Drs. Shannon Leddy and Johanna Sam appointed co-editors of the Canadian Journal of Native Education

By Ayla Collins

June 20, 2022

Newly appointed managing editors Dr. Shannon Leddy (Métis Nation) and Dr. Johanna Sam (Tsilhqot’in Nation) are pleased to announce the return of the Canadian Journal of Native Education (CJNE) as an Open Access online journal. Fully digitized back issues from Volume 18.1 to Volume 41.1 (1991 to 2019) may be found here.

To celebrate this milestone achievement, the editors will be releasing a final hard copy of the journal, built around the theme “Calling on Knowledge Keepers: The Gifts of the Past, Present, and Future.” Please visit the journal website to view the Call For Papers Announcement, and to peruse previous editions of this important platform for Indigenous education in Canada and around the world.

Learn more about Dr. Sam’s and Dr. Leddy’s work.

Congratulations to the Faculty of Education’s SSHRC Grant recipients

By Ayla Collins

June 16, 2022

The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) has announced the latest Insight Grant, Partnership Grants, and Partnership Development Grants recipients. Congratulations to all successful applicants in the Faculty of Education. The UBC Faculty of Education acknowledges with gratitude the many communities, collaborators and partner organizations who work alongside our scholars on these grants. View the complete list of partners and collaborators on Insight Grants, Partnership Grants and Partnership Development Grants.

SSHRC Insight Grants

Insight Grants support research excellence in the social sciences and humanities. Funding is available for research initiatives of two to five years.

Insight Grant Applicants

Dr. Lesley Andres
COVID-19 and the Work/Family Interface: Gender, Education, Labour Market Inequalities, Household Dynamics, and Individual Wellbeing from a Life Course Perspective

Dr. Catherine Broom
Challenging Canadian Citizenship and Identity: Re-Imagining a New Narrative of Belonging

Dr. Jillianne Code
Agency and Learning in Immersive and Virtual Environments (ALIVE)

Dr. Cynthia Nicol
Mathematics Education for STEM as Place

Dr. Leyton Schnellert
Developing Relational Accountability and Decolonizing Possibilities through Education Change Networks

Dr. Fei Wang
Is Culturally Responsive Leadership Culturally Responsive? A Critical Comparative Study between Canada and China

Insight Grant Co-applicant

Dr. Guofang Li
Reading pedagogies of equity: Networked literacy pedagogues as resources for academic reading praxes in teacher education

Insight Grant Collaborator

Dr. Marianne McTavish
Reading Pedagogies of Equity: Networked Literacy Pedagogues as Resources for Academic Reading Praxes in Teacher Education

Partnership Grants

Partnership Grant proposals are exclusively for partnered research training initiatives, and provide support for new and existing formal partnerships to advance research, research training and knowledge mobilization.

Partnership Grant Co-director

Dr. Andrea Webb
Visual Storytelling and Graphic Art in Genocide and Human Rights Education

Partnership Grant Co-applicants

Dr. Lindsay Gibson
Past Wrongs, Future Choices

Dr. Shannon Leddy
Visual Storytelling and Graphic Art in Genocide and Human Rights Education

Partnership Grant Collaborator

Dr. Cash Ahenakew, Dr. George Belliveau, Dr. Vanessa Andreotti
Visual Storytelling and Graphic Art in Genocide and Human Rights Education

Partnership Development Grants

These grants provide support to develop research or related activities, and design and test new partnership approaches for research or related activities that can result in best practices or models.

Partnership Development Grant Applicant

Dr. Rita Irwin
Learning with the Land

Partnership Development Grant Co-applicants

Dr. Mary Bryson
An examination of the impacts of tuition waiver programs on access to postsecondary education among former youth in care

Dr. Jan Hare
International Indigenous Consortium of Teacher Educators: Indigenous Resurgence and Digital Technologies in Teacher Education

Dr. Shannon Leddy
Learning with the Land

Partnership Development Grant Collaborator

Dr. Surita Janghiani
Canadian Consortium of Science Equity Scholars

Community Update | June 2022

By Ayla Collins

June 2022 | published once each term

Message from Dr. Jan Hare, Dean pro tem

Aanii – Greetings!

