“I have almost completed five years at Brescia, and there are many exciting projects that are just beginning now, so having the opportunity to spend four more years at this institution is a real privilege and an honour,” Hanycz said.

Such projects will include the development of a new residence and dining pavilion, new academic programs and increased international awareness of the campus.

The process of appointing and reappointing principals is undertaken by Brescia’s Council of Trustees, who perform annual reviews for their employees, often bringing in staff, faculty and students to speak their minds.

“Some reviews were full 360-degree reviews where students, staff and faculty were invited to meet with the head of our Council of Trustees,” Hanycz recalled.

Hanycz said she was particularly excited to be able to continue working with students at Brescia.

“The best aspect about working at Brescia is having the privilege of serving the women we serve here as our students,” Hanycz said. “They are exceptional young women, they are dynamic, they are engaged, they are committed to leadership and they are committed to making this community better.”

“To me, being able to work alongside these women, and see them grow truly inspires me and convinces me that our future is in very good hands.”

According to George Qubty, director of facilities engineering for Western, the Gallery was renovated to improve humidity temperature control to a level necessary for showing high-end artwork.

“To achieve the LEED certification, we replaced the typical incandescent lighting with the newest LED technology to become only the second gallery in Ontario to make this leap,” Qubty explained. “The other big energy savers are a series of sensors, which are used to adjust lighting and ventilation to occupants.”

Qubty also noted that, like other LEED projects on campus, low off-gassing and high-recycled content materials were used, and the majority of construction wastes were recycled.

James Patten, director of the McIntosh Gallery, said the renovations have made the Gallery much more comfortable.

“As an art gallery, we need to have special climatic controls for the display of works of art, meaning that it can’t be too hot or too cold,” Patten said. “We had a beautiful gallery before, but we had very leaky windows and doors, and it made it very difficult for us to maintain those controls. Now we exceed national standards for exhibition space.”

According to Qubty, this is the first LEED-NC 2009 project in Canada. This certification will inform the approach for other projects on campus—some of which are already underway.

“Western is being operated at the forefront of the green building movement, and we encourage students to use our campus as a learning laboratory,” he said. “The initiatives undertaken within this project [not only] affect ongoing operations directly through water and energy savings, but also through Western’s green cleaning, landscape maintenance and waste management programs.”

Although Patten wasn’t surprised the Gallery was the first to meet the requirements in Canada, he and his team are happy with the results.

“We’ve been working on it very hard to make sure we meet all of the several requirements, including reducing energy usage,” he said. “I wouldn’t say I’m surprised, as the application has been submitted for two years, but I’m delighted. Facilities Management has done a wonderful job.”

2008 represents the onset of the recession, and therefore corresponds to a decline in Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the main indicator of economic standings in Canada. As one may expect, the deteriorating state of the economy is shown to have a direct correlation to the CIW’s statistical representation of well-being.

“When GDP goes down, government focus is solely on the economy at the expense of other areas of life that matter to Canadians,” Linda McKessock, CIW project manager, said. “Incidence of long-term unemployment went way up with the recession, and Canadians are pinched for money.”

Quality of life and well-being are defined by the CIW according to core Canadian values as indicated by Canadian citizens themselves. The primary factors that must be addressed in order to positively impact Canadian well-being include living standards, community vitality, healthy populations, education, environment, leisure and culture, time use and democratic engagement.

If these measures of quality of life continue to indicate substantial decline, the prognosis for Canadian well-being could be worrisome.

“If our well-being continues to go down, the growing gap between those at the top and those at the bottom of the income ladder will continue to increase,” McKessock cautioned.

As a part of the Peer Support Centre’s grand opening yesterday, the University Students’ Council launched a new peer phone-line service for students at Western. The phone-line, which is open from 10 a.m. until midnight, will cater to students who cannot make it to the centre to speak to someone in-person before 6 p.m. when it closes.

Myuri Komaragiri, vice-president campus issues for the USC, feels this service is important for an institution as large as Western.

“Looking at external models, there are many other universities that have a peer phone-line—it appears to be common,” Komaragiri explained. “Maneuvering through this campus can be immensely difficult at times, and it is always beneficial to have a centralized hub of resources.”

“Student issues can often be multifaceted, and taking it out with someone can often lead you to the solution. There is immense comfort in hearing someone’s voice at the other end of the line and knowing there is someone who is sincerely interested in helping you out.”

