For more details about the program see the Caf\u00e9 website here.<\/a><\/p>\nDonia\u2019s role at the Lockhart Drive facilities has continued to grow. He is a part-time supervisor for the Centre, as well as the head trainer and co-ordinator for Power Cord. He\u2019s also pursuing research at the Centre to study how different exercise modalities can have the greatest and most efficient benefits to the individual on multiple levels.<\/p>\n
\u201cSeeing the physical, functional, and psychological benefits of the clients allows me to believe that I\u2019m truly making a difference in the world,\u201d says Donia. \u201cPersonally, I see the positive influence it has on me in my confidence in communicating with people, prescribing exercise, and being able to adapt on the fly as everyone has varying abilities when working with these populations.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Centre employs about 100 undergraduate and graduate students each semester who work with the growing membership and on customized exercise programs. Particularly graduate students who connect their thesis projects to programming, students also help drive the Centre\u2019s research.<\/p>\n
Other graduate students to give short presentations on Nov. 18 are:<\/p>\n
Aly Bailey, PhD candidate
\n<\/strong>Supervisor: Associate Professor Kim Gammage<\/p>\nBailey is a part-time Centre-Assistant and her role is to work with the student trainers in supervising the specialized exercise programs. Her research interests, both as a master\u2019s student and now as a doctoral student, include exploring and\u00a0promoting\u00a0positive body image experiences in a diversity of populations including people with physical disabilities\u00a0and older adults.<\/p>\n
In conjunction with the Senior Fit program, Bailey conducted a study exploring body image experiences and coping mechanisms used by older adult women. She\u2019s also a lead tester on the Balance and Strength in Community Seniors intervention study taking place at the Centre.<\/p>\n
As part of her PhD studies, Bailey will be working with members of the Centre to develop, implement, and evaluate a positive body image program that can be adapted\u00a0by other organizations such as Spinal Cord Injury Ontario and the Niagara Centre of Independent Living.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy passion is to help others learn to have more positive perceptions, cognitions, and attitudes towards their bodies. This is in hopes to improve the well-being and quality of life of individuals who may be at particular risk of body image suffering,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
Kylie Dempster, MSc student
\n<\/strong>Supervisor: Associate Professor Debbie O\u2019Leary<\/p>\nDempster discovered the Centre somewhat by chance in the summer of 2013 while an undergraduate student in Kinesiology at the University of Waterloo.\u00a0Dempster came to the Centre for a week to help collect data with Waterloo doctoral student Laura Fitzgibbon who was involved with the Centre while completing a master\u2019s degree at Brock.\u00a0A year later Dempster was applying to Brock to pursue her master\u2019s degree and research studies in conjunction with the Centre.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was during the research work with Laura that I developed a serious interest in cardiovascular research and decided to pursue graduate studies. Laura always spoke very highly of her time at Brock and with her master\u2019s thesis supervisor, Dr. Debbie O\u2019Leary,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
Dempster has a broad research interest in cardiovascular physiology. Specifically, she is looking at the influence of isometric handgrip exercise training on cardiovascular and cognitive health in people with resistant hypertension.<\/p>\n
Later this fall she will be recruiting members of Heart Strong program to participate in the study.<\/p>\n
David Allison, PhD student
\n<\/strong>Supervisor: Associate Professor David Ditor<\/p>\nAllison\u2019s area of research is in neuroimmunology. His particular interest is in the influence that immune dysfunction, in the form of chronic inflammation, can have on the nervous system and behaviour. Allison has had a front-row view on the Centre\u2019s growth and development as an undergraduate, master\u2019s and now doctoral student at Brock.<\/p>\n
\u201cI began working in the Centre in 2009, before it became Power Cord,\u201d says Allison. \u201cAt the time we were extremely limited in equipment and volunteers so myself and my lab partner, Hisham Sharif, ran the Centre each day and had to be quite creative when developing exercise programs.\u201d<\/p>\n
That included making use of ramps in the hallways for aerobic exercises and using themselves to provide resistance to take clients through workouts.<\/p>\n
\u201cToday, the Centre is well established with lots of accessible equipment, a large number of undergraduate and graduate student volunteers, and a large, and continuously growing, client base,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Scott Donia understands how much it means for people to maintain and, in some cases regain, a healthy and independent lifestyle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":36504,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3319,1,5],"tags":[831,3249,3568,675],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36503"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36503"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36503\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36505,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36503\/revisions\/36505"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}