The Office of Recruitment and First-Year Advisement is hosting the Summer Open Day on Friday, July 26th, from 9 AM for all incoming first-year students at UPEI this fall to join us for an exciting and information-filled morning at the UPEI campus, followed by lunch at the Wanda Wyatt Dining Hall! Incoming students can take campus and residence tours, participate in a mini-student service fair to understand the services and resources available as incoming UPEI students, and attend sessions to learn about everything UPEI! 
 

On Thursday, July 25, Ancillary Services and IT Systems and Services (ITSS) will be replacing the system that manages UPEI meal plans and campus card account balances. The new system is named Avro. 

There will be an outage on the morning of July 25 between 8 am and noon as we transition from the current Multiplan system to the new Avro system. During this period new ID cards will not be issued and using the PaperCut printing system may be affected. 

There will be no impact to door access via Salto card-reading locks. 

To access your campus card account the new link to use is go.upei.ca/campuscard
Important note, please do not attempt to add funds to your campus card account via online credit card payment until Friday, July 26. Doing so may impact the transfer of your existing account funds. 

If you have any questions or issues related to meal plans, campus card account balances, or PaperCut printing please contact Ancillary Services at 902-566-0330 / residence@upei.ca or the ITSS Help Desk at 902-566-0465 / helpdesk@upei.ca

Apologies for any inconvenience this may cause. 

Regards,
Ancillary Services and ITSS

Everyone is welcome to attend the MSc (Mathematical and Computational Sciences) thesis defence of presenter Bowen Xu on Friday, July 26, at 10 am in HSB 105.

Title of the Thesis:  “Deep Reinforcement Learning for Smart Restarts In Exploration-only Exploitation-only Metaheuristic Hybrids”

Metaheuristic algorithms excel in addressing challenging optimization problems but often face the issue of premature convergence, limiting their potential during extended optimization periods. This research aims to overcome this limitation by integrating Reinforcement Learning to implement intelligent restart mechanisms in metaheuristic processes. The objective is to enhance the algorithms' ability to explore and exploit the solution space more effectively, thereby improving performance in complex optimization scenarios.

The study starts with a review of current metaheuristic algorithms, highlighting the issue of premature convergence. It then explores Reinforcement Learning principles, particularly their decision-making capabilities, to optimize metaheuristic performance. A novel framework is proposed where Reinforcement Learning agents monitor the optimization process, identify stagnation phases, and initiate intelligent restarts. These restarts are strategically guided by the agents' learned policies, ensuring diversified search when necessary and focused exploration of promising regions.

Experiments on benchmark optimization problems demonstrate that integrating Reinforcement Learning significantly mitigates premature convergence, leading to superior solution quality and robust performance across various domains. This research not only addresses a critical limitation in metaheuristic optimization but also suggests new applications of Reinforcement Learning for enhancing algorithmic efficiency. The findings underscore the potential of intelligent restart mechanisms to transform optimization, enabling more effective and adaptive metaheuristic solutions.

The Office of Research Services has launched a new internal funding program intended to enhance research excellence in the social sciences and humanities. The SSHRC Seed Funding program supports activities that will strengthen a SSHRC grant proposal and lead to the submission of an application by March 31, 2026.

• VALUE: up to $2500 
• APPLICATION DEADLINE: September 15, 2024 by 4 pm
• ELIGIBLE APPLICANTS: Tenured, tenure track, and term UPEI faculty members in Arts, Business, Education, IKERAS, Nursing, Medicine, Science, or Sustainable Design Engineering, and Librarians, who are employed by UPEI at the time of application and for the duration of the award. Faculty members in Veterinary Medicine may participate as a co-applicant but cannot be the Principal Investigator. A professor emeritus or adjunct professor may apply as co-applicant with a tenured/tenure-track UPEI faculty member. 
• FOR MORE INFORMATION: Program guidelines and application instructions can be found here.

To apply, please use the UPEI Romeo Researcher Portal.