According to Komaragiri, this service is unique because it is completely student-driven. The student volunteers on the other end of the line have received part of the London Distress Centre training in order to be experts at active listening and referrals. However, these volunteers won’t counsel or advise callers—they will work to empower the caller by listening to their issue and suggesting possible resources available for support.

Massiel Ubillus, a fourth-year health sciences student at Western, thinks the phone-line is a necessary service for students.

“I was actually thinking about this last night—sometimes you just want to talk to someone. Sometimes you just want someone to listen to you and give you the chance to let it all out, especially at night,” Ubillus said. “To book appointments with counselling services here can take a while, so when you need the help right away, it’s good to have it.”

Although Komaragiri believes a phone-line and physical centre is currently the best way for students to support students, there is room for improvement if the service needs to be adapted.

“There are phone-dependent organizations that are slowly researching chat-based support and other online forms of support that I think we would be open to developing in the future if there were a great demand,” she said.

The Peer Support Centre is physically open until 6 p.m., so students can either receive support in-person or via phone. To speak with a trained student volunteer, students can call (519) 661-DIAL (3425) between 10 a.m. and midnight.

According to Keith Marnoch, director of media and community relations for Western, the explosion, which was contained to one lower-level lab, was reported to Campus Community Police Services shortly before 3:00 p.m.

“Emergency services got a report of an explosion at the Robarts Research Institute and evacuated and secured the building,” Marnoch said. “I don’t have a name, but a Western research technician was treated on the scene by EMS and they’re now being treated in emergency over at the University Hospital.”

Shortly after the technician was taken to hospital, Western’s Hazardous Materials Team and the London Fire Department were inspecting the lab and building to make sure there were no hot spots present, which could cause a fire to flame up again. Marnoch explained the other main concern was the atmosphere of the building, but a photo ionization test was completed and determined the air quality in the building is back to normal.

“They’ve done a complete sweep and the air is clean. I’ve also been told the heating, ventilation and air conditioning system is being flushed as well to make sure that there’s nothing in the air or in the building,” he said.

Anne Shatkin, an alumni and development officer for the Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry, was in the building at the time of evacuation.

“I was on the telephone when the fire alarm went off,” Shatkin said. “We all just grabbed our things and left the building.”

Although some bystanders outside the building were unaware of what had happened, a building supervisor stopped by and provided more details about what happened to the group of people Shatkin was standing with. Those who were evacuated were allowed in to retrieve their belongings at approximately 4:30 p.m.

In Shatkin’s years of working at Western, she has never witnessed an incident like this, or been evacuated from a building because of similar circumstances.

“One thing I have to say is Western has been very good here about making sure we’re all trained in WHMIS, and that we’ve all been through safety procedures in case anything like this does happen,” she said. “We never feel unsafe—we always know what the process is. There is a lot of security and signage around to make you feel safe.”

According to Marnoch, there is no damage estimate at this time.

The previous budgeting model gave hospitals fixed amounts of money and the autonomy to decide how the money will be used. According to Raisa Deber, a professor in the department of health policy, management and evaluation at the University of Toronto, it gave hospitals incentives to be as cost effective as possible, but it also gave them the incentive to do less.

But if hospitals were asked to allocate funds according to services used, Deber stated small communities will encounter some problems because they would be discouraged from funding services deemed essential but infrequently used.

The HBAM is an effort to address the incentives issues. “What they are trying to do is to balance the incentives so that hospitals are encouraged to be as effective as they can so that you encourage more effective care,” she said.

When asked about the possibility of fund shortage for hospitals in London Ontario, she said she didn’t know. “They have been very careful not to say what happens to individual hospitals,” she said.

According to McLean’s Magazine, “big box” universities with large class sizes are not servicing students who choose university for the sake of learning, rather than a stepping-stone to employment.

In response, some schools have started offering boutique programs, such Guelph’s first-year seminars for tiny groups of motivated students. This has brought up the question of a two-tiered education—one for degree-seekers and one for the academically inclined.

“I don’t see it as a two-tier thing, I see it as meeting the needs and aspirations for a diverse group of students,” Benedikt Hallgrimsson, senior associate dean of education in the faculty of medicine at the University of Calgary, said. “As the demand for a university education has increased we’ve gone from educating something like five per cent of the population to close to 30 per cent.”

Halgrimsson explained the increase in undergraduate students changes their educational needs, and universities need a multi-pronged solution to cater to those students with professional aspirations, enlightenment aspirations and skill-seeking aspirations. In the current one-size-fits-all model, he claimed all students are being compromised.

