People, successes, awards

November 2010
  • Jing Chen who is the recipient of the Professional Achievement Award from the Chinese Professionals Association of Canada.  Professor Chen received his award on Saturday evening from The Honourable Dr. Eric Hoskins, Ontario Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.
September 2010
  • John Miron has agreed to be the editor of the Canadian Journal of Regional Science / Revue canadienne des sciences regionales for the next five years (effective 1 Sept 2010).
  • Geography doctoral candidate Jean-Francois Bissonette has been awarded the William E. Taylor Fellowship for 2010.  This award is given each year to the most outstanding SSHRC doctoral award recipient.
May 2010
  • Tammara Soma won the OPPI Dr. Wayne Caldwell 2010 Scholarship! It recognizes a student member of the Ontario Professional Planners Institute who is making an important contribution in the field of planning for food in the form of planning research and/or community engagement. Tammara's Current Issues Paper was titled "The missing link? The role of a food systems planner"
  • The following students for winning Dr. David Chu Scholarships in Asia Pacific Studies:
     
    Genevieve Depelteau
    Jesse Ajayi
    Mia Baumeister
    Valerie Bryson
    Ian Clark
    Sheila Htoo

    Dean Bond was awarded a 10 month fellowship from The Institute of European History (IEG) awards for his doctoral field research and Natasha Barykina was awarded a SSHRC and a DAAD

    Sanjukta Mukherjee has accepted a tenure stream position as an Assistant Professor at DePaul University's Women and Gender Studies Program. She will be teaching feminist political economy, transnational feminism, social movements and critical development studies. WGS has recently started a graduate program and Sanjukta will be establishing linkages between that program and DePaul's Geography Department
     
    Professor Bill Gough is the recipient of the Canadian Association of Geographers' Award For Excellence In Teaching Geography.  The award is given to an individual who has distinguished herself or himself in courses with small and large enrolments, at different levels of instruction, over several years of teaching in the nominating institution.
     
    Andrey Petrov, Ph.D., received the Starkey-Robinson Award from the Canadian Association of Geographers.  This award gives recognition to high quality research at the Master's or Doctoral level that furthers understanding of the geography of Canada.
     
    Post-doctoral fellow Gillad Rosen who has accepted a Lecturer position in the Department of Geography at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.  Gillad starts on July 1st and says that he is frantically trying to pack for his move while also wrapping up two research projects.  Good luck in your new position Gillad! 
April 2010
  • Congratulations to SSHRC and NSERC award winners!

    S    SHRC Standard Research Grants (3 years)

    Sarah Wakefield, "Understanding scale and networks in social mobilization: a case study of the community food security movement in Canada", $105,980 (developed with the assistance of Charles Levkoe)

    Jason Hackworth, "Geographies of faith, neoliberalism, and welfare provision", $110,149

    Matti Siemiatycki, "Implications of public-private partnerships: Canada within a global perspective", $115,375

    Deborah Leslie and Katharine Rankin also received SSHRC grants.

    NSERC Discovery Grant (5 years)

    Jing Chen, "Remote sensing of vegetation structural and physiological parameters for carbon cycle research," $325,000.
  • Scott Prudham is one of two recipients of the Ashby Prize from the journal 'Environment and Planning A' for his 2009 paper ‘Pimping climate change:  Richard Branson, global warming, and the performance of green capitalism’.  The prize is awarded for the year's most innovative paper published in the journal.
  • Varun Gupta was awarded a NSERC Canada Graduate Scholarship (Masters), and Carolyn Winsborough was awarded a NSERC Postgraduate Scholarship (Doctoral).
  • At its meeting on April 21 the Academic Board approved the appointment of the 2009-10 President's Teaching Award Recipients.  They are as follows:

    o    Professor Robert Brym,     Department of Sociology, Faculty of Arts & Science

    o    Professor Steve Joordens, Department of Psychology, University of Toronto Scarborough

    o    Senior Lecturer Barbara Murck,  Department of Geography, University of Toronto Mississauga

    o    Professor Paul Stevens, Department of English, Faculty of Arts & Science

    o    Professor Mike Wiley, Division of Anatomy, Department of Surgery, Faculty of Medicine

