New Brunswick’s Université de Moncton will not change its name

The board of New Brunswick’s Université de Moncton has decided not to change the school’s name despite concerns about its connection to a problematic historical figure.

The decision follows the release of a university-commissioned report that outlined colonial British officer Robert Monckton’s participation in the brutal deportation of French-speaking Acadians from Eastern Canada.

The Université de Moncton was named to reflect the location of its flagship campus in the city of Moncton, which centuries earlier British colonists had named to honour Robert Monckton.

The report authors estimated a name change for the school — Canada’s largest French-language university outside Quebec — would cost as much as $4.6 million.

The Université de Moncton board says it will instead support the development of strategies to contextualize the origin of the school’s name, as well as an update to its place-naming policy.

More than 1,000 people signed a petition earlier this year seeking to sever the school’s link to Robert Monckton.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 9, 2023.