Professor Gus Kandilas, a York University associate professor who retired in 2023, passed away on Aug. 25 at the age of 64.
Kandilas began in the School of Kinesiology & Health Science in 1989 as a sabbatical replacement, teaching courses on first aid and athletic injuries.
In 1991, he transitioned to teaching athletic therapy assessment, treatment and rehabilitation. In the process, he set out on a career dedicated to educating future athletic therapists. Kandilas became a full-time academic in the YUFA Teaching Stream as an assistant professor, gaining tenure as an associate professor before he retired in 2023. Along the way, he not only made his mark by teaching but by helping develop new curricula for the athletic therapy certificate program and master’s degree application at York.
Throughout his career, Kandilas was known for how much he enjoyed getting to know his students, becoming a mentor to many and serving as a model for the professionalism required in the sports medicine field as a certified athletic therapist.
Additionally, his passion for athletic therapy showed in the many external commitments to athlete he undertook. Since the 1980s, he was heavily involved in lobbying for awareness of the value and role of athletic therapy in combative sports, especially regarding concussion injury.
He was the medical lead at multiple athletic competitions, including the 2015 Pan Am Games in Toronto, and several years ago he joined the Toronto Football Club as the team osteopathic manual practitioner.
Kandilas's commitment to sport, to the many graduates of the School of Kinesiology & Health Science, and to athletic therapy led him to earn several recognitions throughout his life. He earned York’s Faculty of Health Educator Award and the Canadian Athletic Therapists Association’s Distinguished Athletic Therapy Educator Award. The Ontario Athletic Therapists Association also recently recognized his contribution to the field by naming him the first winner of the Pathfinder Award. The award’s website features an hour-long video speaking to the impact Kandilas had on the field.
Further information about service arrangements, as well as tributes, can be found through Arbor Memorial.