In recognition of the outstanding performance and dedication of our faculty and staff, a number of annual awards have been created to acknowledge their efforts and achievements. 

Up to 10 Presidential Awards of Merit for UPEI Faculty, Librarians and Clinical Veterinary Professionals and four Presidential Awards of Merit for UPEI Staff will be awarded in 2016. These awards will be presented during a Celebration of Colleagues to be held on Wednesday, May 11, 2016 from 2:00-4:00 in McMillan Hall, W.A. Murphy Student Centre. 

Susan Connolly, Associate Vice President Human Resources & Legal, will lead the process and chair the committee to select award recipients. 

Nominations for both faculty and staff awards close on Friday, April 1, 2016. 

For further details on the awards and the nomination process, please visit: http://www.upei.ca/president/presidential-recognition-awards-merit 

The Institute of Island Studies Lecture Series continues Tuesday, February 23, with a talk by Dr. Tiber F.M. Falzett, Research Associate at the Institute of Island Studies. His public lecture, “Mar bhlàth an fheòir” (“like the flowering grass”), focuses on the oral and written interfaces in local Scottish Gaelic song composition on Prince Edward Island.
The lecture takes place in UPEI’s SDU Main Building Faculty Lounge, and gets under way at 7 p.m.

Dr. Falzett investigates a once vibrant, yet fragmentarily documented, tradition of local song composition and performance as expressed throughout the nineteenth- and early twentieth-centuries among Scottish Gaelic speakers on Prince Edward Island. By engaging both contemporary printed texts as well as sound recordings from fieldwork undertaken among remaining speakers and semi-speakers in the second half of the twentieth century, a multifaceted and dynamic body of tradition is capable of being pieced together. In turn these reassembled fragments of oral tradition can be reinterpreted to reveal a multi-accentual dynamic in what has since become a silenced ethno-linguistic community. Ultimately, it is intended to place these expressive forms of intangible cultural heritage as created and carried down by Gaelic-speaking Islanders in the context of the wider multicultural zone of the Canadian Maritimes to which they once belonged.

Tiber Falzett’s current research explores the documentation and dissemination of archival intangible cultural heritage on Prince Edward Island. His doctoral research explores the relationship between language and music through sensory metaphor as expressed among Scottish Gaelic speakers on Cape Breton Island. A fluent Gaelic speaker as well as a singer and bagpiper, Tiber has presented his research and performed for broadcast media, including the BBC Television and Radio in Scotland and CBC, and is an active public folklorist in Prince Edward Island and Cape Breton. He, his partner Giulia, and their dog Sofia live in Summerside.

Admission is free and everyone is welcome to attend.

This is the second in a series of an Island Studies Winter/Spring Lecture Series. Watch for details for another lecture about islands – near and far – March 22!

For more information, please contact Laurie at iis@upei.ca or (902) 894-2881.

The topic of local governance is the focal point of an upcoming Public Symposium, “The Geography of Governance,” to be sponsored by UPEI’s Institute of Island Studies, in conjunction with UPEI Research Services. The date is Thursday, February 25, at UPEI’s MacKinnon Auditorium, Room 242, Don and Marion MacDougall Hall, beginning at 7 p.m. (Storm date is the following evening, Friday, the 26th.)

Principal speaker is Diane Griffin, noted Island environmentalist, Stratford Town Councillor, and Vice President of the Federation of PEI Municipalities. She will be joined by a Panel: Dr. Ryan Gibson from the Geography Department at Saint Mary's University, Dr. Michael van den Heuvel from the UPEI Biology Department and Director of the Canadian Rivers Institute, and Jeanetta Bernard from St. Philippe, PEI. The four will discuss local government reform, and the criteria which might be used to decide new municipal boundaries.

Admission is free and everyone is invited to attend.

The Psychology department is presenting their first Department Colloquia this Friday afternoon, February 12, from 3:00 - 4:00 pm in Memorial 215. The talk will be given by Dr. Philip Smith and is
entitled "The Triple P Parenting Program: Coming Soon to a Family Near You."

Join us in the Psychology Lounge for conversation following the talk to discover more about this program that has just been launched in 2015 on the Island.

 All are welcome.

Due to the storm closure on Shrove Tuesday, "Pancakes and Sausages in the Chaplaincy Centre" was rescheduled to today, Thursday, February 11, from 11:30 am - 1:30 pm. Everyone is invited to enjoy this feast, prepared and served in collaboration with The Point, Connection Point Christian Church.

The next presentation in the Human Biology and Environmental Sciences seminar series will take place on Friday, February 12, 2016.

Dr. Diana Hamilton, Biology Department at Mount Allison University will present:

“Movement, diet and duration of stay by semipalmated sandpipers migrating through the Bay of Fundy: new insights challenge previous assumptions”

​Date:  Friday, February 12, 2016  
Time: 12:30 pm
Duffy Science 204

All are welcome.

There will be a UPEI biosafety refresher training session:

Friday, February 19, 2016   1:30 pm – 3:30 pm
Kelley Room 210

This session is required for those who attended the Basic Biosafety course in 2013 or earlier. It is not a substitute for Basic Biosafety. Topics to be covered include a review of basic biosafety principles, a practical approach to spill cleanup, and an update on what’s new at UPEI in the field of biosafety.

