Emotions run high as possible closure of Thompson River University campus in Williams Lake revealed | CBC News
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Emotions are running high after it was revealed the president of Thompson Rivers University, based in Kamloops, B.C., is recommending the school’s Williams Lake campus be shut down.
The news blindsided the Cariboo city’s mayor and council, who are strongly fighting against the recommendation.
Williams Lake Mayor Surinderpal Rathor says he didn’t hear about the possibility until this week, when he was made aware of the agenda item on the TRU board of governors meeting held Friday afternoon.
“I was devastated,” Rathor told CBC’s BC Today about his reaction when he found out. “I could not breathe. I could not stand.”
Thompson Rivers University may close its satellite campus in Williams Lake, B.C., by spring 2028 amid “significant” cost pressure due to the federal government’s 2024 decision to limit the number of international students. On Friday, the board of governors reviewed a report recommending the closure, suggesting it could save up to $4 million. The board will begin consultations on the issue. Williams Lake Mayor Surinderpal Rathor spoke to BC Today host Michelle Eliot, said he was “devastated” upon learning closure was on the table.
Rathor and his council colleagues have told the community they will be fighting any proposed closure and they had no idea it was coming.
“We will not back down from this fight,” Rathor wrote in a Facebook post.
“Our community was blindsided by this decision,” he said in the post. “It is unacceptable. Decisions that impact local students and families should not be made behind closed doors without consultation.”
He said Williams Lake is not just a satellite city of Kamloops, but instead the regional hub for the wider Cariboo region.
Declining enrolment, rising debt
In her report to the board, TRU president and vice-chancellor Airini, who goes by a single name, said the closure of the Williams Lake campus is needed to deal with “unprecedented financial challenges” facing the university.
She recommended the board approve the “full disclosure and disposal of the grounds and facilities at TRU Williams Lake campus” by spring of 2028.
While clarifying that “disposal” is a technical term, she did confirm she sees a future where TRU is no longer the owner and operator of the campus space.
In her report, Airini said that while TRU has operated a campus in Williams Lake since the late 1970s, recent declines in student enrolment are pushing the school toward “a reimagined model for postsecondary education in the Williams Lake region.”
The report says the campus is currently losing approximately $3.4 million annually, and projected enrolment is set to decline even further.
The pressures of spiraling costs are not unique to TRU, as several other campuses around B.C. have been closed or scaled back due to federal caps on international student enrolment.
Proposed alternatives for the campus Airini suggests include a B.C. Wildfire Service training centre or a skilled trades hub.
She also suggested TRU programming would still be offered in Williams Lake through remote learning and by putting classes in other community buildings not operated by the university, reducing costs of maintaining the campus.
The cut, she says, is just part of an additional $19 to $21 million in savings that still need to be found in order to achieve a balanced budget for TRU by 2026/27, despite already removing $30 million from the school’s operating budget since 2025.
Satellite campuses in Clearwater and Barriere have already been closed.
More than a building: chancellor
While the board passed motions related to beginning consultations and preparing reports on what a changed presence in Williams Lake would look like, discussion on the possible closure of campus was postponed until June.
That decision came at the urging of university chancellor DeDe DeRose, a member of the Esk’etemc First Nation and self-described “Williams Lake kid.”
In a motion to postpone discussion on closing Thompson River University’s Williams Lake campus, chancellor DeDe DeRose urged the board to be cautious. A member of the Esk’etemc First Nation, DeRose said she believes fewer members of her community would pursue higher education without the Williams Lake building.
DeRose said the impact of having a university campus in an area that serves many smaller First Nations and rural communities should not be undervalued.
“Seven members of my little community of Esk’etemc crossed the stage last year in Williams Lake,” she said, apologizing as she began tearing up.
“And I know that they wouldn’t have, had they not had the opportunity of having the building there. I know it’s a building, so I’m trying really not to be attached … I want our board to be very careful to do the right thing for the Cariboo-Chilcotin community.”
Rathor said in his interview that he acknowledged the financial issues facing TRU, but argued the school and the province have an obligation to continue to serve the population in and around Williams Lake by providing access to higher education.
“Is the university [there] to make money, or there to provide services?” he said.