    The President's Teaching Award recognizes sustained excellence in teaching, research on teaching, and the integration of teaching and research. Recipients of a President's Teaching Award are designated as a member of the Teaching Academy for a five-year period and receive an annual professional development allowance of $10,000 for five years. 
  • Congratulations to Jesse Ajayi who has received a David Chu Schoarship in Asia Pacific Studies for the amount of $5,000. 
  • Michael Bunce received the AAG’s Rural Geography Specialty Group’s Lifetime Achievement Award for Excellence in Rural and Agricultural Geography at the annual meeting in Washington.  This award was established to recognize individuals whose accomplishments have distinguished them at a level above and beyond their peers. The award recognizes Professor Bunce’s outstanding contribution to knowledge on rural and countryside issues through teaching, mentoring, research and publication.
  • Kate Geddie's AAG paper was chosen as the winner of the 2010 graduate student paper competition by the AAG’s Economic Geography Specialty Group.
March 2010
  • Bruce Huang is this year's recipient of the Dean's Outstanding Technical Service Award from the Faculty of Arts & Science.  There was overwhelming support for Bruce's nomination in the department, with 75 people signing the nomination form, including undergraduate students, graduate students, faculty and staff. Thank you all for signing and putting Bruce's name forward  for this well-deserved award.  And thank you Bruce for the high level of professionalism that you bring to the job, your exemplary work, your patience in responding to our many requests, and the excellent advice and assistance that you provide to all of us on a daily basis.

  • The following members of the department are moving on to post-doctoral fellowships:

    Kate Geddie will be based at The MOVE Network (Swiss Network for Mobility Studies) at the University of Lausanne and funded by the Swiss University Conference.  She will be researching issues related to "transnational education" from April 2010 - September 2011.

    Dieter Kogler has accepted a post-doc at the Martin Prosperity Institute from February 2010 to August 2011.  He will be working on several projects with Richard Florida and Kevin Stolarick, including structural equation models that account for growth patterns among German regions over the past decade, and 'mega-regions', which is a project that explores the emergence of the region as the world moves beyond the nation-state, with the goal to develop global indicators at the sub-national level for the entire world.  He also plans to extend his doctoral research on 'The Geography of Knowledge Formation: Spatial and Sectoral Aspects of Technological Change in the Canadian Economy as indicated by Patent Citation Analysis, 1983-2007'.  Finally, he is in the process of submitting the manuscript of a book that he is editing with Harald Bathelt and Maryann Feldman, which should be published later this year by Routledge in their Regions and Cities series. The edited volume is titled: 'Beyond Territory: Dynamic Geographies of Knowledge Creation, Diffusion, and Innovation'

    Kate Parizeau has received a two-year SSHRC post-doctoral fellowship at the Department of Geography, University of British Columbia.  She will be working with Juanita Sandberg and studying "Gendered experiences of urban informality among recyclers in Buenos Aires, Argentina”.

