Mohyla Ukrainian Institute

Mohyla Ukrainian Institute (Ukrainskyi instytut im. Petra Mohyly). A student residence and cultural center established in Saskatoon in 1916. Initially a nonsectarian residence for Ukrainian students from rural areas attending educational institutions in Saskatoon, the institute became the center of a major controversy in 1917, when the Ukrainian Catholic bishop Nykyta Budka demanded that it become a Catholic entity, and that its properties be incorporated with the Ruthenian Greek Catholic Episcopal Corporation. The desire to protect what was regarded as the national integrity of the institute provided a catalyst for the liberal intelligentsia in Canada to break ranks with the Catholics and establish the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Canada in Saskatoon in 1918. The institute then became an important symbol of and center for the fledgling church community. It sponsored courses in Ukrainian language, literature, history of Ukraine, choral singing, and folk arts; held concerts, lectures, and debates intermittently throughout Saskatchewan; and sought to develop a sense of Ukrainian patriotism in the students who lived there (approx 100 annually). These activities played an important role in shaping many future Ukrainian community leaders. The institute also provided the first home for the Ukrainian Museum of Canada, from 1936 (to 1980), and operated a library, whose holdings currently number approx 10,000 volumes. In 1958 the institute began publishing a bilingual newsletter, Holos instytutu/Voice of the Institute, and in 1965 it moved to a new building situated closer to the University of Saskatchewan campus. Since 1975 the institute has conducted an annual Ukrainian-immersion summer school. The rectors of the institute include (among others) Wasyl Swystun (1917–21), Julian Stechishin (1921–9, 1931–3), Vasyl Burianyk (1932–5, 1936–7), Ivan Syrnyk (1943–7), Rev Vasyl Senyshyn (1956–62), and Albert Kachkowski (1970–9). The early years of the institute are described in Iuvileina knyha 25-littia institutu im. Petra Mohyly v Saskatuni (Twenty-Five Years of the P. Mohyla Ukrainian Institute in Saskatoon, 1945).

[This article was updated in 2007.]