UBC This Week | Aug. 14, 2008

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UBC This Week is a weekly summary of UBC people in the news, recent media releases and upcoming event highlights. UBC This Week past issues are also available on-line.

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Find out what else is happening at UBC this week. For sports events, visit the UBC Athletics site at www.gothunderbirds.ca/schedule.asp.

UBC People


UBC People

Head of UBC Library’s Rare Books appointed to Canadian Heritage post

Ralph Stanton, Head of UBC Library’s Rare Books and Special Collections (RBSC), has been appointed to the Canadian Cultural Property Export Review Board.

This board is an independent tribunal of the Department of Canadian Heritage. Its mandate includes determining whether a cultural property is of outstanding significance or national importance under terms of the Cultural Property Export and Import Act.

Stanton became the Head of RBSC in 2002. Throughout his career, he has played a key role in the acquisition of outstanding book, manuscript and map collections.

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Mechanical Engineering wins international awards

The UBC Department of Mechanical Engineering has won four awards at the Partners for the Advancement of Collaborative Engineering Education (PACE) Global Annual Forum held recently in Detroit, Michigan.

UBC came first in the PACE Laboratory Competition, which evaluated visual appearance of the outside entrance and interior of the laboratory; laboratory layout for student use; equipment; network and infrastructure; PACE software; and student and faculty usage.

In addition, fourth-year student Parisa Bastani and her collaborators at the University of Toronto won Best Engineering Track Paper. Alan Steeves, Manager of Computing/Electronics, won Best Curriculum Paper Award and the Distinguished PACE Integrator Award for setting up a global collaborative design network.

For more information, visit www.engineering.ubc.ca/news-events/article.php?page=/2008/08/mechanical-engineering-wins-pace-awards.html.

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Call for Proposals – Healthy Workplace Initiatives Program Fund

As part of the Focus on People Framework Strategy, UBC is launching the Healthy Workplace Initiatives Program Fund. UBC Vancouver and Okanagan departments/units are invited to submit funding proposals to support healthy workplace initiatives and practices.

Total funding allocation is $100,000 and will be awarded in two $50,000 funding cycles. The application deadline for the first funding cycle is Sept. 30, 2008. The second application deadline is Feb. 28, 2009.

For funding criteria and further information, visit www.hse.ubc.ca/health_promotion/wellness_initiatives/initiatives_healthy_workplace.htm

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New content online thanks to Canadian Research Knowledge Network initiative

Researchers and scholars across Canada can now access 14 major humanities and social science collections online, thanks to a consortium that includes UBC.

This development was made possible by funding provided by the Canadian Foundation of Innovation, eight provincial governments and 67 universities.

For further information on the collections, visit http://researchknowledge.ca/en/news/documents/DCIVendorsEFinal.pdf

A celebratory event was held at the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre – for further information, visit http://researchknowledge.ca/en/news/DCILaunch.jsp.

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UBC student named Killam Fellow

Vida Yao, a UBC Philosophy and History student, has been named a 2008-09 Killam Fellow. She will study this fall at the University of California at Berkeley, which only accepts one or two Canadian Killam Fellows per year.

Administered by the Foundation for Educational Exchange between Canada and the U.S., the Killam Fellowships Program seeks to enhance mutual understanding between the two countries. Almost 90 students have participated, with the number increasing to well over a hundred this year.

For more information, visit www.killamfellowships.com.

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UBC sponsors gathering of university administrators

UBC is the official sponsor of the International Meeting of University Administrators (IMUA) 2008 conference in Vancouver this summer. The IMUA is a forum for the discussion of management and administration issues in higher education. This year’s theme is globalization.

Speakers include Prof. Bryan Gould, an international authority on higher education; Prof. Carl Wieman, Nobel Laureate and Director of the Carl Wieman Science Education Initiative at UBC; Prof. David Dolphin, Professor Emeritus in Chemistry at UBC and lead creator of Visudyne™.; Dr. Ron Dembo, founder of Zerofootprint; Prof. Rachel Gumbi, Rector and Vice Chancellor of the University of Zululand; and Dr. Dan Muzyka, Dean of the Sauder School of Business at UBC.

For more information, visit www.imua2008.ca.