  • Marcie Snyder (Phd Student in the Collaborative Program of Geography and Aboriginal Health) has been awarded a Fellowship from the Manitoba Network Environment for Aboriginal Health Research (NEAHR) to support her research on the role of mobility in shaping Aboriginal health. In addition to providing financial support, the NEAHR program helps students to link with other graduate students in the province and across Canada who are engaged in Aboriginal health research. 
  • Nehal El-Hadi has been selected as the student representative to the ACSP (Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning) Governing Board for the term Spring 2010 through Spring 2012.  This is the first time that a student from the University of Toronto has been ACSP's student representative, representing students in all ASCP planning schools in North America. 
February 2010
  • Carol Lue, MScPl student, has been awarded a research internship by the Canadian Institute of Planners as part of its "Mainstreaming Climate Change: Tools for the Practicing Planning Community" program, funded by NRCan. For her internship, Carol will prepare a case study on strengthening and developing processes for effectively engaging the business sector in climate change adaptation planning in the City of Toronto.
  • Carolyn Hatch is the recipient of this year's AAG Economic Geography Specialty Group graduate student research award for her work on the Canadian contract furniture manufacturing sector. The award includes a $750 contribution towards her research expenses.
January 2010
  • Shiri Pasternak has been awarded a Faculty of Arts and Science Study Elsewhere Scholarship of LCTLS (Less Commonly Taught Languages) for the study of Algonquin with two elders in the Rapid Lake Reserve in Spring 2010.
November 2009
  • Edward Relph's classic text Place and Placelessness has been reprinted with a substantial new introduction setting his original text in its contemporary context. First published over thirty years ago and still widely referenced, Relph’s Place and Placelessness has become a classic of the phenomenological approach to the study of place and has influenced a generation of scholars. 
August 2009
  • Auvniet Tehara, a graduate of our planning program, has just won the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning (ACSP) Marsha Ritzdorf Award for Work on Diversity, Social Justice and the Role of Women in Planning. The award recognizes superior scholarship reflecting concern with making communities better for women, people of color and/or the disadvantaged. Auvniet’s paper is entitled ‘Approaches to People of Color and Food Bank Use in the City of Toronto, Peel Region and York Region’. Minelle Mahtani was Auvniet’s supervisor for the project, and Philippa Campsie, coordinator of the current issues paper course, recommended her for the award.
June 2009
  • PROFESSOR SARAH FINKELSTEIN AWARDED CONNAUGHT GRANT — Congratulations to Sarah Finkelstein, who has been awarded a Connaught New Staff Matching Grant of $20,000 in support of her project entitled "Paleoclimate records from lake sediments in the Canadian high arctic". This was a highly competitive year for the Connaught, with only 27 awards being made to 104 applicants.
May 2009
  • PROGRAM IN PLANNING PHD STUDENT AWARDED TRUDEAU SCHOLARSHIP — Martin August has been awarded a 2009 Trudeau Scholar by the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation. Her doctoral work focuses on the socially mixed approach to public housing redevelopment that has become popular in western developed nations in the past two decades and that has recently been taken up in Canada, including the redevelopment of Regent Park in Toronto.
  • GEOGRAPHY PHD STUDENT WINS DON GRAY MEDAL — Congratulations to Geography PhD student Claire Oswald on winning the Canadian Geophysical Union’s Don Gray Medal. This is the highest student award in the Hydrology Section, and was made in recognition of her short paper and oral presentation at this year’s Joint Assembly with the American Geophysical Union in Toronto. She will receive an engraved medal and a $1,000 prize for her efforts.
  • VISITING PROFESSOR APPOINTMENT AT HARVARD UNIVERSITY — Professor Jim Dunn has been named William Lyon Mackenzie King Visiting Professor in Canadian Studies at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard University. He will be based in the Harvard School of Public Health and the Center for Population and Development Studies.