According to Halgrimsson, the answer is not a two-tier system, but a more diverse approach to an undergraduate education. The needs of the much larger modern student population are very different from the traditionally educated minority.

“We need to do a better job of determining what it is that students that will go out to perform diverse roles in society actually need to know, and provide it to them in an effective way.”

—Megan Devlin

Sausages for students

Students who aren’t quite ready to let go of their meat have a new option for lunch.

On Monday, a hot dog stand opened on Concrete Beach in front of D.B. Weldon Library. While the stand may not see much business from more health-conscious students, Frank Miller, director of hospitality services at Western, said he thought the outlook was good.

“We don’t really offer a hot dog anywhere [on campus]—even though it’s certainly not the most healthy product, it’s still a product that I think we all like from time to time in cold weather,” he said.

Though Western has had hot dog stands in the past, it has been several years since students have had that option.

“We had one years ago, and it was very successful. I guess we never got around to replacing that,” Miller explained. “The person actually sort of became the hot dog legend, and we got around to looking at that possibility again. I think we’ve probably got one of the busiest hot dog people in town, and we thought we’d give it a test to see what students feel about it.”

Because the stand is so new, it is still unclear whether hot dogs will become a permanent Concrete Beach fixture once more—it all depends on students’ reaction. According to Miller, after a month, hospitality services will evaluate the stand’s performance to determine whether or not it will remain during the winter months.

—Julian Uzielli

Giving is better than receiving

For Jane Tucker, president of the London Transplant Gift of Life Association, tonight marks the beginning of what she hopes will be an important step forward for organ donation awareness and advocacy for both Western and the London community as a whole.

Tucker hopes to attract students, faculty members, corporations, and community members alike to an information session scheduled for 7 p.m. tonight at the Windermere Manor’s Convergence Centre. Featuring a transplant recipient as well as a presentation by Mac Quantz, the chief of cardiac surgery at London Health Sciences Centre, the session will focus on educating guests about organ donation and will present fundraising initiatives for Impellas and other similar cardiac devices not currently covered by OHIP.

According to Dr. Quantz, there are a couple of goals for the session. “The ultimate goal is to make the public aware of what’s going on with the transplant program at LHSC,” he said. “We are also working towards some fundraising.”

Tucker said she hopes students and community members alike will leave engaged and educated. Stressing that people check out and register online at beadonor.ca, the new method for designating oneself as an organ donor, she said the issue is relevant and worth getting involved in.

“Every three days, provincially, one patient dies on the waiting list. As a community, we can do better with more donations,” she said. We can help change those statistics and more people can get those transplants in time.”

The information session is at 7 p.m. at the Windermere Manor’s Convergence Centre, 999 Collip Cir.

—Cheryl Madliger

According to a press release, starting November 14 Canada’s most poplar coffee shop will offer new speciality coffees made with premium espressos, such as lattes, mocha lattes and cappuccinos.

“We carefully explored lattes for some time,” Paul House, president and CEO of Tim Hortons, said in the release. “The unique blends we’ve developed deliver a rich, creamy drink consistently and fast.”

This foray into latte land comes as logical step.  Tim Hortons already offers specialty coffees like French vanilla cappuccino and cafe mocha.

“With nearly half a century of coffee experience, we’ve learned how to produce premium coffee, consistently, at value prices,” House said.

A representative for Hospitality Services at the University of Western Ontario was not able to be reached for comment, and it remains to be seen if the new espressos will be offered on campus.

—Shiyamalen Thavandiran

National child labour day

Over 200,000 grade 9 students across Canada spent the day at work shadowing a parent or volunteer host on Wednesday.

“Take Our Kids to Work Day provides a valuable one-day job shadowing experience for many of our Grade 9 students,” Gary Wheeler, a member of the Communications Branch for the Ministry of Education, said “It helps our students learn more about the world of work and the hundreds of career options they have, as they prepare to make the transition from school to work.”

More than 1.5 million students and 75,000 workplaces have participated in the program since its inception. The event is sponsored by the Learning Partnership. The non-profit organization builds strategic alliances and fosters collaboration among its members, who represent school boards, government, teacher and community groups, large corporations and employers.

—Mengxi Li

Beavers battle bears for national supremacy

Nickels may soon have to be reissued if Conservative Senator Nicole Eaton has her way.

Eaton is urging her colleagues and Prime Minister Stephen Harper to introduce a private member’s bill which would abandon the beaver as Canada’s national symbol and replace it with the polar bear.