For questions, contact Leslie Cudmore, Research Grants Coordinator, at lcudmore@upei.ca or 902-566-0709.

Join us for a Cultural Social Night! Show off your unique cultural attire and enjoy an unforgettable evening of board games, laughter, and socializing at the Dawson Lounge (Rm. 520), 5th Floor, SDU Main Building.

Date: Friday, July 26 
Time: 5:00–8:00 pm

Presented by the UPEI Campus Life Program. This event promises fun, connection, and cultural celebration. Don’t miss out—mark your calendars and invite your friends! See you there!

There will be a UPEI Bloodborne Pathogen Training Session on Wednesday, August 14, 2024, from 10:30 am-12:00 pm.

This session is for those individuals whose research involves human blood, tissue, and other bodily fluids. If you wish to attend you must pre-register by contacting Jacky Buell at HSE@upei.ca before Thursday, August 8, 2024. Please provide your name, department and email address. 

If you have any questions about this training session, please contact Dr. Rhoda Speare, rspeare@upei.ca.

Dana Hospitality will host a weekly BBQ every Thursday this summer from 11:30 am to 1:30 pm (weather permitting) in front of the AVC main doors. Check out the menu here. For potential weather cancellations and up-to-date information, please visit @UPEI_Eats. 

Everyone is welcome to attend the MSc (Mathematical and Computational Sciences) thesis defence of presenter Bowen Xu on Friday, July 26, at 10 am in HSB 105.

Title of the Thesis:  “Deep Reinforcement Learning for Smart Restarts In Exploration-only Exploitation-only Metaheuristic Hybrids”

Metaheuristic algorithms excel in addressing challenging optimization problems but often face the issue of premature convergence, limiting their potential during extended optimization periods. This research aims to overcome this limitation by integrating Reinforcement Learning to implement intelligent restart mechanisms in metaheuristic processes. The objective is to enhance the algorithms' ability to explore and exploit the solution space more effectively, thereby improving performance in complex optimization scenarios.

The study starts with a review of current metaheuristic algorithms, highlighting the issue of premature convergence. It then explores Reinforcement Learning principles, particularly their decision-making capabilities, to optimize metaheuristic performance. A novel framework is proposed where Reinforcement Learning agents monitor the optimization process, identify stagnation phases, and initiate intelligent restarts. These restarts are strategically guided by the agents' learned policies, ensuring diversified search when necessary and focused exploration of promising regions.

Experiments on benchmark optimization problems demonstrate that integrating Reinforcement Learning significantly mitigates premature convergence, leading to superior solution quality and robust performance across various domains. This research not only addresses a critical limitation in metaheuristic optimization but also suggests new applications of Reinforcement Learning for enhancing algorithmic efficiency. The findings underscore the potential of intelligent restart mechanisms to transform optimization, enabling more effective and adaptive metaheuristic solutions.

IT Systems and Services (ITSS) will be performing emergency changes to the network between 5:30 and 8:30 pm on Wednesday, July 24, 2024. During this period, users may experience authentication issues on both the campus wired and wireless networks. There will be no impact to Moodle, Outlook email, OneDrive, or other web services.

ITSS apologizes for the inconvenience.

The Office of Research Services has launched a new internal funding program intended to enhance research excellence in the social sciences and humanities. The SSHRC Seed Funding program supports activities that will strengthen a SSHRC grant proposal and lead to the submission of an application by March 31, 2026.

• VALUE: up to $2500 
• APPLICATION DEADLINE: September 15, 2024 by 4 pm
• ELIGIBLE APPLICANTS: Tenured, tenure track, and term UPEI faculty members in Arts, Business, Education, IKERAS, Nursing, Medicine, Science, or Sustainable Design Engineering, and Librarians, who are employed by UPEI at the time of application and for the duration of the award. Faculty members in Veterinary Medicine may participate as a co-applicant but cannot be the Principal Investigator. A professor emeritus or adjunct professor may apply as co-applicant with a tenured/tenure-track UPEI faculty member. 
• FOR MORE INFORMATION: Program guidelines and application instructions can be found here.