  • GEOGRAPHY PHD STUDENT WINS CIHR AWARD — Evan Castel has been awarded a Frederick Banting and Charles Best Canada Graduate Scholarship Doctoral Award from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. A PhD student in Geography, Evan is supervised by Professor Jim Dunn. The award begins in September 2009 and will run for 3 years.
  • MA STUDENT WINS VANIER SCHOLARSHIP — MA student James Nugent has been awarded a Vanier Scholarship. Currently supervised by Ken MacDonald, James’s research proposal is “Changing the climate: neoliberalism, global warming and Canadian labour-environmental alliance-building,” and his PhD supervisor will be Scott Prudham. This is the inaugural year for award of these highly prestigious scholarships, where leading doctoral students from Canada and abroad are awarded $50,000 annually for up to three years. [More at the Vanier Canada Scholarships website]
April 2009
  • PLANNING STUDENTS IN THE NEWS — Matt Armstrong, Edward Birnbaum and Monica Castro feature in an article in the Hamilton Spectator about their Urban Design Project (for PLA 1653, Advanced Urban Design Studio). The project is on the proposed high speed rail and its effect on Hamilton in relation to the decline of the steel industry.
January 2009
  • PROFESSOR MATT FARISH, RECEIVES THE AMERICAN GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY MCCOLL FAMILY FELLOWSHIP — Congratulations to Professor Matt Farish on his award, which he will use for travel to the Canadian Arctic to document the experiences of local people who were affected in various ways by the construction and operation of the DEW (Defense Early Warning) Line. [More at the American Geographical Society website.]
December 2008
November 2008
  • FACULTY OF ARTS AND SCIENCE DEAN'S STUDENT INITIATIVE AWARD  —  MA student Katie Palmer and PhD student Sally Turner have won an award from the Dean’s Student Initiative Fund, for the establishment of the journal Hidden Geographies: Undergraduates Writing to Transgress.
October 2008
  • PROFESSOR JOSEPH DESLOGES INSTALLED AS PRINCIPAL OF WOODSWORTH COLLEGE  —  The former Chair of the Department of Geography & Program in Planning was formally installed as the seventh principal of Woodsworth College October 15th at a ceremony in the Great Hall of Hart House.
  • PROFESSOR MATTI SIEMIATYCKI WINS INSTITUTE FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH COMPETITION  —  The aim of the Britain's Got Brains competition was to find the best policy idea from an early career academic. Matti fought off tough competition to identify the most pressing problem facing Britain today – his policy proposal is to introduce performance benchmarking to reduce the frequency of cost overruns on large public infrastructure projects.[More...]
August 2008
  • IN MEMORIAM: PROFESSOR EMERITUS DONALD P. KERR  —  Former Chair of the Department of Geography at the University of Toronto and former President of the Canadian Association of Geographers, passed away on the evening of Monday, 11 August 2008, at the age of 88.
June 2008
  • DISTINGUISHED PARTICIPANT DIPLOMA WINNERS  —  MSc student Tracie Greenberg and Professor Harvey Shear have received the Distinguished Participant Diploma as part of the 2008 Hromadka Award at the International Water Pollution Conference in Alicante, Spain. The award, for their paper Preliminary Analysis of Water Pollution in a Small Lake in Western Mexico, was made in "recognition of an outstanding scientific contribution."
  • PHD CANDIDATE WINS KARI POLYANI LEVITT PRIZE  —  PhD candidate Jim Delaney has been awarded the Kari Polyani Levitt Prize by the Canadian Association for the Study International Development for best graduate student essay. Jim's work will be published in the Canadian Journal of Development Studies.
May 2008
  • PROFESSOR BRIAN BRANFIREUN RECEIVES YOUNG CANADIAN GEOPHYSICAL UNION SCIENTIST AWARD  —  The CGU Young Scientist Award, inaugurated in 2005, recognizes outstanding research contributions by a young scientist who is a member of the CGU.
  • GEOGRAPHY GRADUATE STUDENT CHOSEN AS TRUDEAU SCHOLAR  —  Lisa Freeman, geography graduate student, has been chosen as a Trudeau Scholar by the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation. Lisa, whose work focuses on social housing, will receive $150,000 to advance her research, as well as a $50,000 bursary to subsidize tuition, living expenses and scholarly travel.
  • FACULTY HONOURED IN "CELEBRATING ACADEMIC EXCELLENCE" CEREMONY  —  Minelle Mahtani and Andre Sorensen were honoured at University of Toronto Scarborough on 29 May in the "Celebrating Academic Excellence" ceremony that recognizes faculty who have received provincial, national and international awards over the last year. Minelle was honoured for being named as a Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society and Andre for being named a Fellow at the University of Tokyo's Faculty of Engineering.