As the university’s academic year and the public education system’s school year draw to a close, I would like to take a moment to consider where we are at and where we are going as a leading Faculty of Education. I recognize that all of us have been impacted by COVID-19, even as we worked tirelessly this year to create community among our friends, family, colleagues, and students, as well as safe conditions for teaching, learning, and research. Our vision for what lies ahead for our education community has been tempered by injustices at local and global levels. It is understandable that we might feel weary at this moment in time. So, I encourage you to take inspiration, as I have, from the compassion, care, and creativity demonstrated by faculty, staff, students, alumni, and donors over this last year. I also hope you take time in the coming months to rejuvenate your hearts, minds, bodies, and spirits. As we go forward, I share with you some of the initiatives, innovations, and priority areas that are guiding our work.

As a Faculty and scholarly community, we have devoted a lot of attention to the ways in which we can create conditions for transformative teaching, innovative learning, and leading-edge research grounded in principles of equity, diversity and inclusion. As part of my mandate as Dean pro tem, I want to ensure that our Black, Indigenized and racialized scholars, students and staff are lifted up, that their work is well resourced and given visibility, and that they are positioned well to become leaders in our communities. Learn more about the ways we are advancing these goals through our equity initiatives.

Several members of our Faculty of Education community recently achieved recognitions that I would like to share with you. I am delighted to announce that Indigenous teacher candidate Selina Boan, who is a member of the Waterhen Lake First Nation and Flying Dust First Nation, received the 2022 Pat Lowther Memorial Award for her debut poetry collection, Undoing Hours. The announcement was made at the 2022 League of Canadian Poets Book Awards. Selina is a Year Four secondary teacher-candidate in our Indigenous Teacher Education Program (NITEP), and is currently completing her practicum in the Vancouver School District. More.

I extend my gratitude to Dr. Handel Kashope Wright, who is providing guidance to the Faculty of Education on concrete pathways to achieving the goals of Scarborough Charter. He was invited to serve as a member of the national Inter-institutional Steering Committee on Inclusive Higher Education of the Scarborough Charter on Anti-Black Racism and Black Inclusion in Canadian Higher Education: Principles, Actions and Accountability. Dr. Wright is a professor in the Faculty of Education and serves as Senior Advisor to the President on Anti-Racism and Inclusive Excellence. More.

The Government of France recognized Dr. Monique Bournot-Trites and two UBC colleagues for their services to French language and culture through the insignia of Knight in the Order of Academic Palms, one of the oldest civil honours bestowed by the French Republic. More.

Dr. Annette Henry was recognized in the 2022 publication of 100 Accomplished Black Canadian Women, which highlights, documents, acknowledges and supports the accomplishments of Black Canadian women in recognition of their social, educational, political and professional successes. More.

The School of Kinesiology in the Faculty of Education, together with the UBC-O School of Health and Exercise Sciences, was ranked first in North America and third globally, according to the 2022 QS World University Rankings by Subject. More.

Wishing you a safe, restful, and productive summer!

Miigwech – thank you,

Jan

Transformative Educational Leadership Journal: Spring 2022 Edition
The Transformative Educational Leadership (TEL) Journal is published twice a year and features articles from graduates of the Transformative Education Leadership Program (TELP). TELP, a cohort-based program focusing on system transformation, is aimed at K-12 system professionals who want to expand their worldview, gain new experiences and raise their academic credentials to new levels.

Read the latest edition of the TEL Journal.

This month, the Faculty of Education welcomes Dr. Kenneth Miller, who will serve as the inaugural Edith Lando Professor in Counselling for Refugee and Immigrant Youth and Families. Dr. Miller has published extensively on the mental health effects of armed conflict and displacement, and works to effect change in cooperation with non-government organizations operating in war-affected countries. More.

Dr. Christopher Martin, an associate professor in the Okanagan School of Education, recently published The Right to Higher Education: A Political Theory, which sets out a novel account of the point and purpose of higher education. The Faculty of Education’s podcast collection includes an episode dated January 25, 2022 and featuring Dr. Martin discussing the debate around higher education in public settings and in policy.

The Faculty of Education is pleased to announce that Dr. Margaret Macintyre Latta was named UBC Okanagan’s 2022 Researcher of the Year, Social Sciences and Humanities. As a champion of interdisciplinary and community-based research, Dr. Macintyre Latta’s focus is advancing curriculum as a shared learning experience that inspires reconciliation. Her research with Indigenous, school district and community partners helps educators to decolonize curriculum and teaching practices. More.

