The Island Lecture Series March lecture is Tuesday, March 19, at 7 p.m. in the SDU Main Building Faculty Lounge on the UPEI campus, and will feature Jocelyn Plourde speaking about his Island Studies master’s research in Samsø, Denmark. “From Policy to Action” is a research project that delves into the link between public policy and the deployment of renewable energy systems. At the heart of the research is a case study of the Danish island community of Samsø. Also known as the Renewable Energy Island, Samsø transitioned away from conventional (fossil fuel) energy sources to being 100% carbon-neutral in only ten years. As part of his presentation, researcher Jocelyn Plourde will discuss the details of Samsø’s transition, the role of public policy in that transition, and the lessons that communities like Prince Edward Island can learn from Samsø’s example. While “from away,” Jocelyn Plourde has lived in PEI for more than a decade. He lives in Charlottetown and teaches high school math and sciences at École La-Belle-Cloche, in Rollo Bay. Jocelyn obtained his degrees in sciences and in education at the University of Ottawa. His thesis titled “From Policy to Action – Renewable Energy in Samsø, Denmark” was written as part of UPEI’s Master of Arts in Island Studies (MAIS) program, which he completed in June of 2018.  Admission to the lecture is free and everyone is welcome to attend. This is the last lecture of the season. The series will start up again in the fall. For more information, please contact Laurie at iis@upei.ca or (902) 894-2881.

Speaker: Will Robbins, Biomedical Sciences Title: Investigating Novel Transmission Routes of the Canid Metastrongylids Angiostrongylus vasorum and Crenosoma vulpis  

The Department of Companion Animals at the Atlantic Veterinary College, UPEI, will be interviewing candidates to fill a newly-created, tenure-track faculty position in Zoo, Exotic & Wildlife Animal Medicine. Each candidate has been asked to present two (2) thirty-minute seminars; one a topic of their choosing that should be geared toward 3rd year DVM students and aimed at delivering “core” information for veterinary students (i.e., information that a new graduate will need to possess to be successful on Day 1); and the other on their vision for building/expanding an exotic animal practice at the AVC. Our first candidate will be on-campus Monday and Tuesday of next week. March 18th & 19th, 2019 Dr. Lara Cusack (AVC ’05) has completed an Exotics, Wildlife & Zoo Animal Medicine Veterinary internship at WCVM (2007); a Wildlife, Aquatic Animal & Zoo Animal Medicine Veterinary internship at St. Matthews University, Grand Cayman (2011) and a Zoological Medicine Residency at the University of Georgia, Georgia Aquarium (2013-2016). She is currently working for the Florida Panther Project as part of the Florida Fish & Wildlife Research Institute. Exotic Animal Medicine: Triage, Restraint & Examination Vision for Building/Expanding an Exotic Animal Practice at AVC Tuesday, March 19th @ 12:30pm, Lecture Theatre ‘A’, AVC Any interested faculty / staff are invited to attend. A copy of the candidate’s CV and letter of application are available by contacting Laurel Fisher (fisher@upei.ca) in the Department of Companion Animals

As part of UPEI’s 50th anniversary, the Robertson Library is presenting a lecture series to celebrate the historical roots of higher education on Prince Edward Island and its future. The series is named after educator Frank Pigot, honoured as a UPEI Founder for his work building the Library’s PEI Collection and University Archives. Dr. Edward MacDonald’s will deliver the first lecture of the series on Tuesday, March 26 from 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm in the Faculty Lounge of UPEI’s SDU Main Building. Dr. MacDonald’s presentation is titled “The School of Experience: A Patchwork Quilt of Informal Island Education, 1825-1965.” While the Island’s formal education system evolved slowly and painfully across the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, other, more informal modes of teaching and learning developed to answer Islanders’ educational needs. From the agricultural societies and mechanics’ institutes of the first half of the 20th century, through the farmer’s institutes that followed, to the adult education underpinning of the Antigonish Movement and the DIY ethos of community schools in the 1960s, these informal systems of education shared one characteristic: they emphasized various kinds of practical, applied learning for Islanders who found themselves outside the province’s structured educational system. Refreshments will be provided. Everyone is welcome.

