THUNDER BAY -- Pat Lang said she was caught off guard upon learning she’d been appointed to the Order of Canada.
Lang, the long-time former president of Confederation College, was left all but speechless when the call came in last week from Gov. Gen. David Johnston’s office, telling her she’d be one of 100 appointees to the prestigious list.
“It was very emotional. Obviously I was very humbled and I was very honoured. I finally said to the woman (on the phone), ‘I’m sorry, I’m usually quite articulate and sometimes even a little bit elegant, but I’m neither today,” Lang said on Sunday.
Lang was one of 75 appointed as Members of the Order of Canada, a list that includes former Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff and David Onley, the former lieutenant governor of Ontario. An additional 22 were made Officers of the Order of Canada, while three more, including author Michael Ondaatje, were made Companions of the Order of Canada.
In a release issued last Thursday, the governor general’s office said Lang was being inducted because of her commitment to “the growth and development” of Ontario’s college system and her long-time career as an academic administrator.
Education has always been an important driver in Lang’s life.
“I knew it intuitively, and learned through the years, that students that have the privilege of going to college, that it changes their lives,” Lang said.
“And I also know that those students, once they became graduates that they drove the economy of whatever community we were living in; to me it always a privilege to have the opportunity to contribute to that in some way.”
Lang, who left the college in 2011, will officially be inducted into the Order of Canada at a ceremony later this year in Ottawa.
