With high-quality academic programming, transformative interdisciplinary research and a welcoming multi-campus experience, Canada’s York University is rapidly building momentum on the world stage preparing students for long-term career and personal success.
Raising the bar in post-secondary education with three unique campus settings in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA): Keele, Glendon and Markham, and centres globally in Hyderabad, India and Las Nubes in Costa Rica, York University is an international leader in creating a more sustainable and inclusive world.
Keele Campus: A modern campus experience with diverse cultures and a broad range of program offerings and perspectives
York University’s main campus is where more than 54,000 students, faculty, staff, partners and the surrounding community converge. United by a shared ambition to promote and work towards positive change, Keele Campus provides a unique opportunity to engage with diverse cultures and perspectives. As a thriving community hub, the Keele Campus experience is enhanced by its proximity and access to economic and cultural centres throughout the Toronto region and surrounding area.
Home to 11 academic faculties amid expansive research, arts and athletic facilities, this vibrant campus affords students a myriad of opportunities — through experiential education as well as technology-enhanced and work-integrated learning — to explore new ideas, gain invaluable hands-on experience and pursue their passions.
Keele Campus also has many ‘first-of-its-kind’ distinctions, including as home to the Disaster and Emergency Management program, led by a number of renowned scholars in this emerging academic area. York University is the only Canadian university to offer both undergraduate and graduate degrees in disaster and emergency management.
"York is such a powerhouse when it comes to social science and humanities research that it really is a perfect fit for the kind of work that I do," says wildfire researcher Professor Eric Kennedy, who feels a deep sense of pride in being part of the York University community.
While disaster and emergency preparedness and management is a relatively unknown field, it has incredible potential. Kennedy stresses the importance of realizing that it is an area of study that can make a significant difference in communities across Canada and around the world. He says graduates in this field will play a crucial role in addressing complex global challenges such as pandemics, floods, earthquakes and forest fires, as disasters — and their consequences — increase.
Glendon Campus Global engagement in a small, immersive environment
Programs enriched through their focus on global engagement are at the core of Glendon, York University’s founding campus, where courses are offered in a uniquely diverse and immersive environment. All students are supported in strengthening their intercultural skills and competency in English and French — with up to 30 per cent of students choosing to study in three or more languages.
For Delhiite Naima Sood, the Glendon Campus community provided the confidence and encouragement to pursue an impressive array of leadership roles during her time as an international student.
Sood, who returned home to India in 2022, embodies York University’s mission by using her voice, experience and skills to drive positive change.
“When I came from high school, I didn’t really have faith in myself that I could do it, but with the peers and the environment that Glendon created, it gave me faith in my own abilities and re-instilled that, hey, I’m capable. I can do this.”
During her time studying sociology, Sood had the opportunity to closely examine the differences she was perceiving between life in India versus Canada. Through the coursework, she interrogated the societal implications of fake news and the explosion of social media, while expanding on her high school-level proficiency in French, a national language of Canada.
Markham Campus Driving innovation through technology and entrepreneurship
Set to welcome its first cohort of students in the fall of 2024, York University’s Markham Campus will focus on offering innovative, tech-forward programs and research in the fields of creative technologies, computer science, sports management, finance and technology, and entrepreneurship. Situated in the centre of one of the country’s most diverse communities, the university’s newest campus will share a home with hundreds of corporate head offices, including Honda Canada and more than 1,500 high-tech and life science companies, as well as startups. The university is currently exploring collaborations with Markham-based companies and institutions while some partnerships, such as one with IBM Canada, are already underway.
“Located in one of the most dynamic and fastest-growing communities in Canada, we look forward to strengthening our partnerships with the private and public sectors as well as government, to provide students with work-integrated learning opportunities while they study and local prospects when they graduate,” says York University President and Vice-Chancellor Rhonda Lenton, who looks forward to opening the campus that will feature the AI & Society research cluster — designed to harness innovation in a socially responsible manner with the university’s inaugural academic programs in digital technologies, computer science, financial technologies, and media arts programs, and will contribute to the training of innovative and entrepreneurially enabled graduates.
Its 10 floors of state-of-the-art teaching and learning spaces will eventually be home more than 4,000 students. Markham Campus will include a new location for the university’s entrepreneurship and innovation hub, YSpace, which recently launched the Startup Visa program to support international founders and companies looking to start or expand their businesses into Canada. The campus will also boast modern common areas with ample open-concept areas, a multi-faith space, an Indigenous learning circle, accessibility features, and a pathway to LEED Gold building certification, furthering York University’s commitment to sustainability.
Hyderabad Campus: Fostering impactful business leaders of the world
As the first major business school to deliver an internationally recognized two-year MBA program in collaboration with India, York University’s Schulich School of Business is acknowledged as a leading provider of education in transformational management, where students learn to be inspirational and impactful business leaders.
Schulich offers the first year of its MBA program at York University’s campus in Hyderabad, with courses taught by the same award-winning faculty members who regularly teach at the university’s Toronto-area campuses. In the second year of the MBA India program, students attend classes in Toronto and customize their studies by choosing from Schulich’s 17 MBA specializations.
“Schulich's MBA in India program offered me the best of both worlds and perfectly matched my requirements. I was able to position myself uniquely during job interviews, and employers always valued the global perspective and experience I brought to the table,” says Vijender Trivedi, who was looking for an MBA program that would make him an impactful global business professional.
“After spending nearly a decade working in marketing for great brands, I know what truly drives business growth — a solid customer-centric and data-driven marketing strategy. I continue to apply learnings from my MBA program and leverage Schulich’s solid global alumni network to excel in my career,” adds Trivedi, who was selected for Schulich’s unique Global Leadership Program to create a market entry strategy and execution plan for a foreign company considering entry into North American or world markets.
He then worked for top Toronto-based international organizations, honing his transformational management skills, before moving back to India in 2020. Today, Trivedi is the changemaker he always wanted to be, and pays it forward as a York University alumnus, serving as the director of Student Services and International Relations at the Hyderabad Campus.
Las Nubes, Costa Rica Campus: Community-driven short programs emphasizing stewardship and conservation
Las Nubes — a project led out of York University's Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change in Toronto, Canada — is located in the Southern region of Costa Rica and supported by the Fisher Fund for Neotropical Conservation. The project aims to safeguard the biological, cultural, and social values of the communities living in the Alexander Skutch Biological Corridor.
Summer Abroad and Reading Week programs are offered at the university’s campus in Las Nubes. It is through these programs that students are given an opportunity to interact with and learn from the local rural Costa Rican communities through first-hand lessons on tropical ecology, sustainability, Indigenous education, arts, health, and conservation. The emphasis of these programs is to deliver experiential education that builds on York University’s long-standing relationships with communities and groups in Southern Costa Rica, including women’s organizations, agricultural co-operatives and producers, environmental protection and social justice groups, and Indigenous communities, among others.
Learn more about York University’s network of campuses and learning opportunities by visiting www.yorku.ca/India
