The documentary examines the toll climate change has taken on Iceland’s glaciers, land, flora, fauna, fish, economy and people. The film also includes exclusive footage of the recent eruptions of Fagradalsfjall, an active volcano only 40 kilometres from Iceland’s capital, Reykjavík.

The virtual event will be moderated by EUC Professor and Associate Dean Philip Kelly, with opening remarks from Hlynur Guðjónsson, the ambassador of the Embassy of Iceland in Ottawa.

Panellists include: filmmaker Terry, producer Melanie Martyn and EUC Professor Kathy Young.

Terry is a documentary filmmaker, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and an instructor in 91��ɫ’s Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change. This film completes his trilogy of documentaries revealing the impacts of climate change on the Arctic and Antarctic. The two previous films in the series – The Antarctica Challenge: A Global Warning (2009) and The Polar Explorer (2011) – have been aired on CBC in Canada and released in the U.S. by PBS, as well as screened at United Nations climate summits.

Martyn makes her documentary film-producing debut with The Changing Face of Iceland. A devoted environmentalist and long-time colleague of Terry’s, she is excited to have been given this opportunity to contribute to his work with the United Nations.

Young is a physical geographer and hydrologist whose work has focused on wetland and snow hydrology in northern Canadian environments. More recently, she has been exploring the impact of dust and volcanic ash on the hydrology of slopes and wetlands in Iceland.

To register for the event, visit .

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Toronto is the traditional territory of the Wendat, Anishnaabeg and Haudenosaunee Confederacies. It is also one of the most culturally diverse cities on Earth. There is a web of historical treaties that were negotiated on these lands – agreements that hold continued relevance and possibility for the present.

Polishing the Chain: Treaty Relations in Toronto is a fall and winter conversation series that will bring together Indigenous and allied scholars, knowledge holders, artists, Earth workers and activists who will explore the historical significance and contemporary relevance of the treaties Indigenous nations in southern Ontario have made with each other, with the land and with the Crown. It will explore: the spirit and intent of Toronto treaties; the ways Indigenous Peoples have upheld and continue to uphold them; the extent to which they are (and are not) reflected in contemporary Indigenous and state relations; and the treaty responsibilities of both settler and Indigenous Torontonians.

The series’ inaugural talk, “The Symbolic Language of Wampum Diplomacy,” will take place on Tuesday, Sept. 28, just prior to Canada’s first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation on Sept. 30. The event, co-presented with the Toronto Biennial of Art, will feature Anishinaabe historian and 91��ɫ Assistant Professor Alan Corbiere, Canada Research Chair in Indigenous History of North America; Tuscarora writer, historian and curator Rick Hill; and interdisciplinary Kanienkehaka artist Ange Loft.

The series will continue with “Taking Care of the Dish: Treaties, Indigenous Law and Environmental Justice” on Oct. 26; “Treaty Relations, Planning and Indigenous Consultation at the City of Toronto” on Nov. 23; “The Forgotten Promise of the Treaty of Niagara” on Jan. 31; “The Toronto ‘Purchase’ ” on Feb. 14; and “We are all Treaty People” on March 14.

All Fall 2021 seminars will be held from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. via Zoom and live-streamed on the . To register, visit .

This year’s EUC Seminar Series is co-presented by 91��ɫ’s new , the Indigenous Environmental Justice Project, and the Jumblies Theatre and Arts Talking Treaties project. For more information about the seminar series, email polishingthechain@gmail.com.

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The Centre for Indigenous Knowledges and Languages (CIKL) is led by inaugural Director , an associate professor at 91��ɫ and the Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Environmental Justice at Osgoode Hall Law School. The new ORU will host Indigenous and non-Indigenous researchers and students engaged in these areas of scholarship, and aims to facilitate knowledge production and dissemination that re-centres Indigenous knowledges, languages, practices and ways of being. Moreover, CIKL will support research involving both traditional and contemporary knowledges, as care-taken, shared and created by Indigenous scholars at the University and from Indigenous knowledge holders in the community.

Cross-appointed between Osgoode Hall Law School and the Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change, McGregor is Anishinaabe from Whitefish River First Nation, Birch Island, Ont. She has an extensive research background focusing on Indigenous knowledge systems and their applications in water and environmental governance, environmental and climate justice, and sustainable self-determined futures.

McGregor notes that “the Centre for Indigenous Knowledges and Languages offers a generative space within and beyond 91��ɫ to advance Indigenous scholarship, research theories, methodologies and practices that supports a keen understanding of the goals and aspirations of Indigenous Peoples. CIKL will foster collaborations and partnerships with Indigenous Peoples and others that create ethical space for dialogue on how research relationships can be envisioned, negotiated, practised in support of Indigenous futurities. Creating this ethical space in collaboration with Indigenous Peoples and our colleagues across the University also creates opportunities for critical dialogue, reflection and change to take place in addressing some of the world’s most pressing challenges.”

Joining McGregor as a research leader is 91��ɫ Professor , who will become CIKL’s associate director. Hillier has recently been appointed a 91��ɫ Research Chair in Indigenous Health Policy & One Health. He is a queer Mi’kmaw scholar from the Qalipu First Nation, and an assistant professor at the School of Health Policy & Management. His collaborative research program spans themes of aging, living with HIV and other infectious diseases, and antimicrobial resistance, all with a focus on policy affecting health-care access for Indigenous Peoples in Canada.