To apply, please use the UPEI Romeo Researcher Portal.

For questions, contact Leslie Cudmore, Research Grants Coordinator, at lcudmore@upei.ca or 902-566-0709.

Join us for a Cultural Social Night! Show off your unique cultural attire and enjoy an unforgettable evening of board games, laughter, and socializing at the Dawson Lounge (Rm. 520), 5th Floor, SDU Main Building.

Date: Friday, July 26 
Time: 5:00–8:00 pm

Presented by the UPEI Campus Life Program. This event promises fun, connection, and cultural celebration. Don’t miss out—mark your calendars and invite your friends! See you there!

Come say hi, have a snack, and play a round of Jenga with UPEI's new Employee Engagement Officer, Jessica Field! 

Jessica would like to hear from you and get your thoughts on all things employee engagement. How do you think we should welcome new employees to UPEI? How would you like to be recognized for the work you do? What professional growth opportunities would be most meaningful to you? What initiatives would you like to see on campus that would enhance your experience while at work? What are some areas that make our workplace great that we should leverage? How can we make a positive impact in our communities, both on and off campus?

Thursday, August 1, AVC 280N, 10:00 am-12:00 pm

Wednesday, August 7, SDU Main Building 201 - Faculty Lounge, 12:00-2:00 pm

Tuesday, August 13, Kelley Memorial Building 234, 10:30 am-12:30 pm

Open to all employees at UPEI. Complimentary light refreshments will be provided, and attendees will have a chance to win UPEI swag!

Unable to attend? 

Stay tuned for future opportunities. If you'd prefer to connect individually, please feel free to reach out to Jessica at jfield@upei.ca 

Dana Hospitality will host a weekly BBQ every Thursday this summer from 11:30 am to 1:30 pm (weather permitting) in front of the AVC main doors. Check out the menu here. For potential weather cancellations and up-to-date information, please visit @UPEI_Eats. 

UPEI alumni, friends and members of the campus community are invited to take in the excitement of a Canadian Premier League match as the HFX Wanderers host Atlético Ottawa. This is a family friendly event with group tickets secured in The Kitchen.

Saturday, August 24, Halifax, Nova Scotia
12:30 pm | Gahan House Nova Centre
2:00 pm | Walk to Wanderers Grounds
3:00 pm | HFX Wanderers vs Atlético Ottawa

Ticket price: $20

Join us for pre-match munchies at Gahan House Nova Centre beginning at 12:30 pm and score some UPEI gear to add to your kit before we march together to the Wanderers Grounds at 2 pm. 

Reserve your tickets now

Questions about the Wanderers and the Wanderer Grounds? Please visit What to know before you go

General questions about the event or UPEI Alumni? Please get in touch with us by email at alumni@upei.ca or call Stephen at 902-388-6578

Join us for a Cultural Social Night! Show off your unique cultural attire and enjoy an unforgettable evening of board games, laughter, and socializing at the Dawson Lounge (Rm. 520), 5th Floor, SDU Main Building.

Date: Friday, July 26 
Time: 5:00–8:00 pm

Presented by the UPEI Campus Life Program. This event promises fun, connection, and cultural celebration. Don’t miss out—mark your calendars and invite your friends! See you there!

CAAL-CBPA Strategic Plan: Goal 6.3 Administer an OER Development Grants Program for educators in the region. 

The Council of Atlantic Academic Libraries (CAAL) is delighted to announce the recipients of this year’s AtlanticOER Development Grants. These grants are intended to support educators in the Atlantic Region in the adaptation, adoption, creation, and curation of open educational resources (OER), and to increase access to course materials for students. With funding from the Council of Atlantic Ministers for Education and Training (CAMET), the AtlanticOER Development Grant Program expanded this year. A new tiered system of funding was introduced to better support textbook creation (up to $7,000), adaptation (up to $3,500), and ancillary material creation projects (up to $1,000). 