To attend the Biosafety Refresher course, you must pre-register by contacting Angela Deighan, Research Services and Graduate Studies, before February 12, 2016 by email (adeighan@upei.ca) or by phone (902-628-4308). Please include your name, department, email address and phone number in your email or voice message.

If you have any questions about this training session, please contact Angela or Dr. Rhoda Speare (rspeare@upei.ca or phone x5071).

There will be a UPEI basic biosafety training session:

Friday, February 19, 2016,  9:00 am -12:00 noon
Kelley  Room 210

Topics to be covered include basic biosafety principles and how they are applied at the University of Prince Edward Island, as well as biosecurity training. This session is open to graduate students.

Please note: those who have not attended a training session since 2013 are currently due for the Biosafety Refresher Course.

To attend the Basic Biosafety course, you must pre-register by contacting Angela Deighan, Research Services and Graduate Studies, before February 12, 2016 by email (adeighan@upei.ca) or by phone (902-628-4308). Please include your name, department, email address and phone number in your email or voice message. If you are a graduate student, please indicate this and include your supervisor’s name.

If you have any questions about this training session, please contact Angela or Dr. Rhoda Speare (rspeare@upei.ca or phone, x5071)

The psychology department is presenting their first department colloquia this Friday afternoon, February 12, from 3:00 - 4:00 pm in Memorial 215. The talk will be given by Dr. Philip Smith and is
entitled "The Triple P Parenting Program: Coming Soon to a Family Near You."

Join us in the Psychology Lounge for conversation following the talk to discover more about this program that has just been launched in 2015 on the Island.

All are welcome.

Please note that there has been a change in the process for booking computer labs on campus. The three computer labs, AVC 218S, AVC 225N and RL 312, that were formerly booked through IT Systems & Services will now be booked through the new Room Booking web page at www.upei.ca/facilities/room-booking-forms.

Thank you,
ITSS

Ever wonder about who online courses really belong to? Or what happens to them when you're not around? Check out the newest blog post over on the SCENT website: projects.upei.ca/scent.

Leave a comment (or two!) and join your colleagues in thinking about this very important facet of academic freedom as it affects our pedagogy and curriculum. And, of course, you can still comment on the first blog post too. We're leading up to our big end-of-term public lecture and workshop with Dr. Len Findlay of the University of Saskatchewan on April 27! So take a few minutes and join in!

For more info:
Ann Braithwaite, Chair of SCENT, abraithwwaite@upei.ca or Gerald Wandio, Faculty Development Office, fdo@upei.ca

Qammar Almas, PhD student will present a seminar on Wednesday, February 10, 2016 at 12:30 pm in the Regis and Joan Duffy Research Centre, Lecture Theatre, Room 212.  The presentation is entitled "Novel Computational Approaches to Research in Chemistry". All are welcome!

Business 371 students Tanya Phillips, Nicole Lynn McTague, Phillip Corney, and Vishrut Kapoor invite faculty, staff, and students to drop by their two Gift Shop stations on February 10 from 11 am - 3 pm at the Robertson Library and Don and Marion McDougall Hall to find that special gift for your Valentine. Gift selections include Candy Bags, Plush Toys, Cupcakes, and Cards.

This initiative is a part of the entrepreneurship class taught by Assistant Professor Michael Cassidy. For more information, email: valentinesecret688@gmail.com 

The location for Noontime Yoga on Tuesday, February 9 will be the UPEI Chi-Wan Young Sports Centre due to the Pancakes and Sausages event taking place at the Chaplaincy Centre. The class will return to the Chaplaincy Centre the following week. For more information, email: amarchbank@upei.ca

Ash Wednesday Masses and Distribution of Ashes will take place at the Chaplaincy Centre at 12:05 pm and 4:30 pm on Wednesday, February 10. For those who are able, Ash Wednesday is a day to fast (cut out / cut back) and abstain from meat.

Welcome to the feast before the fast ... Everyone is invited for Pancakes and Sausages in the Chaplaincy Centre to celebrate Pancake Tuesday / Mardi Gras / Shrove Tuesday, prepared and served in collaboration with The Point, Connection Point Christian Church.

Tuesday, February 9, 11:30 am - 1:30 pm

UPEI Athletics and Recreation is partnering with the Parkdale Sherwood Lions Club to host the "Wendel Clark and Friends" game at MacLauchlan Arena on Thursday, February 11. Game time is 7:00 pm.

Former NHL players attending the event include: Wendel Clark, Stephane Richer, Ron Duguay, Al Iafrate, Gary Leeman, Denis Maruk, Peter Klima, Ken Linseman, Mike Lalor, and Roy Nolan.

Panther Hockey captains Mason Wilgosh and Sam Sweet will also be on the ice, and there will be a special appearance by the Junior Panthers.

Ticket costs: $20 - Game admission; $50 - Dressing room pass (includes game admission, 20 tickets maximum each period); $80 - "Meet and Greet" (includes game admission and post-game social, maximum 100 tickets)

Proceeds are in support of Panther Sport. For tickets, contact Bruce Donaldson at 902-566-0368, or by email at bdonaldson@upei.ca.