“Having dedicated Indigenous research resources and space, as offered by the new CIKL, which is run by and for Indigenous Peoples on campus, is a critical first step,” says Hillier. “This centre will assist 91��ɫ in becoming a research-intensive institution and serves the principals of the Indigenous Framework and University Academic Plan.”

Amir Asif, 91��ɫ’s vice-president of research and innovation, says, “The establishment of CIKL creates a vital space for Indigenous researchers and all those engaged in decolonizing scholarship at 91��ɫ and beyond. The centre will play an important role in invigorating and disseminating groundbreaking, Indigenous-centred research taking place at and beyond 91��ɫ.”

Stayed tuned for upcoming events and initiatives at CIKL.

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“Creating Space: Precarious Status Women Leading Local Pandemic Responses” is a collaborative, two-year project that brings together five organized research units (ORUs) and six researchers representing five 91��ɫ Faculties, as well as 10 partners, working on issues of equity, diversity and inclusion to advance a feminist response to the impacts of COVID-19 through systemic change.

The project was awarded $667,609 and aims to centre precarious status women’s experiences to support self-determination and accelerate systemic change to reduce gender-based violence, promote workplace health and safety and increase economic security.

Associate Vice-President Research Jennifer Hyndman says the successful application was made possible through a groundbreaking collaborative effort. “Such collaboration across Faculties, schools, and disciplinary boundaries is unprecedented among the ORUs at 91��ɫ,” she said.

The community-based project will be led by Professor Luann Good Gingrich (director, Global Labour Research Centre; Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies) and Professor Heidi Matthews (Osgoode Hall Law School), the project's co-principal investigators, along with four research directors: Professor Elaine Coburn (director, Centre for Feminist Research; International Studies at Glendon Campus); Professor Deborah McGregor (Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Environmental Justice; Faculty of Environmental & Urban Change/Osgoode Hall Law School); Professor Gertrude Mianda (director, Harriet Tubman Institute; Gender & Women's Studies at Glendon Campus); and Professor Yu-Zhi Joel Ong (director, Sensorium: Centre for Digital Art & Technology; School of Arts, Media, Performance & Design).

“Our project will take advantage of this unprecedented moment of significant appetite for new ways of thinking and living together that are more just and sustainable,” said Matthews. “As devastating as the pandemic has been for women and gender-diverse individuals, particularly those from Indigenous nations and racialized communities, it has also pried open space to dismantle the otherwise rigid status quo structures that work to marginalize these groups.”

“Creating Space” involves five 91��ɫ ORUs – the Centre for Feminist Research, the , the , the , and  – and nine community partners representing female temporary foreign workers, asylum seekers, Indigenous women and undocumented frontline workers: ; .; ; Black Creek Community Health Centre; ; ; ; ; and . The project will also be supported by its international human rights law collaborator, the .

The multidisciplinary team brings together expertise in labour, digital arts, international law and human rights, Indigenous legal traditions and knowledges, feminist and Indigenous methodologies, and migration and Black diaspora studies.

“We are committed to a collaborative approach that emphasizes relationships and mutual learning, and opening space for creativity and innovation to reimagine the legal and economic systems that create status insecurity for many women in Canada,” said Good Gingrich.

Funding for this project highlights 91��ɫ's efforts in working to support gender equality during the COVID-19 recovery. Sara Slinn, associate dean research and institutional relations at Osgoode Hall Law School, said "Osgoode is very proud to be involved in this timely and important project."

LA&PS associate dean research and graduate studies, Ravi de Costa, said the grant is a testament to the strength of social science and humanities research at 91��ɫ – not only in LA&PS, but across the University. He commended Good Gingrich and Matthews for putting together a "superb" group of researchers from five faculties.

"The research they will do in this project will provide a critical and largely missing understanding of the effects of the pandemic on some of the most marginalized members of society.”

The project will:

• design collective, autonomy-focused, and locally rooted strategies to address economic insecurity, frontline workplace safety and systemic gender-based violence
• launch a new human rights initiative to devise innovative legal arguments that disrupt dominant legal paradigms by supporting Indigenous-led self-determination
• create a participatory, experimental multimedia digital framework to shift the public conversation and accelerate systemic change around gender and status precarity.

Good Gingrich and Matthews say they anticipate cross-Canada impact. Researchers and graduate students contributing to the project will work with partner organizations to build capacity and support mutual knowledge exchange. This work will shape transformative policy, innovative and critical strategies for legal intervention, and change the conversation on a national level.

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91��ɫ students, faculty, staff and alumni nominated students based on their engagement and leadership roles at 91��ɫ. An in-person ceremony was not possible this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic; however, winners were notified in a congratulatory letter from Lucy Fromowitz, vice-provost, students.

“All candidates for this award are role models who exhibit leadership, dedication, integrity, enthusiasm and the demonstrated pursuit of excellence. On behalf of the entire 91��ɫ community, thank you for your hard work and commitment to excellence,” Fromowitz wrote.

Tiffin also recognized the students’ achievements and their dedication to leadership amid the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic. “Each year, students are encouraged to become proactively engaged with their educational experiences through their academic studies, co-curricular and extracurricular activities. You definitely embraced that challenge and, despite the disruption caused by the pandemic in the past two academic years, have not only enhanced the student experience of your fellow students, but also shaped the foundations for future students to become engaged within the 91��ɫ community,” he said. “I’m always impressed by the diversity of ways in which leadership occurs at 91��ɫ, and this was truly evident in the ways you contributed.”

