UPEI professor participates in Intellectual Muscle podcast series

Dr. Joe Velaidum of the University of Prince Edward Island will grapple with the 'big' question--the meaning of life--during a provocative podcast on December 15.
Entitled 'Attaining Spiritual Heights: The Meaning of Life and the Quest for Transcendence,' the podcast can be heard on December 15 at www.theglobeandmail.com/intellectual-muscle. UPEI is one of 25 Canadian universities participating in the Intellectual Muscle: University Dialogues for Vancouver 2010 podcast series.
Velaidum's talk revolves around the inescapable need of people to transcend their "humanness' and the challenges and pitfalls they encounter along the way.
'Given the brute fact of death, what is the point in persisting at trying to rebel against the tyranny of time? Why aren't more of us beset by doubt and powerlessness and depression? I suggest that, like the Olympian, most of us have an inescapable need to transcend our given human natures and strive to become more than we are by connecting to something greater than what our separated and individual existences allow.'
Intellectual Muscle features eclectic talks by prominent and up-and-coming Canadian intellectuals on topics related to the Vancouver 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games. The program, developed by Vancouver 2010 and the University of British Columbia, in collaboration with universities across Canada and The Globe and Mail, runs until the end of the Games in March 2010.
Velaidum is university director for student engagement and retention, the founding director of the Centre for Christianity and Culture, and chair of the Department of Religious Studies. He has published numerous articles on the Canadian literary and cultural critic Northrop Frye, and is now working on multimedia and book-length projects dealing with the meaning of atheism and faith in the modern world.

Notification about campus closures

Faculty, staff, and students are advised that if a decision is made at any time to close the UPEI campus, details will be made available as follows:

Radio Stations: Announcements will be made on local radio stations by 7:00 a.m. if possible. Stations contacted will be: CFCY/Magic93, CBC Radio, Radio Canada, K-Rock, Ocean 100, and C102 (Summerside).

Campus Closure & Alert Line: A message will be recorded, by 7:00 a.m. if possible, on the UPEI Campus Closure & Alert Line. To access this information, please call (902) 894-2882.

UPEI Website: An urgent notice will be posted on the front page of the UPEI website, upei.ca.

Quantum chemistry researcher receives CFI award

Dr. Jason Pearson, an assistant professor of Chemistry in the Faculty of Science, has been awarded more than $40,000 by the Canadian Foundation for Innovation (CFI) under its Leaders Opportunities Fund. Dr. Pearson's research specialty is in the area of quantum chemistry. He uses advanced computer modeling to simulate chemical reactions at the molecular and atomic level.
'This award, in part, allows Dr. Pearson's lab to buy a vital tool for his research: a high-performance, or super computer,' explains Dr. Katherine Schultz, UPEI's Vice President of Research and Development. 'The CFI's contribution allows UPEI to innovate in an exciting new area of science.'
The CFI's mandate is to strengthen the capacity of Canadian universities, colleges, research hospitals, and non-profit research institutions to carry out world-class research and technology development that benefits Canadians.

Education student organizes donations for school children in need

When UPEI education students returned from their pre-service training this time last year they held a class discussion about the obvious impact of poverty on students in some local schools, and they talked about actions that might make a difference. Christie Chandler, now in second-year Education, has taken that discussion a step further this year by organizing a holiday campaign to collect good quality clothing, non-perishable food items, and personal toiletries to distribute to young people who are in need.

The campaign is concentrating on junior and senior high school students in the Charlottetown area in particular. The schools will distribute the donated items, in a confidential manner, to the students who could most benefit from them. Birchwood and Colonel Gray schools in Charlottetown have been designated as the drop-off points. Anyone with items to donate may deliver them to either school on any week day until December 22. More information is available via the UPEI Faculty of Education at 566-0731.

Heather Russell wins Staff Achievement Award

Heather Russell is the winner of the UPEI Staff Achievement Award for 2009. This award recognizes outstanding contributions to University community life and quality of service across campus.
Heather has been a staff member at UPEI for 12 years. Since 2003, she has provided administrative support services to faculty and students in the psychology department, one of the largest departments in the Faculty of Arts. In nominating her for the award, her colleagues praised her unique combination of competence and caring, describing her as 'the heart and soul of the department.' In a testimonial from a former student, Heather was commended for going 'above and beyond her duty to make students' academic careers at UPEI fruitful.'
As a volunteer, she has been an integral part of the free lunch programs for students during exam times organized through the Chaplaincy Centre; a key player in the Purple Ribbon campaign to raise awareness about violence against women; and secretary of the Learning Disabilities Association of PEI.
The UPEI Staff Achievement Award is sponsored by the Academic Support Group.