Education Summer Institutes Focusing on EDID
This summer, we invite you to join one or all of four professional institutes focusing on Equality, Diversity, Inclusion, and Decolonization (EDID). Our Sustainability in the Classroom institute will provide K-12 educators with the foundational knowledge and understanding of global goals and climate justice as well as an appreciation of the diversity of perspectives on sustainability. More.

Dean’s Community & Alumni Engagement Series: Candid Conversations: Delving into Priorities Facing Educators Today
In case you missed it, our online speaker series brought together researchers, practitioners, educators and current secondary school students to discuss important questions and significant priorities facing educators today. Discussions focused on reconciliation and decolonization in classrooms, climate change in education, supporting youth mental health, and race and inequality in school systems. Recordings of all sessions are available.

Dean’s Distinguished Lecture
In March, the Faculty of Education hosted scholars and activists Naomi Klein and Avi Lewis speaking on the topic of climate justice and educational responsibility. A recording of the event is now available for viewing. The Faculty of Education is working to extend its commitments to sustainability and climate justice, so look for more information on our engagement in this significant area in the future.

Congratulations to Dr. Patricia Vertinsky, Recipient of the Roberta J. Park Award for Scholarly Distinction

By Ayla Collins

June 14, 2022

The Faculty of Education extends congratulations to Distinguished University Scholar and Professor Dr. Patricia Vertinsky, recipient of the Roberta J. Park Award for Scholarly Distinction awarded by the North American Society for Sport History (NASSH). Dr. Vertinsky is recognized for her exceptional research contributions enhancing the understanding and appreciation of sport from a historical perspective. She is an historian of physical culture exploring the world of ﬁtness, sport, physical activity and physical education across the last two centuries, in a transnational context.

Learn more about Dr. Vertinsky’s work.

Congratulations to Dr. Harper Keenan, recipient of a 2022 National Academy of Education/Spencer Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship

By Ayla Collins

June 14, 2022

Congratulations to Dr. Harper Keenan, who has been awarded a 2022 National Academy of Education/Spencer Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship. The fellowship grants support early career scholars to make significant scholarly and research contributions to the field of education. The program also develops the careers of its recipients through professional development activities involving National Academy of Education members.

Dr. Keenan’s fellowship is in support of his project titled Unmanageable Subjects: Trans Childhood and the Challenge of Self-Determination at School. This research project examines the challenges facing trans youth and, in particular, the persistent role of schooling in regulating gender, and in managing childhood more broadly. Gender self-determination has been the unifying demand of transgender social movements in the United States since they began to coalesce more than 50 years ago. Dr. Keenan argues that trans people are positioned as unmanageable subjects within the context of K-12 schools. This phrase has an intentional double meaning, referencing 1) the treatment of transgender existence as a taboo topic, and 2) the challenges trans children pose to the administrative and social regulation of gender. How might educators embrace unmanageability? What might it look like to practice education that resists rigidly scripting the world, including who children can be and become within it? Drawing on two years of multi-site qualitative data from five elementary school classrooms and one after school program in a large urban school district in Northern California, this study examines the struggle for gender self-determination in primary education through more than 50 interviews and 5 focus groups with teachers, 20 play-based focus groups with children, and over 500 hours of participant observation.

Dr. Keenan is the Robert Quartermain Professor of Gender and Sexuality Research in Education, a Distinguished University Scholar in Education and Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Education. Learn more about his work.

Nuances of Blackness in the Canadian Academy edited by Drs. Awad Ibrahim, Tamari Kitossa, Malinda Smith and Handel Kashope Wright

By Ayla Collins

June 13, 2022

Nuances of Blackness in the Canadian Academy is a new book edited by Drs. Awad Ibrahim, Tamari Kitossa, Malinda Smith and Handel Kashope Wright, released in February 2022. It contains essays which focus on Black life in academia and offer new historical, social and cultural insights into what it means to be a Black academic.

Contributors to the book shift from margin to centre of the story, and explore two themes: expanding the construction of Blackness to allow for nuance and depth in experience of what it means to be Black in the academy; and challenging the dominant idea of Blackness in the white colonial imagination, particularly anti-Black tropes and the dehumanization of Blackness.