Robert J. Tiffin Student Leadership Award recipients this year:

Amin Hatamnejad
Hatamnejad is pursing a bachelor of science in the Kinesiology and Health Science program in the Faculty of Health. He has held a variety of roles within the Kinesiology and Health Science Student Organization, including president. He helped to transition the program fully online amid the pandemic and created two new chapters: Discover You and the Alumni Network (YUKSAN). Hatamnejad has also worked as a leadership coach, course representative co-ordinator and orientation co-ordinator at both Calumet and Stong Colleges, and has served as a student senator and a president’s ambassador.

Ammon Cherry
Cherry, an environmental studies student in the Faculty of Environmental & Urban Change (EUC), is the president of the EUC’s Student Association (EUCSA). He was part of the Black Excellence YU Student Consultations, whose input contributed to the actions outlined in 91��ɫ’s Anti-Black Racism Framework. Cherry also served as a president’s ambassador, alumni ambassador and a as student representative on several Faculty committees while pursuing his studies.

Bri Darboh
Darboh is a doctoral student in clinical neuropsychology in the Faculty of Health and an MBA student at the Schulich School of Business. She has held many advocacy roles, including doctoral student representative, Black Students in Psychology (BSIP) graduate student representative, member of the Diversity Committee and peer mentor in the Autism Mentorship Program. She is also a student affiliate at the Canadian Psychological Association, the Ontario Psychological Association and the American Psychological Association. Throughout her time at 91��ɫ, Darboh has also created several new workshops, planned events and participated in student groups.

Humayra Rashid Safa
Safa, an international development studies student in the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies (LA&PS), fundraised with LA&PS’s Advancement team to help visible minority students experiencing financial difficulties. This effort allowed more than 200 students to take classes last summer. Safa has also held several roles on the International Development Students’ Association, including co-president, vice-president and treasurer. She also helped to co-ordinate the creation of the Sustainable Development Goals Hub and served as both a president’s ambassador and LA&PS dean’s ambassador.

Jean-Marc Moke
Moke, a psychology student in the Faculty of Health, is dedicated to improving the lives of Black students at 91��ɫ through his many leadership roles on campus. He is a co-founder and president of the BSIP and a member of the Department of Psychology Undergraduate Studies Committee. He sat on both Calumet and Stong colleges' Student Success Councils and is a volunteer with 91��ɫ’s Black Student Alliance. Moke also contributed to the development of 91��ɫ’s Anti-Black Racism Framework and is currently working on establishing a proprietary mentorship program for Black psychology students at 91��ɫ.

Magdalena Kajo
Kajo, an economics and French studies student at 91��ɫ's Glendon Campus, has been an active leader throughout her time at 91��ɫ. She has contributed by serving Glendon Campus as a school director for Peace by PEACE Glendon. She also held the positions of Chair of Glendon’s Student Caucus and co-founder and vice-president of the Glendon Economics and Business Club. In addition, Kajo was an RBC student ambassador for 91��ɫ with RBC Wealth Management.

Mahafarid (Fara) Seddigh
Seddigh, a psychology and law and society student in the Faculty of Health, has held various roles with the Undergraduate Psychology Student Association, including being promoted to co-president after serving as vice-president of student success and as a peer tutoring co-ordinator. She founded LetsStopAIDS at 91��ɫ, the local chapter of a youth HIV charity. She is currently a Daughters of the Vote Delegate for Equal Voice and a member of the Richmond Hill Constituency Youth Council.

Mingyu (Matthew) Lim
Lim, a biology (biomedical science) student in the Faculty of Science, has held several leadership roles throughout his time at 91��ɫ. He has served in many capacities, including as a president’s ambassador, science student ambassador, vice-president of communications and first-year representative on the Bethune College Council. He also contributed his time as a Residence Life don. Lim is currently working as a research assistant in the infant clinical psychology field.

Monica Shafik
Shafik, an international development studies and law and society student in LA&PS, has been an active volunteer and social justice advocate, completing more than 4,200 hours of community service. She is the director of ancestral services for Future Ancestors Services, an Indigenous- and Black-owned, youth-led organization that advances climate justice and equity with an anti-racism and ancestral accountability focus. Shafik has also been a Go Global student ambassador for 91��ɫ International, a student advocacy co-ordinator for the Student Academic Support Centre in the 91��ɫ Federation of Students, and a student ambassador and dean’s ambassador for LA&PS.

Simi Sahota
Sahota, a psychology and business student in the Faculty of Health, has been dedicated to helping others reach their full potential. Her success as a Peer-Assisted Study Sessions (PASS) leader led to faculty inviting her to co-present about PASS at 91��ɫ’s 2019 Teaching in Focus Conference. She has also been a leadership coach, and as project lead of the Financial Wellness Project, she leads a team of research assistants, script writers and video editors.

Vishwaveda Joshi
Joshi, a social anthropology student in the Faculty of Graduate Studies, was 91��ɫ International’s first graduate international student engagement liaison and was invited to represent 91��ɫ during the High Commission of Canada’s Women’s Day Celebration. As co-chair of the Social Anthropology Graduate Students’ Association, she was involved in creating a COVID-19 emergency fund for graduate students in her program early in the pandemic.

To learn more about the Robert J. Tiffin Student Leadership Award, visit the .

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Faculty of Health Associate Professor , in the School of Health Policy and Management, for her proposal titled: “The violence of nonviolence: A critical analysis of the academic literature on the health effects of sanctions.”

Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies Associate Professor , in the Departments of Anthropology and Social Science, for her proposal titled, “Situated neurology: An ethnographic study of neurology in Kenya.”

