The entire UPEI community was dismayed to hear the news of the discovery of remains at a former residential school in Kamloops, BC. Flags on the UPEI campus will be flown at half-mast until sunset on June 8 to honour the lives of the 215 First Nation children whose remains were found in a mass grave.

UPEI is joining the Government of PEI and many other governments and organizations in lowering the flags to half-mast for 215 hours, representing one hour for every child whose life was lost on the grounds of the former residential school in Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc territory.

Crows on campus know if you have food or something that looks like food.

• NEVER FEED the crows or drop food on the ground. This includes food wrappers. 
• KEEP FOOD HIDDEN inside a bag or backpack. Do not just carry a food container. Crows can smell it!
• Should a crow start to attack you, WAVE YOUR HANDS and forcefully shoo them away and continue your walk. That way the crow will learn that it's not productive to show this type of behaviour. 

If everyone on Campus is consistent in dealing with the crows, hopefully, we will all be able to enjoy our beautiful PEI summer outside!

Excellent tutoring support is available during the second summer session!  Go to upei.mywconline.com to see our appointment schedule and make an appointment.  All appointments will take place online.

Can't find an available appointment slot to fit your busy life?  Off-schedule appointments can be arranged by emailing Jon Debly at jdebly@upei.ca.  

Have a great summer!

On Wednesday July 7, ITSS will be conducting routine maintenance on the MyUPEI portal and related services from 8 pm to 12 am midnight. During this time there may be intermittent access and performance issues with MyUPEI, Self-Service, Colleague & apply.upei.ca sites.

We encourage Students, Faculty, and Staff that may need documents or links located on myUPEI to plan ahead and bookmark or download the resources they may need during this period.

As a reminder, you can access Moodle directly using https://moodle.upei.ca & Outlook email directly using https://outlook.office.com.

If you have any questions, please contact the ITSS Help Desk at 902-566-0465.

Do you submit articles to journals published by the American Chemical Society, Elsevier, MDPI, Sage, or Taylor & Francis? Do you pay Article Processing Charges (APCs) to make your article open access? You can can qualify for a discount on your APC because you are UPEI faculty, student, or staff! Learn more at https://library.upei.ca/apc-discounts.

The UPEI Homestay program is looking to recruit new host families living in the Charlottetown area.   Families receive $900/mth and get the opportunity to meet & host students from around the world.   

For more information and to sign up, contact the Homestay Coordinator at homestay@upei.ca

The UPEI Homestay program is looking to recruit new host families living in the Charlottetown area.   Families receive $900/mth and get the opportunity to meet & host students from around the world.   

For more information and to sign up, contact the Homestay Coordinator at homestay@upei.ca

The UPEI Homestay program is looking to recruit new host families living in the Charlottetown area.   Families receive $900/mth and get the opportunity to meet & host students from around the world.   

For more information and to sign up, contact the Homestay Coordinator at homestay@upei.ca

The External Scholarships, Awards, and Bursaries webpage has been updated with more opportunities!

Students looking for external opportunities should be particularly attentive to the July section now and are encouraged to continue referencing this webpage monthly for additions, as these externally funded awards, scholarships, and bursaries are posted regularly when received from various government, corporate, and non-profit sector groups.

For more information, please contact scholarships@upei.ca.

More Outlook tips this week - did you know you can convert an email into a calendar event or a task just by dragging??

Check this out. Enjoy the extra long weekend, from ITSS. 

CHANGE is a lifestyle intervention developed by Metabolic Syndrome Canada for individuals living with or at risk of Metabolic Syndrome. This year-long program supports people who have 2-3/5 of the following conditions: diabetes (or prediabetes), high blood pressure, carry excess weight in their abdomen, have low "good" cholesterol (HDLs) or high "bad" cholesterol (LDL's).  The program is being offered across communities in PEI and is free. You will spend 2.0 hours per week initially with a registered dietitian and kinesiologist. After the first 12 weeks, you will meet bi-weekly for 12 weeks, tri-weekly for 12 weeks, and then every 4 weeks until the program is completed at week 52. At 0, 3, 6, 9, and 12 months you will have detailed assessments including a walk test, strength/flexibility tests, diet scores, measurements of biometrics such as blood, weight, BMI and mental health questionnaires. The program focuses on your individual level of health and supports you to adopt a healthy Mediterranean Diet as well as incorporate exercise into your routine.

For more information email CHANGE@upei.ca or telephone 902-620-5156.