April 2008
  • PHD CANDIDATE WINS FULBRIGHT STUDENT AWARD  —  Paul Jackson has been awarded a prestigious Fulbright Student Award to conduct his PhD research on "Building the 'Cholera Wall': Fear, Public Health, and the Ports of New York and Toronto, 1881-1896." Paul's award in this competition follows on the success of Angela Loder last year and Jennifer Ridgley the year before.
March 2008
  • DEPARTMENT CHAIR ON THE CANADIAN ASSOCIATION OF GEOGRAPHERS COUNCIL —   Virginia Maclaren has been voted in as a Canadian Association of Geographers National Executive councillor.
February 2008
  • DON BOYES WINS INITIATIVE GRANT  —  Don Boyes has been awarded a Faculty of Arts and Science Instructional Initiative Grant for his project to create interactive online course material using Dreamweaver and Flash.
  • PROFESSOR AWARDED $1.1 MILLION GRANT FROM THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE FOR HEALTH RESEARCH  —  Jim Dunn's award is for a 5-year project, "Effects of social housing on adult and child mental health: A prospective study in the GTA west." The study will investigate the effects of moving into rent-geared-to-income social housing on the mental health of adults (aged 18-64) and children (aged 3-10) in the regions of Peel and Halton, and Hamilton.
  • OUTSTANDING TEACHING AWARD FOR GEOGRAPHY FACULTY MEMBER  —  Don Boyes has been awarded a Faculty of Arts and Science Outstanding Teaching Award. These prestigious awards are made on the basis of excellence in teaching and contributions to undergraduate education.
January 2008
  • PROFESSOR SECURES CANADIAN INSTITUTES OF HEALTH RESEARCH GRANT  —  Professor Sue Ruddick has been awarded a Canadian Institutes of Health Research grant of $360,000. Sue is co-principal investigator with Prof Pat McKeever (Faculty of Nursing), and the additional research team includes Geography's Jim Dunn. The grant is for a comparative study of the built environment from the perspective of children with disabilities, comparing their social and physical environments in four different communities. It involves an extensive survey and intensive interviews and mapping.
December 2007
  • PROFESSOR ANDRE SORENSEN ELECTED AS A FELLOW OF THE SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING, UNIVERSITY OF TOKYO  —  This is the first year Fellows have been named, and of the 32 elected, and Professor Sorensen was the sole Canadian. The School states that the title is "granted to persons who have their  main base of activity at institutions abroad and who have carried out  distinguished achievements in scholarship or education in the  engineering field as well as meritorious service to the education or  research at this school through exchanges with it and whose continued  support via exchanges can be expected."
October 2007
  • PROFESSOR WINS AWARD OF MERIT  —  Jing Chen has been selected to receive the 2007 Award of Merit by the Federation of Chinese Canadian Professionals. This is an annual award made in recognition of distinguished Chinese Canadians with outstanding achievements in their fields.
  • FACULTY MEMBER ON NOBEL PEACE PRIZE-WINNING PANEL WORKING COMMITTEES  —  Professor Danny Harvey was a member of two of the working committees for the International Panel on Climate Change, which has received the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.
  • BEST MASTER'S STUDENT PAPER AWARD  —  PhD in Planning student  Martine August received the Ed McClure Award for Best Master's Student Paper at the annual annual meeting of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning, for her paper “Is Social Mix Socially Beneficial?”
  • CHAIR IN PUBLIC HEALTH AWARDED TO PROFESSOR JIM DUNN  —  Jim Dunn has been awarded a Chair in Applied Public Health from the Canadian Institutes of Advanced Research (CIHR) and the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) for the following topic: Interventions in Residential Neighbourhoods and Population Health: A Program of Research, Training, Mentoring and Knowledge Translation. See www.cihr.ca/e/35107.html. This highly competitive, peer-reviewed award pays salary for 5 years and also provides an operating budget to support the Chair's training, mentoring and knowledge translation activities. There were only ten such awards made in Canada, of which two were in Ontario.