Faculty of Health Assistant Professor , in the School of Kinesiology and Health Science, for his proposal titled, “Critical perspectives on the epidemiological dimensions of COVID-19 in sub-Saharan Africa: What can the world learn?”

Faculty of Health Professor , in the Department of Psychology, for her proposal titled, “Consequences of human rights violations on trust among refugees in South Africa: Implications for public health.”

Faculty of Health Assistant Professor , in the School of Health Policy and Management, for her proposal titled, “Decolonizing the social determinants of health to identify areas for mobilizing South-South partnerships of humanitarian solidarity.”

The purpose of the Seed Grants is to enable and support 91��ɫ–based critical social science perspectives in global health research that contribute to the research themes of the Dahdaleh Institute for Global Health Research: Planetary Health; Global Health and Humanitarianism; and Global Health Foresighting. Each recipient will receive $5,000 to support their critical social science global health research.

The scope of critical research is quite broad, though it usually involves the use of critical theory with social justice aims. Critical social science perspectives in global health often inform transdisciplinary, participatory, experimental, or experiential analyses that actively seek greater effectiveness, equity, and excellence in global health. The research engages directly with global public health actors, structures and systems to transform global public health while remaining committed to social science theory and methodology.

In addition to supporting promising critical social science research programs in global health, the Seed Grants are meant to encourage faculty to develop fuller grant proposals over the 2021 summer term for fall Tri-Council and other grant deadlines. Each recipient will present their “Work in Progress” at a Winter 2022 workshop on Critical Social Science Perspectives in Global Health Research, marking the beginning of the Dahdaleh Institute Seed Grant Program’s third year.

The Dahdaleh Institute Critical Perspectives in Global Health Steering Committee extends thanks to each of the applicants and congratulates the 2021 recipients.

Courtesy of YFile.

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Professor  of the Department of Politics, who passed away in late 2020, was among the founders of the IPEE Summer School, an event that presents a unique interdisciplinary opportunity for graduate students at 91��ɫ – but also for students and activists across Canada and beyond – to investigate a salient issue within the field of political economy and ecology.

This summer marks the 30th anniversary of the IPEE Summer School at 91��ɫ, which will feature a dynamic panel of artists and scholars exploring social, political, historical and cultural topics. This year's guest professor for the seminar titled "Freedom Dreams: Approaching the Transnational Political Economy of Race" is Robin Davis Gibran Kelley, a Distinguished Professor of History and the Gary B. Nash Endowed Chair in U.S. History at UCLA. In addition to Kelley, a number of prominent scholars of the global political economy of race will be giving presentations that will be recorded for public viewing, including  (91��ɫ), Tony Bogues (Brown University), Glen Coulthard (University of British Columbia),  (91��ɫ), Vijay Prashad (Tricontinental Institute), Rhoda Reddock (University of the West Indies) and Alissa Trotz (University of Toronto).

On Reparations and Decolonization

On June 29 at 7:30 p.m., Kelley will give a public lecture via Zoom, titled “On Reparations and Decolonization.” Troubled by how the current discourse or “plans” for reparations do not, for the most part, challenge the terms of racial capitalism, Kelley will revisit the question of reparations, which he examined in his book Freedom Dreams two decades ago. Following a brief discussion of the history of reparations movements, he will explore how, as the reparations movement becomes legitimized, its scope may be narrowed to be consistent with neoliberal thinking and capitalism, including the logic of property rights and compensation without radical transformation. As such, reparations discourse may exclude Indigenous dispossession, potentially derailing struggles for decolonization. He will also explore the meaning of decolonization and the larger question of repair: What is required to reverse 500-plus years of history and to make a new world? How may we think of reparations and decolonization as processes complimentary to one another, rather than at odds?

This event is free and all are welcome to attend. To register, visit .

Visualizing Freedom Dreams

On July 8 at noon, join Kelley, whose book Freedom Dreams explores the Black radical imagination, in conversation via Zoom with Ghanaian British filmmaker and artist John Akomfrah, creator of Vertigo Sea – a stunning meditation on the whaling industry, the slave trade and the current migrant crisis – and Canadian multidisciplinary artist Bushra Junaid, whose piece Two Pretty Girls... brings to life the entanglements between Newfoundland and the legacies of plantation.

In a public dialogue titled “Visualizing Freedom Dreams,” moderated by Julie Crooks, head of the department of Arts of Global Africa and the Diaspora at the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO), they will explore what it means to visualize freedom dreams, placing their own contemporary work in dialogue with historical images contained in the Montgomery Collection of Caribbean Photographs recently acquired by the AGO.

This free event is produced in partnership with the AGO and the Montgomery Collection. All are welcome to attend. To register, visit .

For more information about the IPEE Summer School, visit .

Courtesy of YFile.

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�ʰ��Ǵڱ�����ǰ����� (Faculty of Education),  (Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change),  (Lassonde School of Engineering) and  (Osgoode Hall Law School) are the principal investigators on the winning projects, which were announced in late May.

“91��ɫ is delighted to see Professors Cristina Delgado Vintimilla, Sarah Flicker, Matthew Perras and Dayna Scott receive these highly competitive NFRF Exploration grants. My heartiest congratulations to them,” said Vice-President Research and Innovation Amir Asif. “These grants allow Canada’s foremost researchers to build strength in high-risk, high-reward and interdisciplinary research for societal benefit – an historical strength for the University.”