In her argument, Eaton compared the beaver to a rat that was no longer relevant.

However, Roots Canada has since launched a petition in response, pointing to the beaver’s relevance.

“Our buck-toothed friends up in Algonquin Park, now preparing for the long winter, are deeply offended by Senator Eaton’s unconscionable demand to retire the beaver and cause offence to millions of Canadians,” the petition read.

Thus far, the petition has garnered over 6,000 signatures.

“Beavers have risen beyond their original stature as a hunted species for hats [...] to symbols of hard work and perseverance,” one signatory commented. “Rodent or not, they are a true representation of Canadians. Polar bears, on the other hand, eat seals and sell Coca Cola.”

—Gloria Dickie

A new review is being conducted on the rising number of cyclist deaths annually in Ontario. There are 15 to 20 deaths per year as a result of cycling accidents.

A review issued by the office of the chief coroner for Ontario, Andrew McCallum, will reveal the common causes of cyclist deaths. This report will be completed in spring 2012.

Dan Cass, regional supervising coroner for the Toronto Region, commented “15 to 20 deaths is still 15 to 20 deaths more than we’d like to see. Every cycling death is a preventable death.”

According to Cass, the coroner’s office is simply looking to find ways to make cycling safer and decrease the likelihood of deaths in the future.

This review will look into the age and location of each death from 2006-10. The most important part of the review will be whether these accidents were preventable with a helmet and whether distractions such as cell phones were involved.

To stay safe on the road, Cass recommended common sense and a helmet.

—Victoria Marroccoli

RIM gets sued

For students who suffered through the BlackBerry data outage from October 11-14, help is on the way.

Jeff Orenstein, founder of Consumer Law Group in Montreal, has filed a class action lawsuit pertaining to how Researh In Motion handled the data crash.

As an apology for the service outage, RIM offered their users $100 worth of free apps, such as Bejeweled, Texas Hold ‘Em and BubbleBash2, which are available for download before December 31 at no charge.

According to Orenstein, the company failed to properly compensate their affected customers, especially because RIM did not give their customers a choice in the apps offered.

“To put credit on next month’s bill would have been the best plan, but they didn’t do that,” he said.  “I think for most people, they don’t want the free apps.”

Orenstein continued that he hopes the lawsuit will end with all participants receiving a $100 credit on their next phone bill at RIM’s expense.

—Lauren Seabrook

Say good-bye to unwanted calls

To better control unwanted telemarketing calls from foreign nations, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, along with 12 other global telecommunication enforcement agencies, are working to create a global no-call list.

“There is no new list per se. It is an international network […] to track down violators,” Eleanor Belshaw-Hauff, a spokesperson for the CRTC, explained. “The Canadian list is still in effect.”

Canadians who are already on the do not call list do not have to register for a second global list.

Anyone interested in registering for the national list can either call the CRTC or visit their website. Registration is simple, taking affect within 31 days of signing up and expiring after five active years.

The do not call list can be applied to any and all Canadian telephone numbers, including Voice Over Internet Protocol and wireless numbers. Penalties for calling those on the no call list are between $1,500 and $15,000.

—Kate Eadie

Five cent toilet invented

The University of Toronto’s efforts to reinvent the toilet may have a Western solution.

In response to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s $3 million challenge, a Toronto engineering team has been tasked to develop a self-contained toilet without reliance on running water, sewage connection or electricity and costs at a maximum of 5 cents per day to use.

Facing difficulties with disposal of solid waste, however, the Toronto team contacted Jason Gerhard, an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at Western, with the intention to apply his soil decontamination technology to their cause.

In association with Jose Torero, a University of Edinburgh professor, Gerhard co-founded this STAR (Self-sustaining Treatment for Active Remediation) technology to destroy over 99 per cent of contaminants in soil through the process of smoldering combustion. As this process is able to convert organic material such as oil, coal-tar and oxygen into water, carbon dioxide and heat with minimal use of energy and water, the Toronto team considered it a potential solution for disposing solid human waste.

If successful, these reinvented toilets would address the sanitation needs of 2.6 billion people throughout the developing world and potentially prevent 1.5 million annual deaths from diarrhea, dysentery and cholera.

—Mason Zimmer

The London Police Service has charged 35-year-old Shawn Riddick with one count of sexual assault. This charge is in relation to an incident last Saturday at the Sear’s outlet store at 530 Oxford Street West. Riddick was arrested Monday night and charged as of Tuesday’s press release.