Island nurses graduate from new critical care and emergency nursing program

Seven nurses from three Island hospitals graduated today from the first-ever critical care and emergency nursing program offered on Prince Edward Island.
The graduates just completed a 15-week critical care and emergency nursing pilot program at UPEI's School of Nursing, which involved classroom study, lab simulation and clinical placements. The program manager is Judy Cotton, and the two nurse educators are Tanya Matthews and Mike Mac Donald.
'Through this program, practicing nurses on P.E.I. can develop their professional skills in the areas of critical care and emergency, which will ultimately improve patient care,' says Dr. Kim Critchley, Dean of Nursing. 'By offering this first-ever educational opportunity here on P.E.I., we can recruit and retain qualified critical care and emergency nurses in the province.'
The graduates are Pamela Condon, Kings County Memorial Hospital, Montague; Angela Neill, Bonnie Bradley and Dana Hood, Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Charlottetown; and Catherine Andrew, Mona MacLellan and Trudy Read, Prince County Hospital, Summerside. Most of the graduates work in critical care and emergency departments at their hospitals.
Another seven nurses will participate in the program beginning in February.
Partnering in this program with the School of Nursing are the P.E.I. Department of Health, Health Canada and the P.E.I. Nurses Union.
'We are pleased to partner in this program and to help provide Island nurses with an opportunity for professional development in critical care,' said Health Minister Doug Currie. 'Nurses play an essential role in the delivery of health care on Prince Edward Island, and providing this program for both new and experienced nurses will result in direct benefits for Islanders.'
This program is one of ten pilot projects across Canada that are part of a pan-Canadian initiative called Research to Action: Applied Workplace Solutions for Nurses, led by the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions and funded by Health Canada. The pilot projects are aimed at testing retention and recruitment strategies to address the nursing shortage.

UPEI Faculty of Arts holds book launch on January 7

The UPEI Faculty of Arts will hold a public book launch to celebrate ten new books by UPEI faculty in the Main Building Faculty Lounge at UPEI on Thursday, January 7, from 4:30-6:30 p.m.
"Remote Control: Governance Lessons for and from Small, Insular, and Remote Regions" explores the question: how does one transform small size and relative isolation into a powerful combination for sustainable growth and prosperity? This collection fleshes out tools and strategies used by mid-level governance structures, and it emphasizes a proactive, creative and assertive approach to governance. The book is edited by Godfrey Baldacchino of Island Studies, Rob Greenwood and Lawrence Felt.
In "A Magnificent Gift Declined: The Dalton Sanatorium of Prince Edward Island 1913-1923," Leonard Cusack of the history department portrays provincial and federal political manoeuvring and the social context surrounding the Dalton Sanatorium, P.E.I.'s first hospital for treating tuberculosis. Considered a state-of-the-art facility at the time, the sanatorium was donated by Charles Dalton to the Province of P.E.I. and built in the rural community of Emyvale in 1913. By 1923, it was totally demolished.
Benet Davetian, chair of the sociology and anthropology department, explores the development of civility, a core concept of social life, in "Civility: A Cultural History." Ranging from the Middle Ages to the present, and covering France, England and the US, the book discusses spitting, line-up etiquette, toilet hygiene, good manners and the relativity of politeness as they change over time. It not only historicizes the development of civility but also locates the concept in today's society and offers a renewed perspective on crucial issues such as multiculturalism.
In "Spirits in the Material World: The Challenge of Technology," political studies professor Gil Germain uses an analysis of four French philosophers to illuminate humans' implication in technology and tenuous hold on reality. He argues that humans are fast becoming disembodied or spirit-like creatures, and gives reasons why this inclination toward spiritization ought to be resisted.
"Texts and Traditions of Medieval Pastoral Care: Essays in Honour of Bella Millett" is edited by English professor Catherine Innes-Parker, and author/editor Cate Gunn. The collection focuses on the growth of, and changes in, pastoral and devotional literature, which flourished in the Middle Ages. Ranging historically from the difficulties of localizing Anglo-Saxon pastoral texts to the reading of women in late-medieval England, the individual essays survey its development and transformation into the literature of vernacular spirituality.
"Afternoon Horses," by Deirdre Kessler of the English department, reflects the author's bond with island landscapes-particularly those of P.E.I. and Tasmania-and with childhood and family-the sinews that hold families together through distance, aging and death.
"Athena Becomes a Swallow and Other Voices from The Odyssey," by English department chair Brent MacLaine, contains 27 monologues spoken by characters who appear in Homer's The Odyssey. Adopting the voices of the minor characters, MacLaine offers a novel perspective on the epic events, demonstrating how the shine of the gods falls on the common folk as well. In this collection, he creates a world as real and immediate to us today as it may have been 3,000 years ago.
"Beyond Silence: Voices of Child Sexual Abuse," authored by the SAGE editorial collective, takes a fresh approach to the ongoing work of child sexual abuse prevention by focusing on the knowledge and wisdom of adult survivors. In this collection, 14 Island women tell about the abuse they suffered as children, the profound effect it has had on their lives, and the reasons why people need to join the fight to stop it. A prevention chapter, written by the group as a whole, focuses on five key areas that need to be addressed in order to end child sexual abuse. Contributor Colleen MacQuarrie of the UPEI psychology department is a member of the editorial collective and co-author of the prevention chapter.