Cristina Delgado Vintimilla is an assistant professor in the Faculty of Education. Delgado Vintimilla’s project, titled “Ecological Devastation in Extractive Zones: Resistance, Recuperation and Regeneration,” received $248,053.00. Working with a multidisciplinary team of Indigenous and non-Indigenous researchers, artists and activists from across Canada and Ecuador, including Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies sociology Professor Denielle Elliott, the research team will explore what it takes to recuperate the devastation of the “Capitalocene.”

The project considers the urgent nature of ecological and environmental challenges posed by the devastation of blasted landscapes (Mountaintop removal mining, open-pit mining, strip mining). Women and children who are targets of annihilation through capitalism and colonialism, specifically, Black, Indigenous and people of colour (BIPOC), understand the value of non-hegemonic knowledges/practices to heal ruined places. The challenge is in recognizing their unconventional ways of knowing and doing as legitimate healing alternatives to the technological “fixes” that damaged blasted landscapes.

This research will congregate a diverse team of scholars, students, Indigenous activists, Elders, knowledge keepers and healers to lead an interdisciplinary project that draws from and contributes to education, anthropology, biology and the arts. The researchers’ approach is to codesign recuperative practices in “blasted landscapes” in Canada and Ecuador in an urgent effort to address the damage of extractive capitalism and exploitative investments. The sites— built on the dispossession and enslavement of BIPOC—are connected through capitalist, extractive industries that have left the environments forever changed.

The ecological devastation of these sites is the point of departure for this project. The researchers will ask: How are women and children who identify as BIPOC staging unconventional relations with the land to regenerate “blasted landscapes”? And how are they activating alternative modes of belonging in the process? How can we approach blasted landscapes as sites for imagining other futures?

Sarah Flicker, a professor in the Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change, is the principal investigator on the project “Transnational Perspectives on COVID-19’s Impact on Youth Sexuality, Risk and Relationships.” The project, which involves an international research team that includes Faculty of Education Assistant Professor Jen Gilbert, received $249,038.00 in funding.

COVID-19 has fundamentally altered nearly every aspect of youths’ relational lives; new norms regarding physical and social intimacy and access to public and private spaces affect family, peer, and sexual connections. The challenge of navigating this new terrain coincides with adolescence, a developmental period when choices regarding risk and well-being are already fraught and complicated. Though decisions around how to connect, date, and love continue to be influenced by factors including gender, race, sexual cultures, community, and space, pandemic logics cause a profound shift: behaviors that once sparked alarm are now endorsed as low risk (e.g., sexting); practices that were up for debate are now decidedly off limits (e.g., sleepovers); and what were idealized as innocuous romantic gestures are now the height of danger (e.g., kissing). Changing policies and regulations (e.g., wearing masks, keeping distance, forming pods) influence sexual and intimate possibilities in new and unanticipated ways.

The international and interdisciplinary team brings together scholars in education, psychology, public health, social work, sociology, and youth studies with expertise in participatory methods, sexuality, and global health research. The project’s multi-method, multidisciplinary, and multi-site research will examine how COVID-19 is redefining risk and re-forming youth sexuality in Australia, Canada, and the United States, all countries with liberal democracies with comparable discourses and debates surrounding youth sexuality, but starkly different experiences of and responses to the pandemic.

Results will be used to develop site-specific and transnational briefings, videos, podcasts, and other resources to help sex educators, parents and youth navigate social norms, health risks, and sexual relationships during (and, eventually, in the wake of) a pandemic.

Matthew Perras, assistant professor, Department of Civil Engineering at the Lassonde School of Engineering is the principal investigator on the project “Using machine learning to understand ancient climatic influences on the stability of cliffs and tombs in the Theban Necropolis of Egypt.” Working with an international research team that includes his colleague Usman Khan, also an assistant professor in the Department of Civil Engineering at Lassonde, who is a co-principal investigator on the project, the research focuses on the Theban Necropolis, a UNESCO World Heritage site comprised of tombs and temples near Luxor, Egypt. The project received $250,000 in funding.

The tombs in the Theban Necropolis are often shallow excavations with entrances at the base of cliffs. The tombs hold evidence of rock mass collapses during construction through to recent deterioration leading to potential instabilities. Climatic variations are known to cause rock to deteriorate, however, there is debate about the exact influence on crack growth rates. Due to lack of detailed observations and experiments on long-term crack growth in rock, since such experiments span many months or even years, current numerical tools are not capable of capturing the influences of climate change on crack growth. This leads to challenges in determining when instabilities will develop and problems designing preservation strategies. To address these challenges, Perras and the research team propose to utilize machine learning (ML) to aid in analyzing existing climate data and crack growth indicators to predict instability. A ML algorithm will be trained on current measurements (weather & crack movement), then on historic climate & photographs of crack growth.

Ancient climate records and models (Nile sedimentation, tomb flooding & collapses) could be used to back analyze the influence on crack growth with time. With the expertise of geotechnical engineering, geology, archaeology, data and climate science, the researchers will seek to understand the prevailing conditions that led to the current state of stability and develop guidelines for preserving the stability into the future. The novelty of this research is in the combination of machine learning with archaeology and geological engineering. Machine learning in both fields is in its infancy, however, such techniques allow for nuanced behaviors to be extracted from large and complex data sets as in this project. Understanding the current measurements, past influences and applying it to predict future instabilities will help to identify key areas for protection and aid in preserving this UNESCO site for generations to come.

Dayna Scott, 91��ɫ Research Chair in Environmental Law & Justice in the Green Economy; associate professor, Osgoode Hall Law School and the Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change, is the principal investigator of the project titled, “Jurisdiction Back: Infrastructure beyond Extractivism.” The project received $ 246,725.00 in funding.

