It has come to my attention that students enrolling in courses during the first week of classes do not get immediately access to the password protected moodle course electronic classrooms. Therefore, these students don't have access to the course handouts in order to catch up with what they have missed in the first 1-2 lectures. […]
Education
#AdventBotany and Alien Abductions 😉
More evidence that using Social Media in Science isn't frivolous
Who can resist being entranced by the gorgeous Fall colours around us? I find them distracting, even as Canada's science and sustainability communities have been focussed on much more weighty issues of a general election and Ada Lovelace Day, a celebration of Women in STEM. In the midst of the latter socially important stuff, I couldn't help […]
Ada Lovelace Day 2015 at York University: 26th & 29th October 2015
Ada Lovelace Day was launched in 2009, by Suw Charman-Anderson, as way of drawing attention to and celebrating the under-appreciated contributions of women to STEM fields: Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. I first came across Ada Lovelace Day in 2013, when I added a post to the international map (below right), about one of my female mentors, Professor Emerita […]
Why academics should regularly attend conferences where we don't present our work. Pt 1
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics), one always presents new research at every conference one attends. (Or at the very least, one must be a co-author on a talk or poster). Growing up as an ecological researcher, I've observed that there are two main reason for this ALWAYS […]
Prof. Marc Spooner's next course should be "Best practices in conference organizing"
I fell behind with my blogs at the end of June, when my back pain flared up. I'd probably gone a bit overboard with driving and sitting/standing, and I spent Canada Day flat on my back, groaning. I'm again doing well with moving around and having the energy to stand and work. so I'm dealing with my 2 missing July posts, by (1) updating the […]
More women ecologists: My peek into commercial academic publishing
Sad News over the Weekend: Update September 30 2015: I was very sad to hear on Sunday, that my chief editor and the lead author on Ecology: A Canadian Context 2nd Edition, Professor Bill Freedman had lost his battle with cancer. It's just under a year since Bill told me about his diagnosis. I've thought of […]
Leadership & management lessons learned directing IRIS: Part 2
In 2006, when I took over as director of York University's Institute for Research and Innovation in Sustainability (IRIS), I was very concerned with how to improve my skill set for effective leadership and management. In many ways, my experience as a sustainability researcher from 2006-14 was as much about observing and learning from other […]
