (’70) was awarded the Eco-Hero Lifetime Achievement Award by the Nova Scotia Environmental Network (NSEN) and has been active with the Network during the past 30 years in many executive capacities, including Senior Policy Advisor. During this time, she simultaneously served on the Board of the Environmental Health Association of Nova Scotia (EHANS) for 22 years and on the Board at the Ecology Action Centre for 10 years, where she was a founding member and Chair for many years of the Wilderness Committee.

Throughout the three decades, Cole has worked actively on education and policy issues involving wilderness preservation, mining, atmosphere and energy, toxics, climate change and, particularly, the inter-relationship between environment and health. She often says, “health is the real driver of environmental change.”

Her interest in discourse and social and environmental activism began during her time at Acadia. She noted in a recent interview that her experiences on the Wolfville campus were fundamental in developing critical thinking skills that she has applied time and again over the course of her career.

“University is a time for the exploration of ideas,” she said, “and that’s what I value most about my time at Acadia. The University and the courses it provided was a backdrop to discourse and a meeting of the minds of people on campus.”

She cited Acadia’s mission – to provide a personalized and rigorous liberal education; promote a robust and respectful scholarly community; and inspire a diversity of students to become critical thinkers, lifelong learners, engaged citizens, and responsible global leaders – and noted, “Wow! I resemble that. I spent a lot of time after meals and in the evenings making conversation happen. There was a constant exchange of ideas, and critical thinking became part of my experience at Acadia.”

She graduated with two degrees from Acadia, the first in liberal Arts and the second in Education, after which she taught for six years. She has also been a broadcaster with the CBC and was accepted to Carleton to do a Master’s in Journalism. She thought as well of returning to school to study environmental law, but in both cases she decided not to turn her attention to a specific line or system, believing strongly that it would limit her preference for independence intellectually.

An independent thinker, Cole wanted the freedom to formulate and express her own ideas and has spent her career closing in on issues and doing all she can to move toward best-practice solutions with long-term outcomes firmly in mind.

In addition to her extensive work locally, she is also a leading voice on environment and health issues nationally and speaks regularly to international audiences, particularly through UN Habitat’s Biannual meetings of the World Urban Forum. As a long-time member of the Health Caucus of the Canadian Environmental Network, she has presented sessions highlighting best urban practices on environment and health at the World Urban Forum in Canada in 2006, China in 2008, Brazil in 2010 and Colombia in 2014. In addition, she presented at the UN’s Habitat lll in Quito, Ecuador in 2016.

Cole continues to represent NSEN as a member of the Nova Scotia Roundtable on Environment and Sustainable Prosperity. She is currently transitioning to a more public role. The timing of the Eco-Hero Award is, in her estimation, interesting and significant. “It helps to bring attention to a broad range of issues that I’ve worked on,” she says, “and will hopefully encourage people to learn more.”

Her goal is to apply her knowledge and expertise to reach a broader community and identify practical things that people can do in their neighbourhood and community to effect positive change. She will also continue to encourage government and industry leaders to reach for the deepest possible solutions to environmental challenges. “We are all in this together,” she said. “We are not separate from nature, and we need to bring the earth back into balance.”

For more, please visit her website: http://www.sheilacole.com/ .


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