Nuances of Blackness in the Canadian Academy is essential reading for all those in academia seeking to understand the experience of Blackness in the academy, and is available through the University of Toronto Press.

Last Minute Attendees

By virginia tung

Congratulations to all graduates

By Ayla Collins

Graduation reception, Robert H. Lee Alumni Centre

Sincere congratulations to all Faculty of Education graduates! We salute you for your scholarship and commitment to education throughout your time with us. On May 26, 2022, the following Faculty of Education graduates crossed the stage:

PhD, EdD, MA, MPPGA, MEd, MET, MMEd, BA, BEd (Elementary Program), BEd (Middle Years), BEd (Secondary Program), and Diploma in Education

The following School of Kinesiology graduates also crossed the stage:

PhD, MA, MHPCTL, MHK, MKin, MSc, BHK, BKin

The ceremony recognized the Faculty of Education’s Killam Teaching Prize recipient, Dr. Robert VanWynsberghe. Dr. Jillianne Code was the second Education Killam Teaching Prize Recipient. Learn more about Dr. Code and Dr. VanWynsberghe’s achievements in teaching.

For more photos, visit our 2022 Spring Graduation Reception Flickr album.

Pride Wall Submission Form

By Ayla Collins

To recognize and support Vancouver’s Pride Festival, the Faculty of Education is creating a webpage dedicated to sharing 2SLGBTQIA+ stories and resources. Submit a quote, story, scholarly work or resource to this form by Thursday, June 30, 2022 to be considered for inclusion.

Six Questions with Dr. Thomas Schanding

By Ayla Collins

May 24, 2022

Six Questions with Dr. Thomas Schanding

Dr. Thomas Schanding is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Education and Area Coordinator for the School and Applied Child Psychology (SACP) Program, which prepares graduate students to become practicing psychologists. Dr. Schanding’s research program focuses on the social-emotional, mental and behavioural health of students, as well as the social experiences and school functioning of 2SLGBTQIA+ youth.

What was the inspiration for your program of research and what is the focus?

Much of my research focuses on universal screening of school age students. Initially, I was drawn to academic screening, but I have now become much more involved in behavioural and mental health screenings. When I was a practicing school psychologist, my main role was working with youth with significant behavioural and mental health challenges. Ultimately, I realized that Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) was the most effective way in which we could build upon the resilience and positive assets of youth. Now, my focus is on how we can screen youth for SEL and mental health issues to ensure we provide excellent interventions that create a foundation for strong academic learning, and healthy social and emotional development.

What kind of impact on knowledge or on society would you like your work to have?

Ultimately, I want families and schools to have the proper tools to know how a child is doing, and what can be done if they notice any problems. Preventing or mitigating behavioural and mental health difficulties and ensuring proper education and treatment should be available to all children, and a part of a robust public education system. My hope is that we can build a strong screening system of behavioural and mental health for children in schools that would link easily to medical and mental health programs external to schools.

Whose work has been particularly important in your career to date, and why?

Many people have influenced how my program has evolved, including the Dual-Factor model of mental health proposed by Drs. Peter Greenspoon and Donald Saklofske (2001), then further expanded up by Drs. Shannon Suldo and Emily Shaffer (2008). This model seeks to not only identify the risks for psychopathology, but also to consider the subjective well-being of youth and what strengths they have—something we lose if we only focus on a deficit. I also admire and follow the work of Drs. Erin Dowdy, Katie Ecklund, Stephen Kilgus and Tyler Renshaw in conceptualizing and addressing behavioural and mental health and wellness in schools. I think these researchers help push us to consider how we best identify and serve our children and families.

What advice would you give to graduate students doing research in this area?

There’s still a lot to learn about how we can quickly and effectively screen children and identify which services are best suited to meet their needs. Additionally, there is a large amount of work required to understand how to do this in a culturally responsive manner.

What would you like your next big research project to be about?

There are many screeners out there that measure different facets—mental health, social and emotional learning skills, adverse childhood events and more. I would like to do a head-to-head comparison of various screeners in seeing what type of screener best predicts certain outcomes for youth.

If you could have a super power, what would it be?

Since I was young, I have always wished I could fly like Superman.

This interview has been edited for clarity.