Resource conflicts and legal uncertainties have dominated the political landscape over the last decade. From Standing Rock to the TransMountain pipeline, conflicts over extraction and its infrastructures have intensified, catalyzing a fierce Indigenous resurgence. As Scott and the research team conceived this project, Wet'suwet'en hereditary leaders were blocking a pipeline company from accessing their lands, inspiring solidarity actions that blocked rail lines, ports, highways, and political offices. The situation dramatically demonstrated that when corporate interests thrust contested projects onto Indigenous homelands - even with governmental approvals – they must contend with Indigenous governing authority.

The research project offers a transformative way forward: a fundamentally new set of relations based on different underlying assumptions about law and land. It is a vision that insists the future is not foreclosed, but pregnant with potential for renewed relations of jurisdiction and infrastructure. If anything, the new COVID-19 reality has only made this more obvious. Will we rebuild? Should we rebuild? Or, even more importantly, what should we build anew? The ground-breaking 2019 Yellowhead Red Paper documents how Indigenous-led consent processes based on fulfilling responsibilities are already having the effect of restoring Indigenous jurisdiction and reclaiming Indigenous lands and waterways, foodways and lifeways. Scott proposes to systematically document, support, expand and evaluate this work to determine which strategies and approaches have the most success. How can remaking the material systems that sustain collective life enact Indigenous jurisdiction? What does infrastructure resilience look like for Indigenous communities emerging out of COVID-19 in an era of ongoing climate crisis? How can the “just transition” to sustainable economies be imagined and infrastructured to foreground Indigenous governance systems? This project offers an agenda for fundamentally re-making our socio-technical systems; for both conceptualizing and building infrastructure otherwise.

Courtesy of YFile.

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This annual celebration was cancelled in 2020 due to the emerging crisis of the COVID-19 pandemic. One year later, mass vaccinations are hinting that there will be an end of the pandemic. Organizers decided to proceed with the celebration, which was offered over Zoom and co-hosted by the Office of the President and the Office of the Vice-President Research & Innovation.

Welcome remarks were delivered by President and Vice-Chancellor Rhonda L. Lenton and Vice-President Research and Innovation . Lenton presented each of the 2020 President's Research Awards. The 2021 award recipients were announced by Asif. The celebration also included a series of videos, which featured all of the 140 recipients from 2019 and 2020. Faculty of Health Professor , associate vice-president research, MCed the celebration.

The recipients of the 2020 President’s Research Awards are:

, School of Kinesiology & Health Science, Faculty of Health, was selected for the President’s Emerging Research Leadership Award (PERLA) in Cluster 1: Engineering, Science, Technology, Health and Biomedicine, as a reflection of his outstanding leadership in and contribution to the fields of exercise physiology, metabolism and skeletal muscle health.

Since 2012, when he came to 91��ɫ, Perry has contributed significantly to the success of the University, both internally and externally. He established the only human muscle biopsy lab at 91��ɫ, where he investigates the basic cellular mechanisms of muscle fitness and applies these discoveries toward developing novel therapies to treat muscle weakness disorders.

In 2016, he was elected to serve as a director, academic, for the Canadian Society for Exercise Physiology, Canada’s major authority in exercise science and prescription. This society focuses on integrating state-of-the-art research into best practice. It comprises professionals interested and involved in the scientific study of exercise physiology, exercise biochemistry, fitness and health.

Perry was the recipient of the 2017 Faculty of Health Research Award (early career). He has also received multiple internal and external awards, including funding from the Canada Foundation for Innovation, the Ontario Research Fund, the Natural Sciences & Engineering Research Council of Canada, the James H. Cummings Foundation, the Rare Disease Foundation and industry funding.

, Schulich School of Business, was chosen for the President’s Emerging Research Leadership Award (PERLA) in Cluster 2: Social Science, Art & Design, Humanities, Business, Law and Education Cluster), for his extraordinary leadership and contribution to the fields of marketing and consumer studies. As the Canada Research Chair in Entrepreneurial Innovation and the Public Good, he develops insights that inform business and policy-makers about the benefits of effectively communicated innovation and the potential costs to susceptible consumers and society. He examines how marketers can better communicate product and service innovations to maximize adoption and awareness. This work focuses on new product design and innovation, as well as product categorization, category ambiguity and visual processing.

In 2012, Noseworthy was appointed scientific director of the NOESIS Innovation, Design & Consumption Laboratory, a world-class behavioural lab at Schulich, to extend his primary research programs. The NOESIS lab is intended to foster innovative research into consumption, consumer behaviour and design. Noseworthy has developed this lab with the specific goal of conducting high-quality research, training skilled personnel and facilitating knowledge mobilization. Broadly speaking, Noseworthy’s research program is designed to help combat Canada’s innovation deficit by helping the private sector transfer knowledge into commercialized products and services to grow the economy.

, Department of Psychology, Faculty of Health, was selected for the President’s Research Impact Award (PRIA) for her innovative contributions to psychology and mental health in the areas of bullying, aggression and violence, especially among marginalized children, youth and families.

In recognition of these contributions, Pepler was named an Officer of the Order of Canada by the Governor General. She is the only psychologist recognized by the Canadian Psychological Association for distinguished contributions to both psychology as a science and public or community service.