The grants aim to support educators from provincially funded post secondary institutions in achieving the following objectives:

• Support the creation or adaptation of open textbooks and ancillary materials, such as PowerPoint slides, quiz banks, images, and other digital study or interactive aids;
• Create a variety of OERs developed for use by educators and students in credit-bearing courses;
• Establish supportive events for the development of content for OERs, such as sprints (a collaborative in-person or virtual event to create or adapt an open textbook or ancillary resources); or
• Distribute funds to maximize direct benefit to a wide range of student learners and inquiry across a diversity of disciplines.

The 2024 Development Grant recipients are: 

• Dr. Cynthia Alexander, Department of Politics, Acadia University
• Dr. Yigit Aydede, Sobey School of Business and Economics, Saint Mary’s University  
• Dr. Karen Brebner, Department of Psychology, Saint Francis Xavier University  
• André Davey, School of Access, Education, and Language, Nova Scotia Community College 
• Dr. Elizabeth Jewett, Director of Extended Learning, Mount Allison University 
• Dr. Laura Lambe, Department of Psychology, Saint Francis Xavier University 
• Hannah Rosborough, Instruction and Scholarly Communication Librarian, Sir James Dunn Library, Schulich School of Law, Dalhousie University 
• Dr. Mo Snyder, Department of Earth and Environmental Science, Acadia University 
• Matthew Walker, School of Performing Arts, Dalhousie University 

We are pleased to offer support to educators in the region in developing OERs.  

Members of the UPEI campus community and general public are invited to the Harrington Research Farm Open House on Saturday, July 27 from 10:00 am and 2:00 pm. The first open house in five years! 

Come and discover the science behind your food! Several interactive activities will be featured throughout the day to present the scientific research on potatoes, cereal grain, corn, hops, and much more! There will be a number of children's activities as well as guided wagon tours of our research farm.  

Did you know that the Harrington Research Farm has more than 600 acres of farmland and a large greenhouse dedicated to year-round agriculture research on sustainable cropping systems?  

The farm has hundreds of small plots dedicated to research on potato and cereal varieties best suited for the Maritimes. Our research aims to manage weeds, insects and diseases, as well as maintain soil health and water quality, with the objective to support agricultural producers across Canada.  

RSVP here: https://www.facebook.com/events/8115656791791450/ Free on-site parking and food are available (while supplies last). 

UPEI Procurement Services is currently taking bids on some used cleaning equipment. There are a number of vacuums and auto scrubbers on this list.

Bids are being accepted in the University's e-tendering portal Bonfire until July 24, 2024, at 4:00 pm. This portal requires you to register by creating a username and password as your UPEI credentials are not connected to this system. When registering for the Bonfire portal, please put your name in the Vendor Name and Contact Name fields. You can access the information about this opportunity at https://upei.bonfirehub.ca/projects/82255/details

If you require assistance, please email tenders@upei.ca.

Dana Hospitality will host a weekly BBQ every Thursday this summer from 11:30 am to 1:30 pm (weather permitting) in front of the AVC main doors. Check out the menu here. For potential weather cancellations and up-to-date information, please visit @UPEI_Eats. 

The Faculty of Sustainable Design Engineering is interviewing two candidates for a tenure-track position. Each candidate is invited to give a public research presentation, which everyone is welcome to attend.

Dr. Gangqiang Li, Monday, July 22, 2024, 11:00 AM, FSDE 205

Dr. Gangqiang Li, tenured researcher, École Centrale de Nantes, France, will give a presentation titled "The Application of Cable/Tether Technology for Ocean and Space Exploration." 

Dr. Mahdi Alavi, Tuesday, July 23, 2024, 11:00 AM, FSDE 205

Dr. Mahdi Alavi, battery state estimation engineer, Chrysler Automotive Research & Development Centre, will give a presentation titled "Controls and Sustainability."