page_title: Wilfrid Laurier University
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Wilfrid Laurier University / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Students in front of Waterloo College
context_page_description: Wilfrid Laurier University is a public university in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. Laurier has a second campus in Brantford, Ontario, and recently has opened a third campus in Milton, Ontario as well as offices in Kitchener, Toronto, Yellowknife and Chongqing, China. It is named in honour of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, the seventh Prime Minister of Canada. The university offers undergraduate and graduate programs in a variety of fields, with over 15,000 full-time undergraduate students, over 1000 full‑time grad students and nearly 4,000 part-time students as of Fall 2019. Laurier's varsity teams, known as the Wilfrid Laurier Golden Hawks, compete in the West Conference of the Ontario University Athletics, affiliated to the U Sports.
context_section_description: In 1910, the Lutheran Synod established a seminary, which opened to students in 1911, as the Evangelical Lutheran Theological Seminary of Eastern Canada. In 1914 the seminary developed non-theological courses under the name "the Waterloo College School". In 1924, the Waterloo College of Arts was established. Waterloo College of Arts became affiliated with the University of Western Ontario ("Western") in 1925 and soon began to offer honours degree programs in the arts. In 1960, the Lutheran church relinquished its sponsorship of Waterloo College obtained a revised charter changing the name of the seminary to Waterloo Lutheran University. On November 1, 1973, the name was again changed to Wilfrid Laurier University when the relevant provincial law was given Royal Assent by the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario Ross Macdonald, who later served as Laurier's Chancellor. Waterloo Lutheran University's seminary and theological programs continued to be offered by the affiliated Waterloo Lutheran Seminary (now Martin Luther University College).
  Laurier's school colours, purple and gold, extend from its early affiliation with Western; originally maroon and gold, the school adopted purple in lieu of maroon to honour its link with Western, whose colours were purple and white. While Laurier's colours remain, it ended its affiliation with Western in 1960.
caption: First year students of Waterloo College standing outside Willison Hall in 1947
exif: {}