Pepler received a Network of Centres of Excellence grant to establish PREVNet – Promoting Relationships & Eliminating Violence Network, funded from 2006-19. She built this interdisciplinary network with her former PhD student Wendy Craig (Queen’s University), with over 120 researchers, 150 graduate students and 62 national organizations. PREVNet’s researchers and partners co-created over 150 resources for bullying prevention and healthy relationships. PREVNet was the culmination of Pepler’s decades of research linking science with practice and public policy for children’s healthy development and healthy relationships.

Pepler’s research embedded in clinical and community settings has real impact on the lives of children, youth and families. She has a strong publication record, having written or co-edited 10 books and more than 200 journal articles, chapters, and reports. In 2007, Pepler was recognized as a Distinguished Research Professor by 91��ɫ for her groundbreaking research.

, Department of Physics & Astronomy, Faculty of Science, was chosen to receive the President’s Research Excellence Award (PREA) in the Engineering, Science, Technology, Health and Biomedicine Cluster, for his exceptional contribution to atomic, molecular and optical physics.

Hessels, 91��ɫ Research Chair in Atomic Physics and a 91��ɫ Distinguished Research Professor, has led numerous research projects that have far-reaching consequences for the understanding of the laws of physics. He is leading a collaboration whose goal it is to use ultraprecise measurements of the electron to study one of the fundamental unresolved questions of physics.

In 2019, Hessels led a study published in the esteemed journal Science, which found a new measurement for the size of the proton at just under one trillionth of a millimetre. The study confirmed the 2010 finding that the proton is smaller than previously believed. The year before, Hessels led a team that achieved the most precise measurement of the fine structure of helium ever recorded. His researchers had been working on this for eight years.

Hessels is now leading a collaboration (EDMcubed) that is attempting to measure the shape of the electron – or, more specifically, whether its charge is evenly distributed. This measurement will try to shed light on one of the fundamental mysteries of physics: why the universe is made entirely of matter (electrons, protons etc.) and, unexpectedly, has no antimatter (anti-electrons, antiprotons etc.).

The recipients of the 2021 President’s Research Excellence Awards are:

, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Lassonde School of Engineering, was selected as the recipient of the President’s Emerging Research Leadership Award (PERLA) in Cluster 1: Engineering, Science, Technology, Health and Biomedicine.

The award demonstrates the complexity and relevance of Rezai’s research in utilizing science and engineering concepts built on the fundamentals of fluid mechanics, material engineering, electronics and microbiology to tackle pressing global challenges in both the health and safety sector, and in the field of bioengineering. His impact on his discipline is demonstrated by his receipt of funding as a principal investigator that spans Tri-Council, industry and provincial sources.

His research has resulted in 47 journal papers, seven book chapters, two issued and two submitted United States patents and 50 conference papers. His achievements were recognized by the prestigious Early Researcher Award from the Ministry of Economic Development, Job Creation & Trade in 2019 as well as the I. W. Smith Award from the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering in 2021.

Rezai joined 91��ɫ in 2013 and initiated a graduate program in Mechanical Engineering at Lassonde in 2015 while serving as the graduate program director since 2015. His work has earned four competitive best paper conference awards, the Natural Sciences & Engineering Research Council of Canada Visiting Fellowship in 2012, and multiple awards obtained by his students in the past five years. His work has also been recognized in 2017 and 2018 by the Early Researcher Lassonde Innovation Award and the Early Researcher Lassonde Innovation Fund. He provides leadership in his innovative research program and his mentorship and supervision. He has built international connections and his engagement has raised 91��ɫ’s research profile.

, School of Kinesiology & Health Science, Faculty of Health, is the recipient of the President’s Emerging Research Leadership Award (PERLA) in Cluster 2: Social Sciences, Art & Design, Humanities, Business, Law and Education. The award illustrates her leadership in the field of research on the promotion of physical activity among children with disabilities.

Bassett-Gunter has developed an interdisciplinary program of research that has made contributions to the fields of behaviour change psychology, physical activity promotion, health communication and knowledge translation.

Since joining 91��ɫ in 2013, she has published 42 papers in leading journals, and she has shared her research at numerous conferences throughout Canada and internationally. In 2018, she earned the prestigious Early Researcher Award from the Ontario Ministry of Research & Innovation.

Bassett-Gunter has secured significant external research funding in competitive, peer-reviewed grants as both a principal investigator and co-investigator from major granting agencies, including the Social Sciences & Humanities Research Council and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. Her mentorship impact is evidenced by the success of her students, many of whom have had their research published in leading journals and have secured Tri-Council and other funding. Bassett-Gunter provides leadership in her innovative research programs and in her mentorship and supervision. She has built international connections and her engagement has raised the research profile of 91��ɫ.

, the Jean Augustine Chair in Education, Community and Diaspora, Faculty of Education, was selected as the recipient of the President’s Research Impact Award (PRIA). James is the senior advisor on equity and representation in the Office of the Vice-President of Equity, People & Culture.

James is a leading Canadian scholar and researcher in the areas of equity and inclusivity in education, community development, immigration policies and settlement, and critical ethnography. In relentlessly documenting and addressing inequities related to Black and other marginalized groups, James has become internationally renowned for tackling and naming issues of racial inequity, and forging evidence-based policies and actions through innovative participatory research.

His track record clearly speaks to his strong success in designing and carrying out funded programs of research, including ministry, Tri-Council, corporate, school board, foundation, and community-based grants and contracts. He successfully engages his graduate students, involving them in writing and presentations, as co-authors of scholarly work and as active partners in knowledge mobilization activities.

