Dean's Office Report

Launch of New FAHS Blog

A new FAHS Blog has been launched that provides faculty, staff, students, and alumni with an opportunity to write about current and relevant topics. Individuals can also comment and respond to the blog postings to provide their own individual insight.

New Research Excellence Award to Recognize High-Quality Research in Applied Health Sciences

A new research award has been established by the Associate Dean, Research and Graduate Studies in the Faculty of Applied Health Sciences. This award will recognize and reward faculty research excellence. The application deadline is quickly approaching, please forward your nominations to Nota Klentrou by November 30, 2014. 

Click here for additional details. 

New International Memorandum of Understanding (MOU)

A new MOU with the Guatemalan Olympic Committee was recently signed by both parties. The agreement is to designed to encourage research collaborations and student/athlete exchanges between Brock and Guatemala. Interim Dean Mandigo will be participating in the official signing ceremony in Guatemala City scheduled for December 3.

In addition, two new MOUs for our Faculty with Tsukuba University (Japan)  and the National Taiwan University of Sport are also close to being approved.

Brock Niagara Centre for Health and Well-Being (BNCHWB)

The official opening for the BNCHWB was held on Wednesday, October 22 at the Brock Research and Innovation Centre. Various dignitaries such as Brian McMullan (Mayor of St. Catharines), Jim Bradley (MPP St. Catharines), John Suk (Chair of the Board of Trustees), Susan Sydor (Chair of Senate), Jack Lightstone (President and Vice-Chancellor) and members from Brock’s Senior Administration joined faculty, staff, students and clients for the Grand Opening. Cogeco TV also did a great profile on the Centre.  Thank you to all those involved in making the BNCHWB’s grand opening such a big success!

Read the full story:

http://www.brocku.ca/brock-news/?p=30423

Fall Preview

This year’s fall preview was another great success for FAHS. Close to 4000 prospective students and parents visited the campus. Our Faculty's information sessions in David S. Howes Theater were extremely well attended. Faculty, staff and students fielded a steady stream of questions from interested students and parents for more than four hours in the Ian D. Beddis Gym. A special thanks to Lucie Thibault for organizing the event and for all of the staff support from Mike Armstrong, Jon Therrien and each of the academic advisors (Katrina Bennie, Stephanie Brooks, Michael Fawkes, Maryann Polce-Gordon, and Sandra Micsinszki) in preparing for the event. As well, a special thanks to all other faculty, staff, and students who spent a beautiful fall day talking to prospective students.

Welcome to Elyse Lappano

A special welcome to our newest staff member, Elyse Lappano, who is the Faculty’s new Experiential Learning Coordinator, Inclusive & Adaptive Physical Activity. Thanks to a generous donation from Niagara Recycling, Elyse will be coordinating inclusive and adapted physical activity programs within our Faculty such as SNAP, Autisim Camp, and Brock Niagara Penguins. In addition, Elyse will be providing support to the Therapeutic Recreation stream in RECL to support internships and placements for students in that program. Elyse is a graduate of the BPhEd and MA (Health and PE) programs in our Faculty.

Convocation

Thanks to everyone for attending the fall convocation where we saw the confirmation of 1 doctoral, 14 MA, 16 MSc, and 128 undergraduate students. Also, a special congratulations to Dr. Tony Bogaert from the Department of Health Sciences as this year’s recipient of Brock’s Distinguished Award for Research and Creative Activity. In addition, Ms. Leslie Nash (MSc Health Sciences) was presented with the Graduate Student Spirit of Brock Medal by the Chair of Brock University’s Board of Trustees, John Suk.

NSSE Results

The 2014 results from the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) were recently published and our Faculty is featured prominently in the report. A few highlights:

• 56% of first year students (Ontario = 51%) and 82% of 4^th yr students (Ontario = 73%) in FAHS reported participating in Service learning
• By 4^th yr, 91% of our students reported participating in at least one High Impact Practice (e.g., participation in learning community, service learning, research with faculty, internship or field experience, study abroad, culminating experience)
• Significantly more 4^th yr students in our Faculty at Brock reported that they would go to the same institution that they are currently attending compared to the Ontario average of students in health profession programs

You can access the full report for our Faculty at: http://www.brocku.ca/webfm_send/33609 or the Institutional Analysis Website: http://www.brocku.ca/institutional-analysis/external-surveys/nsse

Senate Update

The agenda and corresponding reports for the 624^th Senate Meeting on Wednesday, November 12^th are posted at: https://www.brocku.ca/webfm_send/33672

Future of Post-Secondary Education (PSE)

You may be interested in reading a new article by former U Windsor and Laurentian U President, Dr. Ross Paul, called “Winners and Losers in the Future of Canada’s Universities” http://forum.academica.ca/articles/2014/11/19/winners-and-losers-in-the-future-of-canadas-universities. Dr. Paul suggests that Universities that fall under one of the following four categories are better prepared to be successful moving forward:

1)     High-reputation, medical-doctoral institutions

2)     Small, residential teaching institutions

3)     Focussed institutions with a particular cachet (i.e., those that can differentiate themselves better than others in a certain area of focus)

4)     Others position for success (due mainly to geographic location)

It would appear to me that if Dr. Paul is correct, Brock’s opportunity would be to fit into the third category. But to do that, we must clearly differentiate ourselves. Again, from my perspective, our Faculty is primed to be one of Brock’s leaders in moving us forward. With higher than average research output, higher than average quality teaching, high demand programs, and our commitment to community engagement and experiential learning (all while remaining fiscally responsible), we can help Brock lead the way to be on the “winning” side of the future of PSE in Canada.