A motion approved by the University of Alberta’s Board of Governors last month calls for eliminating mandatory retirement at 65 for academic staff.

The board’s move mirrors the support for the change by a task force of administrators and academic staff leaders formed last year to examine the university’s retirement rule and marks the end to a decades-long battle over the issue at the university.

Twenty-two years ago, history professor Olive Dickason felt she was at the peak of her research and teaching career when she turned 65 and the university pushed her to retire.

Dickason fought the university at the Alberta Human Rights Commission and won, but the university appealed, and the case went to the Supreme Court of Canada, where the university narrowly won in 1992.

But things have changed since, and provisions needed to be put in place now to retain and attract senior scholars, U of A provost and vice-president academic Carl Amrhein said in a statement.

“We recognize that today’s life and work environments are very different from a number of years ago,” he said. “People are living longer and want to continue contributing. Those who perform a positive service to the university beyond the age of 65 are important to the needs of our growing university.”

Amrhein added the new policy also should help in the recruitment of top professors, some of whom want to teach past age 65 and would choose to go to universities where mandatory retirement had been eliminated.

“Getting rid of mandatory retirement is something our association has been working towards for some
time,” said academic staff association president David Johnson, noting the change brings the U of A in line with other North American universities. “We are pleased negotiations are complete and we can now move forward.”

He also said the policy still needs to be ratified by academic staff to become effective on June 30.