As part of UPEI’s 50th anniversary, the Robertson Library is presenting a lecture series to celebrate the historical roots of higher education on Prince Edward Island and its future. The series is named after educator Frank Pigot, honoured as a UPEI Founder for his work building the library’s PEI Collection and University Archives. PEI historian and folklorist John Cousins will present the second lecture in the series, entitled “Stand for Your Lessons: Educational Change and Cultural Reaction.” This illustrated talk will be Tuesday, April 30 from 7:00 to 8:30 pm in the Eptek Centre in Summerside. The period between 1960 and the early 1970s brought the most dramatic change in Island education since the creation of the one-room district schools in the early 1850s. The consolidation of the public schools saw the disappearance of a major element in Island culture. This presentation will examine the impact of that change on rural Island communities, on their families and on the children who were “consolidated.” Further, a main question remains to be examined: what lessons can learned by using prior experience as a guide to evaluate how elements of culture may react during dramatic, and sometimes traumatic, change? Refreshments will be provided. All are welcome.

The University of Prince Edward Island's Faculty of Sustainable Design Engineering (FSDE) annual Student Design Expo on April 18 will showcase the best in student, sustainable, and green engineering in Atlantic Canada. Student projects will be set up for public viewing at various stations around the first floor of the Faculty of Sustainable Design Engineering Building. Each project is the result of collaboration between UPEI FSDE students and an industry or community partner. Students were tasked with designing and creating solutions to their partners’ unique challenges. The Student Design Expo begins with a short ceremony at 1:00 pm. Projects are available for viewing through the afternoon, with the Student Award Ceremony beginning at 4:00 pm, and a brief panel discussion about opportunities for design engineering graduates beginning at 4:30 pm.

It's that time again! Soup for the Soul Year 4, Event 6 UPEI Graduate, Soup for the Soul Founder and Cow's Ice Cream employee Kyle Holland returns with his new team from Cow's to host our final Soup event of this academic year. Tomato and Chicken Noodle soups with ummm, hmmmm dessert from Cow's. Come and get it!

AS part of the Molecular and Macromolecular Sciences Seminar Program, Dr. Michael Freund from Dalhousie University will be presenting on Conjugated Polymer Composites for Biologically Inspired Sensing and Energy Storage/Conversion Systems.  Conjugated polymers are an exciting class of materials that hold great promise in emerging electronic, sensing and energy applications. The excitement surrounding the field has resulted from the tremendous possibilities presented by merging the vast knowledge base of synthetic organic chemistry and polymer science with critically important areas of electronic materials and solid-state physics. This rapidly growing field presents opportunities for revolutionizing material science and electronics in ways we are just beginning to imagine. This presentation will discuss the development of conjugated polymers for use in artificial photosynthesis and artificial olfaction, inspired by biological systems. In particular, recent developments in the design of membranes consisting of electronically and ionically conducting polymers will be discussed including their figures of merit and engineering challenges for use in coupling the absorption of light with the generation of solar fuels. In the area of artificial olfaction, the development of chemically diverse conjugated polymer sensing elements compatible with CMOS integrated circuits will be described.  His presentation will be followed by a pizza luncheon in the Chemistry Student Lounge, KCI 200.  All are welcome to attend. 

The campus community will come together to condemn the terrorist attack that took place during Friday Prayers at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand. We will remember and mourn the 50 victims, others who are injured, and their affected families.  This event is Tuesday, March 19 at 12:45 pm in McMillan Hall of UPEI's W.A. Murphy Student Centre. Please join us as we share prayers, reflections, and thoughts. We will come together as a community to meet this hate with love, to challenge this these hateful islamophobic ideologies, and to support our Muslim brothers and sisters.  

We are in the third of four weeks of our FSDE graduate students presenting their thesis research in three-minutes, for the purpose of preparing and practicing clear, concise, and inspired talks. This week we have four 3-minute presentations: "BioPierce: preventing piercing infection using 3D printers” Emad Naseri "Development of a portable, smartphone-operated salivary cortisol biosensor” Rodolfo Nino-Esparza “Fighting superbugs in chickens for a healthier dinner table” Nauman Nazeer “Waste to value: isolating nanocrystalline cellulose from local invasive tunicate” Matthew Dunlop Wednesday, March 20, 12:00 noon to 1:00 PM in SDE 212, all are welcomed!