Mr. Christopher Rose

Convocation C
Doctor of Letters, honoris causa

Christopher Rose is a passionate educator and a Canadian leader in autism therapies and advocacy. Mr. Rose pioneered positive interventions and support for autistic children long before autism was understood to be a significant issue by health authorities and government.

Christopher Rose’s teaching career began in 1958 in Zimbabwe. While teaching in the regular school system, he began to work with the school’s hearing impaired students, initiating his life-long commitment to special education.

Arriving in Canada in 1964, he continued his work with hearing impaired and challenged children in Vancouver’s Jericho School of the Deaf. He moved to Kamloops in 1972, working at Kamloops’ Fitzwater School for the Handicapped and Overlander Secondary School. Over his twenty years at these schools, and later as principal of Happyvale Elementary and Beattie Elementary, Christopher Rose gained a reputation as a leader in the integration of alternately-abled students into the schools and classrooms of the Kamloops-Thompson School District.

Shortly after retiring, he was recruited by a group of parents and others connected with the Giant Steps Program to help re-build the struggling organization. By 1998, the program was back on track, in 2002 the parents voted to rename the facility the Chris Rose Therapy Centre which is now nationally recognized for the quality of its programs. He developed an international conference on autism that brings world-renowned autism specialists to Kamloops. Mr. Rose’s influence includes initiatives for teachers with UNESCO in Zimbabwe and, more recently, for special educators in Armenia.

During his career, Chris Rose also promoted the well-being of children across the public school system. He was elected to three terms as a school trustee, helping to found the Action for Healthy Communities Society, a group that played helped ensure that healthy food choices were made available in school vending machines and, more recently, that Provincial Legislation was changed to require daily physical activity in schools.

Mr. Rose epitomizes Thompson Rivers University’s commitment to open access to education for all members of society and also to a healthy and sustainable campus.