Articles by author: Brock University

• Environmental stewardship is the priority as Niagara Parks and Brock University sign new MOU

  Monday, April 23, 2018 | By Brock University

  MEDIA RELEASE: 20 April 2018 – R00084

  A new Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) promoting closer cooperation between The Niagara Parks Commission and Brock University was signed today by Niagara Parks Chair, Janice Thomson and Brock’s Interim Provost and Vice-President Academic, Tom Dunk.

  Niagara Parks and Brock have a history of collaboration that goes back decades. This new MOU is designed to enhance the stewardship and conservation practices of both organizations, while providing tangible results and educational/research opportunities for Brock students and faculty through their work with Niagara Parks and its staff.

  The MOU proposes creating an Excellence in Environmental Stewardship Initiative (EESI) that uses the expertise and resources of both organizations to increase environmental stewardship for the public, through open events, and for students through co-operative education, course projects and research. For instance, staff and researchers can study public perceptions of the natural environment in a setting like the Niagara Glen, which attracts 130,000 visitors a year, to better understand which stewardship activities work best and which can be improved upon.

  The agreement also promotes the pursuit of mutually beneficial opportunities such as grant proposals and community forums, as well as joint efforts to promote environmental stewardship not only within Niagara Parks and Brock, but by developing local, national and international networks to share and promote these efforts.

  “With the recent launch of our new 10-year strategic plan, which places a major emphasis on our environmental stewardship responsibilities, the timing of this new collaborative agreement with Brock University is ideal,” stated Niagara Parks Chair Janice Thomson. “This partnership reflects Niagara Parks’ steadfast commitment to the environment and we look forward to continuing to work closely with Brock University and its team at the Environmental Sustainability Research Centre in further advancing and promoting our shared goals.”

  Professor Ryan Plummer, Director of Brock’s Environmental Sustainability Research Centre, said the MOU will advance the understanding and practice of environmental stewardship.

  “Our partnership with the NPC in the Excellence in Environmental Stewardship Initiative addresses this two-fold challenge and does so in an iconic landscape,” said Plummer. “Meaningful impacts for the environment and for people will be realized from this initiative through innovative research, hands-on experience and state-of-the-art practices. Engaging Brock faculty and students directly with staff from the NPC is sustainability science in action.”    

  About Brock University‘s Environmental Sustainability Research Centre (ESRC)

  Brock University’s ESRC advances environmental sustainability locally and globally through excellence in research and education. The ESRC encourages research excellence in environmental sustainability by faculty, librarians and students; enables enriching educational experiences in environmental sustainability; and, engages in knowledge mobilization and fosters knowledge impacts about the environment. The ESRC is a research centre within the Faculty of Social Sciences as well as one of five transdisciplinary hubs at Brock University. 

  News media, for more information contact:

  Maryanne Firth, Brock University Communications

  maryanne.firth@brocku.ca  (905) 688-5550 ext. 4420

  About Niagara Parks

  Since its establishment in 1885, Niagara Parks has remained a self-financed agency of the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture & Sport, entrusted to preserve and protect the land surrounding Niagara Falls and the Niagara River. Today, Niagara Parks boasts gardens, a horticulture school, recreation, golf courses, restaurants, heritage and historic sites, gift shops and, of course, Niagara Falls. In short, natural landscapes, history, family fun, hiking, culinary delights, attractions and adventure. 

  For more information, please visit niagaraparks.com or contact:

  Tony Baldinelli, Senior Manager, Communications and Stakeholder Relations
  tbaldinelli@niagaraparks.com            (905) 356-2241 ext. 2206

  Categories: Media releases

• Two Brock students named finalists in national research contest

  Monday, April 23, 2018 | By Brock University

  MEDIA RELEASE: 20 April 2018 – R00083

  Body image research looking at negative perceptions and illness has earned two Brock University graduate students each a spot in the finals of a national research video contest. 

  Candace Couse and Aly Bailey are among 25 finalists in the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC)’s The Storytellers video contest.

  In addition to each receiving a $3,000 prize, the Brock students will join 23 other finalists from universities across Canada at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences 2018 on May 28 in Regina, Sask., where they will give presentations before a panel of judges. Five students will then be chosen to present at SSHRC’s 2018 Impact Awards ceremony.

  The Storytellers contest challenges post-secondary students to share SSHRC-funded research, conducted by either themselves or their supervisor, in a three-minute video or 300-word submission to show Canadians how social sciences and humanities research is affecting lives, the world and the future for the better.

  “As a researcher, finding an innovative way to share your project with a general audience is very important,” says Diane Dupont, Interim Dean of the Faculty of Graduate Studies. “SSHRC Storytellers has provided a national platform for students to share the importance of their work.

  “I am so proud of Candace and Aly for their success in this contest,” says Dupont. “To have not one, but two entries in the Top 25 shows that Brock graduate students are involved in exciting and globally relevant research and have the ability to translate that research into a form that brings to life the work for a non-technical audience.”    

  Couse, a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Humanities, researches visual representations of illness in the arts and medical sciences, looking at how Western understandings of death and dying confine people to narrow definitions of illness and health.

  “All bodies of all abilities are in constant states of degeneration and regeneration,” she says.

  Couse’s video opens by asking, “What does it mean to be sick?”, pointing out that illness can be marginalizing for people when the “sick” body is grounded in categories of malfunction and morality. “We come to think of the sick person as bad or heroic,” she says.

  “My research shows how visual representations of the sick body are produced by and co-produce our understanding of bodies and illness,” Couse says. “It’s a problem that causes real harm for sick people that can produce tension between self and body.”

  Bailey, a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Applied Health Sciences, also focuses on body image in her research in a program to transform people’s negative body perceptions. In Western societies, she says, most people are dissatisfied with their bodies.

  In her video, Bailey begins by introducing a character named ‘Rose’ who, heavily influenced by societal pressures, thinks she’s fat, ugly and hates her body. Viewers follow along as the woman learns about B.I.A.S., or Body Image Awareness Seminars, a SSHRC-funded positive body image program where researchers and participants work together to bring about body acceptance, appreciation and respect.

  “We don’t have to buy into societal pressures to change our bodies and conform to these ideas of what our bodies should be like; everybody can have a positive body image instead of living in this negative state,” says Bailey.

  She and Couse both praised The Storytellers contest for providing a platform to publicize their research.

  “It’s incredibly important for me to be able to reach many people about our B.I.A.S. program that promotes a positive body image movement,” says Bailey. “This (contest) is the perfect platform for that.”

  “My research has a lot to do with relational knowledge,” says Couse. “It’s important to get that research out there so people can interact with it and contribute to it.”

  For more information or for assistance arranging interviews:

  * Maryanne Firth, Writer/Editor, Brock University maryanne.firth@brocku.ca, 905-688- 5550 x4420 or 289-241-8288

  Brock University Marketing and Communications has a full-service studio where we can provide high definition video and broadcast-quality audio.

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  Categories: Media releases