Legendary journalism professor Mary McGuire retires after 31 years

Today marks the end of an era at Carleton’s journalism school as one of our longest-serving professors – Mary McGuire – heads into retirement.

Mary has been a full-time member of the Carleton faculty for 31 years. And she’s been in the halls at Carleton since the late 1970s, when she was a star student in our Bachelor of Journalism program, graduating in 1979. One of her former classmates and later a colleague on faculty at Carleton, Dave Tait, said he’s had many chances to learn from Mary.

“We got to know each other as J-school classmates and friends, but you’ve also been my teacher – at the Whitehorse Star, at CBC North and then back at Carleton – as I struggled to learn each job you’d already mastered,” Tait said in a faculty farewell message to Mary.

After graduating from Carleton’s journalism program in 1979, Mary worked for seven years in Whitehorse, primarily for CBC Radio. She also covered northern and Indigenous issues on Parliament Hill and across the North for the CBC’s Northern Service before joining Carleton’s journalism faculty in 1990.

McGuire was a fixture in the Carleton journalism faculty for close to three decades before cancer took her out of the classroom. She’s taught more than a thousand students over the years and would have taught many more, had illness not cut short her teaching career.

“There are now legions of superb journalists—“Mary’s kids”—running around out there, doing their bit to make the world a better place. And it’s all thanks to you,” said colleague Susan Harada.

Mary also helped on more than one occasion to change the school’s curriculum, was the first to expand courses in radio journalism and then, as the internet evolved, to develop and launch courses in digital and multimedia journalism, too.

“You probably don’t know the degree to which you contributed to the School over the years but everyone else did,” said Elly Alboim, a long-time colleague. “You dragged us into the digital age with determination and persistence. You led our efforts to professionalize our teaching and modernize our curriculum. It is a legacy you can be proud of.”

Another part of McGuire’s legacy at Carleton will be the fund she created to help introduce another generation of students to Canada’s North. This fund, administered by the School of Journalism, will support student travel to accept paid internship opportunities with professional news organizations in Canada’s northern territories or in one of Canada’s predominantly Indigenous communities. And with Mary’s encouragement, CBC North agreed to create a new paid internship program for Carleton grads.

For colleagues, Mary’s legacy will also be the years of friendship and support.

One of Mary’s former students, Matthew Pearson, has recently become a colleague after joining Carleton’s journalism faculty last year. He summed up the feelings of many with a touching tribute to Mary published in December by Maclean’s magazine.

“Thank you for the gift of your wisdom, your infectious love of radio, and your enduring dedication to our students. I carry you in my headphones, in my classroom and in my heart,” Pearson said.

The head of Carleton’s journalism program, Allan Thompson, said he plans to recognize Mary’s departure by launching a new tradition at Carleton’s journalism school, hosting a panel discussion or symposium in Mary’s honour to mark her retirement. It will be up to Mary to suggest the topic and the guest speakers. Watch for more details of this event in the autumn.

“The best tribute to Mary and her remarkable 31 years at Carleton is to bring people together to talk about how to push the boundaries of journalism, how to help our students create a better world,” Thompson said. “That has been Mary’s specialty for three decades.”

You can learn more online about the Mary McGuire Journalism Internship Travel Fund, which is still accepting donations in Mary’s honour.

Wednesday, June 30, 2021 in General, Journalism News
Share: Twitter, Facebook