{"id":50985,"date":"2018-10-19T11:51:10","date_gmt":"2018-10-19T15:51:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsroom.carleton.ca\/?p=50985"},"modified":"2025-08-19T09:36:41","modified_gmt":"2025-08-19T13:36:41","slug":"carleton-mourns-passing-of-former-president-william-e-beckel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/2018\/carleton-mourns-passing-of-former-president-william-e-beckel\/","title":{"rendered":"Carleton Mourns Passing of Former President William E. Beckel"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<section class=\"w-screen px-6 cu-section cu-section--white ml-offset-center md:px-8 lg:px-14\">\n    <div class=\"space-y-6 cu-max-w-child-5xl  md:space-y-10 cu-prose-first-last\">\n\n            <div class=\"cu-textmedia flex flex-col lg:flex-row mx-auto gap-6 md:gap-10 my-6 md:my-12 first:mt-0 max-w-5xl\">\n        <div class=\"justify-start cu-textmedia-content cu-prose-first-last\" style=\"flex: 0 0 100%;\">\n            <header class=\"font-light prose-xl cu-pageheader md:prose-2xl cu-component-updated cu-prose-first-last\">\n                                    <h1 class=\"cu-prose-first-last font-semibold !mt-2 mb-4 md:mb-6 relative after:absolute after:h-px after:bottom-0 after:bg-cu-red after:left-px text-3xl md:text-4xl lg:text-5xl lg:leading-[3.5rem] pb-5 after:w-10 text-cu-black-700 not-prose\">\n                        Carleton Mourns Passing of Former President William E. Beckel\n                    <\/h1>\n                \n                                \n                            <\/header>\n\n                    <\/div>\n\n            <\/div>\n\n    <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n<p>The Carleton University community was saddened to learn of the passing of William E. Beckel, who served as the university\u2019s eighth President from 1979 to 1989.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cOn behalf of the entire Carleton community, I offer my deepest condolences to the Beckel family,\u201d said Carleton President Benoit-Antoine Bacon. \u201cWilliam Beckel provided exemplary leadership during a critical period of Carleton\u2019s evolution, and his tireless dedication to students and to this institution helped define who we are today. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family during this difficult time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In his decade as president, Beckel oversaw the establishment of Carleton\u2019s School of Computer Science, Institute of Women\u2019s Studies, Institute of Political Economy and Canada\u2019s first Bachelor of Engineering program in aerospace engineering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He also led a major strengthening of Carleton\u2019s joint programs with the University of Ottawa, including the creation of the shared centres for graduate studies in Chemistry, Geoscience, Biology, Physics, Electrical Engineering and Neuroscience, and a joint PhD program in Economics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In his farewell address in June 1989, while being lauded for his role at the helm during \u201c10 glorious years,\u201d Beckel shared the credit with the large team that he worked with, from fellow administrators, faculty and members of the Board of Governors to students and front-line staff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI am continually amazed by how truly great you people are,\u201d he said. \u201cEveryone from managers to secretaries to students to faculty to groundskeepers, you have all contributed to the success of Carleton University. If there has been any glory earned in these 10 glorious years, it has been earned by us all.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Born in Kingston., Ont., Beckel was a zoologist who became the first dean of the University of Toronto\u2019s Scarborough College in 1964 and served as president of the University of Lethbridge from 1971 to 1979.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He was awarded honourary degrees by both Carleton and the University of Ottawa in 1989.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In honour of Beckel\u2019s leadership and service to the Carleton community, the university\u2019s flag will be lowered to half-staff position on the day of his funeral.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1000\" height=\"1434\" src=\"https:\/\/newsroom.carleton.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/Beckel001-1000w.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-50992\" srcset=\"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/162\/Beckel001-1000w.jpg 1000w, https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/162\/Beckel001-1000w-300x430.jpg 300w, https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/162\/Beckel001-1000w-400x574.jpg 400w, https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/162\/Beckel001-1000w-768x1101.jpg 768w, https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/162\/Beckel001-1000w-700x1004.jpg 700w, https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/162\/Beckel001-1000w-200x287.jpg 200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Carleton University community was saddened to learn of the passing of William E. Beckel, who served as the university\u2019s eighth President from 1979 to 1989. \u201cOn behalf of the entire Carleton community, I offer my deepest condolences to the Beckel family,\u201d said Carleton President Benoit-Antoine Bacon. \u201cWilliam Beckel provided exemplary leadership during a critical [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":410,"featured_media":50986,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[114],"tags":[157],"class_list":["post-50985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-news","tag-president"],"acf":{"cu_post_thumbnail":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/410"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50985"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50985\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50993,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50985\/revisions\/50993"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}