Annette Trimbee has a PhD in aquatic ecology. And, while Edmonton is far removed from the ocean, MacEwan University’s president sees a lot of symmetry between her fascination with sea life and the ecosystem that exists on the downtown campus.
“I was really curious about anything and everything,” Trimbee says of her time as a student. “So, what does learning about blue-green algae, how does that prepare you to lead a university or a treasury board of a finance department or in health and wellness? It’s about systems. If you do something over here, it has an impact over there. There are inputs, there’s outputs, there are relationships. There are surprises, things you can’t predict. So, that way of thinking about connections is helpful.”
Trimbee, from Winnipeg, came to Edmonton to study at the University of Alberta. She spent 25 years in various portfolios with the provincial government, and was a deputy minister in both Advanced Education and Technology, and Treasury Board and Finance.
She moved back home to take on the presidency at the University of Winnipeg. But, when the chance came to come back to Edmonton in 2020 to take the reins at MacEwan University, the opportunity was too good to pass up. She has two grown children in Edmonton, so she could be closer to them. And stewarding MacEwan through an ambitious expansion was, and is, an incredible opportunity. The school, which currently is home to about 20,000 students, has a goal to expand to 30,000 students by 2030. A new seven-storey School of Business building will not only add capacity, but create more traffic north of the campus, an area which has traditionally been a downtown dead zone.
Trimbee’s contract was recently extended till 2030.
“It’s a time of great transformation, whether you’re 18 years old, 25 or 35, whatever,” says Trimbee, from her second-floor office that overlooks 104th Avenue. “We have a lot to be excited about. And what’s it like to lead in a time of great growth? It’s a lot of fun compared to leading in times of sliding backwards. I like that MacEwan is in perpetual motion. I like scaling up, but scaling up in a way that doesn’t lose our sense of who we are, who we were and who we want to be. We can’t lose those relationships or that sense of place.”
MacEwan’s downtown buildings are connected by a series of pathways and footbridges which Trimbee feels bolster the sense of community in the school. The faculties don’t feel separate, as they would on a campus where the buildings are spread out. Business students brush shoulders with arts students. And, when class changes, Trimbee says the hallways have the energy of a shopping mall.
As a leader with a background in biology, maybe it’s not a surprise that Trimbee uses the word “ecosystem” over and over to describe MacEwan. And, she doesn’t see herself as a leader who is a top-down kind of person; her job is to ensure that ecosystem flourishes, and that ideas are born and can come to life in all corners of the school.
“If people think that I’m something like a CEO, I’m not, really,” she says. “This place is full of faculty, staff and students who have ideas of their own. I can create an ecosystem where they can run with it, where their ideas can thrive and where the best ideas survive — and I don’t mean that in a Darwinian, survival-of-the-fittest way. It’s about gentle here, gentle there.”
This article appears in the Jan/Feb 2025 issue of Edify