In 2008, he founded the 91��ɫ Centre for Education & Communities, which he directed until 2018. James’ impressive scholarly output includes over 20 authored and co-authored, edited and co-edited books; over 130 book chapters and articles in refereed journals; reports, reviews and educational resources; and hundreds of presentations and workshops. With research that reaches a wide range of audiences, from scholars to policy-makers to the public, and that has undoubtedly enhanced 91��ɫ’s research reputation, James is most deserving of the 2021 PRIA.

, Faculty of Environmental & Urban Change, was selected as the recipient of the President’s Research Excellence Award (PREA). The award is in recognition of her outstanding accomplishments and leadership as an internationally recognized scholar of human displacement, humanitarian response, feminist geopolitics and refugee subjectivity.

In January 2021, she was appointed associate vice-president research in the Office of the Vice-President Research & Innovation. Hyndman has been an exceptional leader in building research programs at 91��ɫ and in training the next generation of scholars. From 2013 to 2019, she served as director of 91��ɫ’s Centre for Refugee Studies, expanding its mandate and strongly supporting faculty to compete successfully for funds to facilitate innovative research and publish in top peer-reviewed journals and books.

Hyndman is a prolific scholar whose list of publications – in peer-reviewed journals and with esteemed book publishers – is extensive. Most recently, she co-authored, with 91��ɫ Professor Emerita Wenona Giles, Refugees in Extended Exile: Living on the Edge (Routledge, 2017). She has two monographs, Managing Displacement: Refugees and the Politics of Humanitarianism (Minnesota University Press, 2000) and Dual Disasters: Humanitarian Aid after the 2004 Tsunami (Kumarian Press, 2011), plus a co-edited volume with Giles, Sites of Violence: Gender and Conflict Zones (University of California Press, 2004). She has conducted community-based research, applied work for the United Nations and governments, and is one of 91��ɫ’s most highly cited scholars in the social sciences and humanities.

To view the program for the 2020 Research Awards Celebration, click here. To view the program for the 2021 Research Awards Celebration, click here.

Courtesy of YFile.

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“91��ɫ’s Top 30 Under 30 is a community of changemakers,” says Julie Lafford, executive director, Alumni Engagement. “Driven by passion, they create positive change and are outstanding representatives of the university, reflecting the high calibre of 91��ɫ alumni.”

91��ɫ alumni take the education, skills and support they receive at 91��ɫ and develop a strong sense of purpose, a desire to create positive change, and a long-standing commitment to the public good. Those qualities are all evident in the young alumni selected.

“I am proud to know that my work with Fix the 6ix was recognized by 91��ɫ,” says Deanna Lentini (BSc ’16), a physiotherapist and founder of Fix the 6ix, a thriving volunteer organization that gives back to the community and gives students opportunities to build their leadership skills. “It shows that little ideas with a lot of heart can do big things.”

Representing every Faculty at the University, these alumni are leaders working and volunteering in a variety of fields, from health and sustainability to the arts and business, and work to bring a uniquely global perspective to help solve societal challenges.

“To create positive change in the world, the action starts at the local level,” says Miranda Baksh (BES ’17, MES ’19), founder and CEO of the Community Climate Council (CCC), a not-for-profit organization advocating for local climate action through enhancing climate literacy and political advocacy. “Positive change can occur when a community feels empowered and increases climate literacy and political advocacy. I hope that through our work I can keep inspiring youth, especially from underrepresented and marginalized communities, to use their voices for positive change."

For more information on the 2021 Top 30 Changemakers Under 30, visit the website.

The 2021 Top 30 Changemakers Under 30 are:

• Ajith Thiyagalingam, BA '15, JD '18, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies, Osgoode Hall Law School
• Alexandra Lutchman, BA '14, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
• Aurangzeb Khandwala, BA '18, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
• Bailey Francis, BA '19, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
• Basia Pozin, BBA '17, Schulich School of Business
• Bo Cheng, BSC '17, MMAI '20, Science, Schulich School of Business
• Christine Edith Ntouba Dikongué, BA '14, Glendon
• Dani Roche, BDES '13, School of Arts, Media, Performance & Design
• David (Xiaoyu) Wang, MSCM '20, Schulich School of Business
• David Marrello, BBA '15, Schulich School of Business
• Deanna Lentini, BSC '16, Health
• Eunice Kays, BA '17, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
• Farzia Khan, BA '17, Lassonde School of Engineering
• Giancarlo Sessa, BBA '19, Schulich School of Business
• Iman Mohamed, BA '14, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
• Isabella Akaliza, BA '20, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
• Jillian Lynch, BA '19, Health
• Krystal Abotossaway, BHRM '13, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
• Larissa Crawford, BA '18, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
• Luke Reece, BA '15, School of Arts, Media, Performance & Design
• Maneesha Gupta, JD '17, Osgoode Hall Law School
• Matthew Ravida, BCOM '18, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
• Mikhaela Gray Beerman, BA '14, MED '18, Glendon, Education
• Miranda Baksh, BES ‘17, MES '19, Environmental & Urban Change
• Nicole Doray, IBA '17, MES '19, Glendon, Environmental & Urban Change
• Prakash Amarasooriya, BSC '15, Health
• Rana Nasrazadani, BA '20, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
• Rowena Tam, BA '17, School of Arts, Media, Performance & Design
• Shant Joshi, BFA '17, School of Arts, Media, Performance & Design
• Shaquille Omari, BA '15, Liberal Arts & Professional Studies

Courtesy of YFile.

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