Media releases

• Dramatic Arts mainstage brings fantasy world to life in celebration of unique identities

  Monday, March 02, 2026 | By Brock University

  MEDIA RELEASE— March 2, 2026 — R0025

  Brock University’s Department of Dramatic Arts (DART) is set to whisk audiences away to a magical land of powerful beings and fantastical creatures.  

  From dragons and elves to wizards and sorceresses, Escape to ILKANOR: A Fantasy Play in Nine Chapters invites viewers to leave the real world behind and embark on a journey of the imagination. The mainstage production opens Friday, March 6 at the Marilyn I. Walker Theatre in downtown St. Catharines.

  Written and directed by DART Assistant Professor and playwright Mike Griffin, the play explores escapism and fantasy genre tropes through diverse characters and extraordinary creatures.

  “Our creative exploration of escapism began by asking why people want to escape through stories and where they want to escape to,” he says. 

  Featuring bold theatrical components that incorporate puppets, masks and physical theatre, the fantasy unfolds in nine chapters, each featuring a host of characters who travel to different areas in the magical land of Ilkanor.  

  Many of the characters reflect marginalized perspectives that are not often represented in leading roles, Griffin says. Through their magical transportation to Ilkanor, these characters are able to explore different parts of their identity.

  Among the play’s chapters, for instance, are tales of a neurodivergent individual who becomes a wizard in Ilkanor and a non-binary drag artist who becomes the leader of a kingdom.  

  Griffin says the play is not a typical hero’s journey. 

  “Instead, we are exploring representation in fantasy, touching on neurodiversity and disability, and wrestling with identity and self-care,” he says. 

  More than 40 DART students in all years of the program will bring Ilkanor to life, advancing their learning by collaborating with both emerging and established theatre makers.   

  “The show is truly magical, not only in the fantasy elements, but also in the collaborative work and care to build the world of Ilkanor,” fourth-year DART student and mainstage performer Nav Brar says. “I personally don’t know another show that has highlighted so many different people that don’t always get their time, in one production.” 

  Third-year DART student Julia Foley, an assistant designer for the play, says the crew embraced a sustainability mindset while creating the fictional world, with the production incorporating recycled materials in the set, costume and puppet designs. 

  Working with limited or thrifted materials meant having to explore and be open to new possibilities based on what is available, she says. 

  “The elements of transformation and rebirth are at the core of the show’s landscape, communicated not just through the set and costumes, but through the stories told by each character as they journey from the real world to Ilkanor, where they unlock their full potential,” Foley says. “We similarly saw the potential in our thrifted fabrics, books and garbage materials and transformed them into something beautiful and new.”  

  Escape to Ilkanor: A Fantasy Play in Nine Chapters opens Friday, March 6 at 7:30 p.m. at the Marilyn I. Walker Theatre in the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts in downtown St. Catharines. Performances will also take place Saturday, March 7 at 7:30 p.m., Sunday, March 8 at 2 p.m., Thursday March 12 at 11 a.m., Friday, March 13 at 7:30 p.m. and Saturday, March 14 at 7:30 p.m.  

  General admission tickets are $25 and tickets for students and seniors are $20. Visit Brock University Tickets to reserve seats. 

  
  For more information or for assistance arranging interviews:

  *Sarah Ackles, Communications Specialist, Brock University [email protected] or 289-241-5483

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  Categories: Media releases

• World Hearing Day: Equal access to early interventions key to supporting children globally, says Brock prof

  Friday, February 27, 2026 | By Brock University

  MEDIA RELEASE— February 27, 2026 — R0024 

  This World Hearing Day, Hillary Ganek and her students are teaming up with the Cochlear Implant International Community of Advocacy (CIICA) to support families of children with hearing loss in developing countries.

  Organized by the World Health Organization, the global advocacy campaign is this year focused on the need to improve hearing care for all children, which is also a research priority for the Brock University Assistant Professor of Applied Linguistics. 

  Ganek’s project with CIICA, a European non-profit organization, involves families from low- and middle-income countries around the world whose children have benefitted from cochlear implants. These permanent electronic devices digitize sounds and transmit them to the cochlear nerve to help treat hearing loss. 

  By collecting and sharing stories from families who have accessed cochlear implants for their child along with the support services that enable the surgery and ensuing therapy, Ganek and CIICA hope to identify areas that require additional advocacy in different countries. 

  “In the past 30 years, there have been significant developments in the way that we treat hearing loss in high-income countries,” says Ganek, a speech-language pathologist and certified auditory-verbal therapist. “We are able to identify children with hearing loss at birth, which means we can capitalize on the fact that infants are learning to listen and talk from the very moment that they are born, and even before, as they’re listening in the womb.” 

  Because the brain has evolved to learn language from birth, early diagnosis of hearing loss is critical to language acquisition and improved outcomes for children, she says.  

  “If we diagnose a child with hearing loss, we can get them fitted with hearing technology, whether that’s a hearing aid, cochlear implant or another device, by the time they’re six months old,” says Ganek. “Then we get them into speech therapy or sign language class so that they are learning to communicate when their brain is meant to be learning to communicate.”

  Research shows the results of this early treatment are dramatic, with many children acquiring age-appropriate language skills by the time they start school. 

  However, Ganek says with 80 per cent of people with hearing losses living in low-resource settings, children can miss out on treatment during this critical developmental window.  

  “Children in different health-care systems may have hearing loss because they have less access to vaccination programs and medications that fight infectious diseases. They are also more likely to have been given ototoxic prescription drugs, which can damage hearing as a side effect,” she says. 

  When those risk factors are compounded by limited access to hearing screenings, technologies to treat hearing loss and professional speech-language pathologists to provide interventions, the inequity becomes even greater. 

  “This work with CIICA is to draw attention to the few families who have been able to get their children this technology and find support,” says Ganek. “We can then look at what we need to do in the hearing-loss community to ensure that the path to treatment and support is less difficult and available to more families.”

  With the support of a student team, Ganek will prepare the families’ stories to share on the CIICA website along with a map showing where the families live. The families’ journeys will be available online Tuesday, March 3, when World Hearing Day is observed.

  Once the awareness elements are in place, the team will then analyze the personal narratives to identify common themes and experiences, which can inform the development of a policy paper to help guide CIICA and other advocates. 

  For more information or for assistance arranging interviews:

  *Sarah Ackles, Communications Specialist, Brock University [email protected] or 289-241-5483

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  Categories: Media releases