Wesley Nicol , BA / 54

Wes Nicol is the founder of Tartan Homes, builder of thousands of homes in the Ottawa area and the United States, and Nicol & Lazier, an Ottawa-based legal firm practicing in real estate and commercial law. Over the last 15 years, Mr. Nicol has played roles as chairman, director and president of AutoSkill International Inc., a company that develops educational software solutions. He has also served on the boards of numerous other companies and non-profit organizations and is known in the Ottawa area as an angel investor.

Nicol was a longtime member of Carleton’s Board of Governors. In 2001, he received the Alumni Entrepreneur of the Year award, in recognition of his outstanding entrepreneurial achievement. Nicol is also a graduate of Osgoode Hall Law School of York University and was called to the Bar of Ontario in 1958. He received the degree of Doctor of Laws, honoris causa from Carleton in November 2006.

A philanthropist, Nicol established the Wesley and Mary Nicol Charitable Foundation, which allocates donations to charitable organizations and sponsors the annual business plan competition run out of Carleton’s Eric Sprott School of Business. The national competition is designed to generate interest in entrepreneurship on the part of university students, develop in students skills that will assist them as entrepreneurs, and raise the profile of entrepreneurship.