By Glen Herbert

We’ve been hosting a number of tours lately, as have so many CIS schools. It’s that time of year. One thing that guests are often surprised by is that we're located, quite literally, in a typical Muskoka village. It has a population of 200 and, except for the intrigue and the drama (and not being in Quebec) there are similarities to Louise Penny’s Three Pines. You almost expect to see Ruth out walking her duck. There’s a bakery, a post office, a bookstore; there’s a farmer’s market on weekends, children jumping off the municipal dock. The Rosseau General Store has been operating here since the Ditchburns first started making their classic wooden boats in the bay (their log cottage is on campus, now staff housing). The creaking, worn wooden floors of the General Store are a charming reminder of its age, though it’s not a museum exhibit. It remains just as vital as it ever was, people chatting as they pass through, or stopping for ice cream outside. Crossroads, the one restaurant in the village, was recently voted by Open Table as one of the best 100 restaurants in the country. And it is.

Given the celebrities who have homes here, the New York Times once called Muskoka the “Malibu of the north,” if somewhat quieter and more reserved than the Malibu of the south. There are celebrity sightings, but they’re small towny as well. No one makes a fuss. One of our students plays guitar on Wednesday nights at Crossroads through the summer, and Martin Short on a few occasions has got up to sing with him. Tom Hanks once signed books for kids, just impromptu, in the bookstore. As you do. There are NFL hockey players who boat over to do workshops at the hockey camp that’s hosted on campus in the summer.

Celebrity sightings aside, whenever we host tour groups, we make a point of taking them through the village. It’s not an important factor of our academic program, true, but it's an important aspect of the student experience. There’s a sense of belonging to a community, and a sense of safety. A student from Nigeria once mentioned to me how great it is to chat with the locals and to get to know their dogs. Like her, many of the students are known by name in the village. There is a woman in her 90s who, having lived here her whole life, tells stories of the history of the place. Students shovel her drive when the snow hits, and rake her leaves in the fall.   

In all of that, the village of Rosseau is a unique and delightful aspect of who we are and what we offer. It’s not for everyone, perhaps. Some students thrive in a metropolis. But not all do. Whenever I ask alumni about their time at RLC, I invariably hear about how wonderful it was to spend that time in a village, by a lake, in Muskoka.

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