Innis College - Definition

Innis College is one of the constituent Colleges of the University of Toronto. The smallest college with 1200 students, it sits in the historic campus's west end, beside the university's central research library. Originally designed to be a wing (now Wetmore Hall) onto New College, it was founded separately in 1964 as the second non-federated college to be formed under the federated administration and located in the historic Macdonald/Mowatt house on St. George Street (since relocated to renovated row-housing along Sussex Avenue).

Innis College is named in homage to famous U of T political economist Harold Innis, and is perhaps best known internationally as the base college of Marshall McLuhan.

Innis existed as a small and peripheral college for much of its history. Its only residence was the delapidated Vladimir House on Spadina Avenue. In 1994 the new Innis College residence, a modern apartment-style building, was constructed on St. George Street just north of Robarts Library and the college immediately became more prominent. Despite the new residence Innis is still the only college not to offer a meal plan, discouraging some applicants. On a positive note, Innis was the first college to host an open pub (1975) and the first college to sport an equity split between faculty and students on their governing council.

Overshadowed by its much larger or older cousins--University College, St. Michael's College, Victoria College, Trinity College, and New College--it has carved out a niche in Film and Cinema Studies and Environmental Studies.