According to Constable Dennis Rivest, media relations offer for London Police, “[Riddick] approached a female sales associate requesting assistance, and the sales associate attempted to help this male when she was sexually assaulted. [He] then walked around the store for a brief time and then left the area.”

Riddick was caught on camera while he wandered the store before leaving through the north exit to the parking lot.

The sales associate received no injuries as a result of the assault. No other information has been released to protect the identity of the victim.

“Thanks to those that called in and helped us out with our investigation,” Rivest added.

—Megan Devlin

Increasing the youth vote

Last week’s provincial elections resulted in a voter turnout of only 49.2 per cent. The last time levels were this low was in 1867–144 years ago.

Enter the Global Vision Riding Ambassador Program. A part of the national non-profit organization Global Vision, the program is trying to turn this trend around by increasing political interest and involvement in youth.  It is looking to establish local chapters in each of the country’s 308 ridings.

Samantha Fox, a fourth-year nursing student at Western, heads the London North Centre riding for this program.

According to Fox, the main reason so few youth come out to vote is a general feeling of disenfranchisement and being overwhelmed. She explained they feel like their votes don’t count and so they simply choose not to engage in politics.

“The youth have the desire. Instead of having adults lecture them on politics they need to actively participate to feel empowered,” she said.

The goal of the program is to increase youth political activism by 2015—a goal Fox said is feasible. She hopes to see a voter turnout among youth of 100 per cent by 2015.

“It’s a very ambitious goal but we have to aim high and go for it.”

Global Vision will soon host four major nationwide conferences centered on the Riding Ambassador program. Fox is also looking to create a mini-conference in London and has plans to speak at Western.

—Danielle Xu

Name discrimination in the workforce

A new study by the University of Toronto has revealed that racial discrimination is very much alive in corporate Canada.

After sending out 8,000 fake job applications including both English-sounding names and Indian, Greek or Chinese-sounding names, Philip Oreopoulos and Diance Dechief found that those with more anglo-saxon names were 47 per cent more likely to receive call backs in Toronto than the others.

Comparatively, in Montreal, English names had a 39 per cent advantage, and a 20 per cent advantage in Vancouver.

Both resumes had identical qualifications and made it clear the applicant was proficient in English or French.

Philip Oreopoulos believed that as concerns over language and social skills increased, so too would this discrimination.

“The results suggest name discrimination is related to overall concerns about language and social skills, and so to the extent that these concerns have increased, the extent of this name discrimination has also likely increased,” he said.

—Gloria Dickie

Seymour Schulich has launched a $100 million scholarship opportunity for undergraduate students attending Canadian and Israeli Universities. The initiative is focused on increasing enrolment in subjects like science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

David Goodman, director of the Schulich Leader Scholarships program, said the scholarship will be administered by the United Jewish Appeal of Greater Toronto.

“Mr. Schulich believes these types of graduates produce really wonderful outcomes in the workforce and will ultimately lead Canada and Israel to the forefront of these fields,” Goodman said.

Graduating high school students from both Canada and Israel planning on studying one of the STEM subjects will be eligible for the Leadership program. Those granted the scholarship will receive $60,000 which will be paid out in annual installments of $15,000 over four years. A total of 25 schools are going to be invited to take part in the program, 20 in Canada and five in Israel. Starting in 2012, 25 “leaders” will be chosen from each school to receive the scholarship, which will increase in number 50 in 2013 and 75 in 2014.

“Mr. Schulich believes [the recipients] would make exceptional leaders to various types of industry,” Goodman said. “[It’s] a great foundation for the economies and well-being of both Canada and Israel.”

—Joshua Schendel

Bribing BlackBerry users

Proud BlackBerry owners will be happy to hear Research in Motion has decided to offer its subscribers a number of premium apps, worth $100 in total, at absolutely no cost.

This decision comes at the heels of last week’s system outage that left millions of users around the world without network service. It was reported to have lasted three days in Europe, the Middle East, India and Africa, one and a half days in Latin America and Canada, and one day in the United States.

“We truly appreciate and value our relationship with our customers,” Mike Lazaridis, RIM co-CEO, stated in a press release. “We’ve worked hard to earn their trust over the past 12 years.”

He added the company is taking immediate and aggressive steps to prevent anything like this from happening again.

RIM has not explained how they will prevent service from dropping yet again, but for those still emotionally attached to their BlackBerry, some of the free apps provided by RIM include the Sims 3, Bejeweled, Shazam Encore and Vlingo Plus.

