Our Story

Our Story

Saint Mary’s: one of Canada’s oldest universities

Saint Mary's traces its earliest beginnings to 1802 when the Reverend Edmund Burke, later Bishop Burke, taught young men at the Glebe House, on the corner of Spring Garden Road and Barrington Street. The boys’ school grew first into a college and then into a university, never wavering in its commitment to education and community service.

One of the first faculties of commerce in Canada

Under the leadership of the Irish Christian Brothers, the college shared its Windsor Street campus with a high school and built a solid reputation for Saint Mary’s undergraduate programs. They pioneered a number of new instructional programs including one of the first faculties of commerce in Canada.

Learn more about SMU history here.

Sobey School starts

Originally established in 1934 as the Saint Mary's University Faculty of Commerce, the school was later renamed the Frank H. Sobey Faculty of Commerce and then the Sobey School of Business. Frank H. Sobey was the founder of Empire Company Limited and Sobeys. The Sobey Building was opened in 2000.

Student Outcomes

Learn more about our school's performance by checking out the Atlantic Common University Data Set pages on the Saint Mary's website. This information explores student outcomes, the demographic make up of our student body, class sizes, and so on.