Did you know that 90% of young vapers in PEI (aged 16-24) began vaping using flavoured vape juice? 75% of young vapers in PEI use products with the highest available nicotine content (50-60 mg/ml). 1 vape pod = 20 cigarettes worth of nicotine.  

Vaping is not an approved cessation method. If you vape, consider making a plan to quit. If you don’t vape, don’t start. Talk to your healthcare provider about help or contact Smokers’ Helpline at 1-877-513-5333,  #CommitToQuit.

For more information on the 2020-21 Youth and Young Adult Vaping Survey, visit https://pei.lung.ca/2020-21-youth-young-adult-vaping-survey.

June is Pride month and this provides us with opportunities to support our LGBTQ2+ communities.  Pride was originally started to recognize the Stonewall Riots in New York on the one-year anniversary of the riots.  It has since spread across the world and has a month dedicated to raising awareness of issues in our LGBTQ2+ communities.  

The Transgender Community is one of those communities and at the UPEI Health & Wellness Centre, we provide Gender Affirming Care to faculty, staff, and students as well as patients across PEI who are struggling to find a primary care physician/NP to provide Gender Affirming Care.  We are located on the 2nd floor (North end) of the Murphy Building.  You can telephone us at 902-566-0616 or email us: healthcentre@upei.ca to make an appointment. 

Have you ever been impacted by extreme weather or natural disasters on PEI? Were you able to get the information and the help you needed at the right times? 

We are looking for interview study participants who will share their experiences about how they prepare and respond to these types of events. The information you share with us feed into a design process to create new interactive technologies to help citizens during storms, flash floods or other types of disasters that we increasingly need to respond to in 2021.

We are looking for people who are: fluent in English, 18 years of age or older, live or have lived on PEI  and have experienced an extreme weather or natural disaster event on PEI they would be comfortable speaking about.  Participants for this study also must have reliable internet connection as interviews will be conducted online.  

Interviews will take about 30 minutes to complete and participants will be compensated with an 8Gb USB key worth approximately $12 for their time.  Participants will also be given the opportunity to join in future community co-design sessions for the new technology!

If you would like to improve preparedness and response of Islanders to natural disasters, please contact Choyce Chappell (cachappell@upei.ca) or Christopher Power (cdspower@upei.ca) to set up an interview between 1 June 2021 and 15 July 2021.

Due to the July 1 holiday, Financial Services will be moving up the weekly cheque runs by one day. The Accounts Payable deadline will be Monday, June 28th at 4 pm for processing on June 29th.

The entire UPEI community was saddened by Wednesday’s tragic discovery of 751 unmarked graves at the site of the former Marieval Indian Residential School in Saskatchewan, within a month of the remains of 215 Indigenous children being found buried at a former residential school in Kamloops, BC. The flags at UPEI have been lowered to half-mast to honour the lives lost and in support of all residential school survivors and their families during this difficult time. 

Due to the July 1 holiday, Financial Services will be moving up the weekly cheque runs by one day. The Accounts Payable deadline will be Monday, June 28th at 4 pm for processing on June 29th.

UPEI has developed and implemented a comprehensive Hearing Conservation Program (HCP).

Fortunately, noise exposure can be controlled. Every effort should be made to use quieter processes, machinery, or equipment.

As part of the UPEI HCP, audiometric testing will take place the morning of July 5, 2021 and the afternoon of July 8th, 2021 at the Kelley Memorial Building Room 313. These tests take approximately ten minutes to complete.  It is important to have your hearing tested annually. All are welcome to attend.

Please pre-register for audiometric testing by contacting Shelly Kavanagh at shkavanagh@upei.ca  or 902-566-0901.

Learn more about UPEI's Hearing Conservation here.

June is Stroke Awareness Month.  Stroke is a medical emergency and recognizing the signs of a stroke can mean the difference between life and death, or the difference between a full recovery and a lasting disability.  Strokes can happen to anyone:  babies, teenagers, young adults to older adults.

FAST is an easy way to remember the most common signs of stroke.  FAST stands for Face - is it drooping? Arms - can you raise both? Speech - is it slurred or jumbled? and Time - to cal 9-1-1 right away!!

Do not drive to the hospital - take an ambulance.

Did you know in Outlook mail you can create a simple poll to send in your email? Click on the last set of three dots and use the poll option. For more useful tips click on the "?" icon in the upper right-hand side of Outlook Web App, where you can find more information on how to get the most out of our new mail system.