—Jason Oncz

A healthy downtown

The London Health Sciences Centre has expressed an interest in collaborating with the City of London and Western to create a “synergistic innovative initiative between the education and health care sectors.”

The Centre has been the most recent candidate to throw their hat in the ring for space in the revamped downtown.

According to Julia Capaldi, communications consultant for the LHSC, the organization is enthusiastic about potential collaboration.

However, she stressed no formal plans have yet been made, and London’s downtown is only a potential area for this project.

“LHSC is only in the exploratory phase of this opportunity,” she said.

The impact of Western’s proposed downtown campus on potential LHSC interests are yet to be determined. “Ongoing discussions with the leaders of Western and the City of London [are needed] to make this possibility a reality,” she continued.

As it is tentative, estimates of cost and specific proposed placement of LHSC’s healthcare component are not yet known.

—Mason Zimmer

Shooter arrested

The prime suspect behind the shooting on Clarke Road on October 11 has been arrested.  40-year-old Thi Tran was killed in the incident.

The warrant for the arrest was issued early on Saturday. “Denzel Borden, age 19, was arrested on Saturday at around 6:30,” Dennis Rivest, media relations officer for the London Police, said. Borden faces several charges, including second degree murder, possession of a firearm while knowingly not being a holder of a license permitting such possession and possession of a dangerous weapon in a public space.

“He will be transferred back to London, and will be making a court appearance, probably today,” said Rivest. Being over 18 years of age, Borden faces any charges that would apply to an adult.

—Julian Panchaud

The Sarnia Road bridge construction timeline has been delayed. Instead of ending by the end of October, the bridge is now scheduled for completion at the end of November.

“Early in the project we lost 18 days of work because of snow, rain and heat issues,” John Lucas, director of roads and transportation for the project, said.

“The amount of rain saturates the soil, making it incredibly muddy and impossible to work, so five days had to be spent cleaning that up,” Lucas said. These circumstances further delayed the production of the bridge.

“The summer made up for some of the lost time, but not enough of it. We hoped that the good weather would continue,” said Lucas.

Save for the few instances of brutal heat in the summer, there was a great deal of good weather for working on the bridge, but it didn’t quite make up for the amount of time lost early on.

“Because of that, the end of October became unrealistic, so the finish date has been changed to the end of November,” said Lucas.

—Julian Panchaud

RIM says sorry

Research in Motion co-founder Mike Lazardis issued a video apology yesterday for a three day outage of BlackBerry Messenger.

Full service has since been restored

“Since launching BlackBerry in 1999, it’s been my goal to provide reliable, real-time communications around the world. We did not deliver on that goal this week, not even close,” Lazardis said in his release.

The breakdown was allegedly caused by a hardware failure which led to a ripple effect in RIM’s systems.

Users in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, India and South America first experienced the delays and outages on Monday. The problem later spread to North America.

“With so many BBM users nowadays, I think it was inevitable that the back-end of the RIM operating system might encounter issues,” Leah Travaglini, a fourth-year history student at Western and BlackBerry user, said. “Obviously it was frustrating because BBM is the way that so many people communicate, but I think we all need to get over it. There is such a thing as text messaging.”

Lazardis concluded his message by saying, “I apologize for the service outages this week. We’ve let many of you down.”

—Gloria Dickie

Mo’ money, less problems

Wednesday brought good news for five researchers at Western who will receive a combined $5.2 million to fund their research through the Canada Research Chairs program.  Minister of state (science and technology) Gary Goodyear announced $203.9 million in funding via the program as well as $10.2 million from the Canada Foundation for Innovation to undertake new research Wednesday at the University of Guelph.

According to Trevor Lynn, manager of communications for the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, both amounts will go towards leaders in the Canadian research landscape.

“Through the CRC program, the federal government funds up to 2000 research chairs across Canada on an ongoing basis. CFI is a federally funded foundation that gives money associated with CRC to cover the cost of their research infrastructure and equipment,” he said.

With one or two announcements each year, the funding is integral in allowing researchers to pursue their interests. Dan Sinai, associate vice president research (acting) at Western, said the programs are of great benefit to the University.

“Over the past decade, Western has benefited tremendously from both the CRC and CFI programs […] to build some of the world’s most unique research facilities and laboratories and to provide our researchers with equipment they need to provide answers to the questions of tomorrow and today,” he said.

The five researchers at Western recognized in the announcement at Guelph work in fields ranging from quantitative finance to planetary small bodies.

—Cheryl Madliger