David Johnston

Academic career

Johnston has had a long academic career, during which he came to specialize in securities regulation, corporation law, public policy and information technology law. After 1966, he worked for two years as an assistant professor at the Queen's University Faculty of Law and then joined the University of Toronto's law faculty, where he taught until 1974, eventually being promoted to the rank of full professor. Johnston was then appointed as dean of the University of Western Ontario Law School, serving between 1974 and 1979, at which time he was elevated to become the fourteenth Principal and Vice-Chancellor of McGill University. It was during his time in that role that he became acquainted with Pierre and Margaret Trudeau, as the Johnston children played with the Trudeau children when the families were at their adjacent cottages in the Laurentians.

It was also during Johnston's time at McGill, in 1981, that he went on the first of what would be a dozen visits to China as a university president. At an Innovation Forum held at Nanking University on 21 October 2013, Johnston described "Nanjing University [as his] second home and [his] home away from home."

Johnston stepped down in 1994 as principal of McGill to remain at the university only as a law professor until he was, in 1999, installed as the fifth president of the University of Waterloo. During that period, the couple acquired a home in Heidelberg, Ontario, and began operating an adjacent horse training ranch, Chatterbox Farm. Johnston, in 2006, along with Jim Balsillie and the mayor of Waterloo, established a Waterloo Steering Committee to "educate business leaders, academics, and citizens about the challenges Waterloo faces and engage them in setting goals for educational achievement, access to services, investment in infrastructure, and social inclusion." At the university, Johnston forged academic exchanges with universities and technological institutes. With his "strong support", the University of Waterloo established a Confucius Institute and Sino-Canadian College in partnership with Nanjing University in 2005.

Education promotion and charitable foundations

Johnston was credited with encouraging his prime minister to reinvigorate the federal government's promotion of international educational cooperation. Johnston was advised by Harper to lead an Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada to Brazil in 2012 to participate in a hemispheric conference on international education, hoping it would "lead to more Brazilians choosing Canada as their preferred place to conduct research and study."

As part of his efforts to promote education and research, Johnston, beginning in 2012, annually hosted the Killiam Award Symposium at Rideau Hall. In regard to philanthropy, the governor general established in late 2013 the Rideau Hall Foundation, a charitable group meant to aid the viceroy in connecting and honouring Canadians, enhancing Canadian identity, and increasing potential for excellence with the aid of certain partners. Johnston then launched, via the foundation, the My Giving Moment campaign, encouraging Canadians to donate their time and/or money. He was aided in the launch by George Stroumboulopoulos, who interviewed the governor general on his show George Stroumboulopoulos Tonight. Johnston stated near the end of his tenure that he would remain as chairman of the Rideau Hall Foundation after his successor took office.

In late 2016, the governor general hosted a conference on concussions, declaring head injuries in sports to be a "public health issue", and criticized the NHL's position on fighting in hockey. This followed on his remark made in early 2012 to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation that hockey should be made safer by redesigning hard-plastic equipment, eliminating head shots and high-sticking, and eliminating fighting, which he said in a later interview was "eroding the game". He called on the NHL to hold a summit on fighting and concussions. While Johnston did speak with NHL commissioner Gary Bettman and the deputy commissioners about a two-day conference that would, with the involvement of medical experts and individuals associated with hockey, decide on new game rules, the group of people involved became too large to manage. Johnston instead turned his attention to the Amateur Hockey Association of Canada and raising awareness among parents.