In "Romantic Cosmopolitanism," English professor Esther Wohlgemut shows how cosmopolitanism in the early nineteenth century offers a non-unified formulation of the nation that stands in contrast to more unified models such as Edmund Burke's which found nationality in, among other things, language, history, blood and geography.

Orysia Dawydiak of AVC draws on her own Ukranian heritage in her first novel, "House of Bears," the story of a young woman, her strained relationship with her traditional Ukrainian mother and her family's unspoken past, starting in the 1930s in Ukraine, followed by emigration to England and settlement in Canada.

Nursing student preceptor recognized by UPEI for longstanding work

Dr. Kim Critchley (left), UPEI Dean of Nursing, presents Leslie Warren, divisional nurse supervisor with the Office of the Attorney General, with the 2009 Bill and Denise Andrew Preceptor Scholarship for her longstanding work as a preceptor with nursing students. Fourth-year students work with preceptors to gain experience in community agencies across the province. Looking on is Simon Pickles who completed his five-month placement under Warren's guidance at the Sleepy Hollow Correctional Centre, and Christine Murray, a member of the UPEI Nursing Faculty and advisor for the Nursing and Population Health course. Fifty-four nursing students recently completed their community placements in a wide variety of rural and urban settings.



Laura Archer to speak on January 19

Laura Archer, a nurse with the international humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), will be the first presenter in a new speakers' series that features three inspiring alumni of the University of Prince Edward Island. The series is organized by the UPEI Student Union.
Doctors Without Borders delivers emergency aid to people affected by armed conflict, natural or man-made disasters, epidemics, and exclusion from healthcare. Since 2006, Archer has helped to deliver medical programs in several African countries including the Central African Republic and Chad. She became a household name around the world in March 2009 when she was kidnapped, along with three other aid workers, while working in the Darfur region of Sudan. They were released after three days in captivity.
A native of Charlottetown, Archer graduated with honours from UPEI in 2001 with a BScN. She received the Rotary Club of Hillsborough Nursing Award and The Sister Mary Gabriel Memorial Scholarship for Outstanding Academic Achievements in 2000.
"Laura is truly an inspiring alumna, and we want to give current UPEI students the opportunity to hear about the amazing things that she and our other speakers are doing. We are very excited to bring Laura back to UPEI," says Timothy Cullen, president of the UPEI Student Union.
The other two speakers in the series are Dr. Greg Fleming who is a veterinarian with Disney's Animal Kingdom, on February 9, and Dr. Heather G. Morrison, Chief Health Officer for PEI, on March 16.
Laura Archer's presentation takes place at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday, January 19, in the Alex H. MacKinnon Auditorium (Room 242) of McDougall Hall, UPEI. This is the location for all three presentations. A reception will follow in Schurman Market Square. Everyone is welcome. For more information, contact the UPEI Student Union at 566-0530.

Maritime student residences challenged to save energy

The University of Prince Edward Island has challenged students in residences at other post-secondary institutions in the Maritimes to an energy conservation competition. Holland College, St. Francis Xavier, Mount Allison, Dalhousie and the University of New Brunswick have all confirmed their participation. Students in more than 30 residences will take part.
'We're delighted with the enthusiastic response to our challenge,' says David Taylor, manager of sustainability and energy management at UPEI. 'The competition provides students with a real opportunity to reduce their energy consumption and minimize their personal impact on the environment.'
Each student residence will track its weekly electrical energy consumption and prepare a report. UPEI will use the reports to generate a summary for all participants and post the data on its sustainability website. The summary will demonstrate the percentage reductions in energy usage for each residence weekly and cumulatively. This information will be shared via a participant listserv as well.
The competition will run for six weeks, beginning on January 10. Mount Allison students have drafted a code of conduct for the energy challenge that will be included on the website. Institutions are free to use this code or modify it to suit their particular situations.
At the end of the challenge, prizes and a plaque will be awarded to the institution with the greatest cumulative reduction in energy usage from January 10 to February 20, 2010. The plaque is being donated by Maritime Electric.
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