The University of Prince Edward Island celebrates diversity and multiculturalism during its seventh annual International Development Week from February 4 to 8.

The week begins on Monday, February 4, with two showings of the award-winning 1997 Iranian movie, Children of Heaven, the first at 1:30 p.m. in Room 211 in the Robertson Library and the second at 4 p.m. in Room 104 of the K.C. Irving Building. A discussion hosted by University 100 and psychology students will follow.

On Wednesday, February 6, students will discuss global issues affecting children and possibilities for youth action during a student symposium on global change in the W.A. Murphy Student Centre’s McMillan Hall. Participants will include high school and first-year UPEI students, with education students as facilitators.

Nigel Fisher, president and CEO of UNICEF Canada, will give the keynote address at the symposium. Fisher has considerable experience in advocacy for the protection of civilians, especially children, in zones of conflict, and has worked extensively in basic education and child development. He worked with UNICEF for over 20 years in Africa, Asia and the Middle East, as well as at UNICEF headquarters in New York.

Diana Youdell, special advisor to the Director General of the Afghanistan Task Force, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, will give a talk called “Canada … Making a Difference in Afghanistan” on Thursday, February 7, at 10 a.m. in the Atlantic Veterinary College’s Lecture Theatre C. Her presentation will be followed by a question and answer period.

Youdell recently returned from Afghanistan where she served as Head of Development Programs for CIDA from August 2006 to September 2007. She is currently on temporary assignment from the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA). Under her guidance, more than $100 million of CIDA funds was disbursed to support national programs run by the Afghanistan government, including microfinance, sustainable livelihood, gender equality and girls’ education.

The week wraps up on Friday, February 8, with the annual UPEI International Development Scholarship Luncheon at the Rodd Royalty Inn, starting at noon. Nigel Fisher will be the guest speaker at this event.

Members of the public are invited to take part in the week’s activities. All events are free except the luncheon, which costs $30 per person or $270 for a table of 10. People may also sponsor a UPEI international student to attend the luncheon. Proceeds from the fundraising luncheon go toward an international student scholarship at UPEI. For information and tickets, please contact Beverly Gerg at (902) 894-2842 or bgerg@upei.ca by February 1, 2008.

In conjunction with International Development Week, an exhibition called International EXPOsure 2008 will be held on February 5 and 6 in the W.A. Murphy Student Centre’s concourse. The expo will include informative displays about the many cultures that are part of the UPEI community.

Canadian horse-owners will have access to an innovative technology that enhances the healing of equine tendon and ligament injuries, thanks to a new partnership between UK-based VetCell Bioscience Ltd and the Atlantic Veterinary College at the University of Prince Edward Island.

The two organizations have entered into a partnership establishing the Atlantic Veterinary College as the Canadian centre for the introduction of VetCell’s equine stem cell therapy technology. VetCell’s technology involves extracting stem cells from an injured horse’s healthy tissue, multiplying those cells in the laboratory, and re-injecting the cells into the soft tissue wound of that horse to improve healing rates and reduce re-injury.

VetCell’s Chief Operating Officer, Dr. David Mountford, says that the company’s technology is currently in use in some of the world’s leading equestrian countries, including the UK, Australia, France, Germany, Holland, the United States and Japan. “We’ve been very particular about the expertise of the partners we’ve chosen in each country where we are currently active,” says Mountford. “The technical expertise and the equine focus that the Atlantic Veterinary College has demonstrated make them our obvious choice in Canada.”

Dr. Laurie McDuffee, an equine surgeon, associate professor and researcher at the Atlantic Veterinary College, will lead the Atlantic Veterinary College laboratory in delivering this new leading-edge equine health service. Dr. McDuffee has ten years experience in regenerative medicine and cell therapies for horses.

“The Atlantic Veterinary College is very excited to be the Canadian leader in the introduction of this technology,” says Dr. McDuffee. “We are eager to provide a new tool to treat horses’ injuries right now. Our laboratory also has an ongoing research program in cell-based therapies and is exploring further collaborations with VetCell in the research and development of cell-based therapies for bone fracture healing and treatments for companion animals.”

VetCell and the Atlantic Veterinary College are currently offering this equine health service to selected veterinary clinics in Canada. To-date, ten horses have been treated and it is expected that the service will be widely available to veterinarians and horse owners from across Canada by May 2008.

VetCell’s stem cell technology will be made available to veterinary clinics across Canada through training sessions delivered by Drs. McDuffee and Mountford. The first session is scheduled to take place at the Atlantic Veterinary College in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island on March 5, 2008. A second session will be delivered in Ontario on March 7, 2008. Additional sessions are being planned across Canada.

The Atlantic Veterinary College at UPEI is committed to excellence and innovation in education, research, and professional services. The college is known around the world for its outstanding educational programs, aggressive research agenda, and being home to more than a dozen centres of expertise that range from veterinary epidemiological research to aquatic health. The Atlantic Veterinary College’s Veterinary Teaching Hospital is the only full service referral hospital in Atlantic Canada.

VetCell BioScience Limited is a leading provider of stem cell technology to the world of animal health. VetCell was founded to investigate and develop the veterinary use of stem cell technologies. The company was formed in London, UK in partnership with the Royal Veterinary College and the Institute for Orthopaedics and Musculoskeletal Science. VetCell is committed to working with top veterinary research establishments across the world to improve and expand the range of species and conditions treated using regenerative medicine.

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For further information, please contact:
Charlotte McCardle or Trina Paquet, External Relations
Atlantic Veterinary College at UPEI
(902) 566-0533 / cmccardle@upei.ca

David Mountford, Chief Operating Officer
VetCell Bioscience Ltd
+44 207 691 2062 / info@vetcell.com / www.vetcell.com

Dr. R. Bruce Craig, a history professor at the University of Prince Edward Island, is using his expertise in espionage to unlock Cold War secrets.

His knowledge of Cold War history will be used to petition the federal court in New York City for the release of grand jury records from the 1951 indictment of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg who were accused of running a spy ring that passed American atomic secrets to the Soviet Union. They were convicted of spying and executed in 1953.

The National Security Archive, along with several leading US historical associations, filed the petition to unseal the Rosenberg grand jury records on January 31. Supported by extensive declarations from Craig and other experts, the petition describes the trial as a defining moment in the Cold War, and argues that 57 years later, scholarly and public interest in these transcripts far outweigh any remaining privacy or national security interests in continued secrecy.

Craig, who is the author of Treasonable Doubt: The Harry Dexter White Spy Case, published by the University Press of Kansas, has considerable experience in petitioning grand jury records that pertain to espionage, on the Rosenberg case and several others.

'I spent the good part of this last year preparing the lead historical declaration that was just filed with the National Security Archive petition to force open these grand jury records and I'm very excited about the current prospect of unsealing the Rosenberg records," stated Craig. "A victory in court not only would strike a blow against government secrecy, but the grand jury records we'd get access to would clarify much that remains divisive and unknown about this controversial trial."

Grand jury minutes are not generally made public and are supposed to remain secret in perpetuity. However, one of Craig's previous court filings, "Craig v. USA," set the precedent that makes it possible for historians to gain access when it can be clearly established that the historical values outweigh the need for continued secrecy. In the late 1990s Craig was the lead petitioner in another case that resulted in the unsealing of the Alger Hiss espionage case grand jury records.

Craig and his fellow petitioners believe they have made a strong case for the release of the Rosenberg records. In the words of one such petitioner, New York Times reporter Sam Roberts, "Few cases in American jurisprudence have stirred emotions, generated debate in and out of government and the judicial system, and have had as enduring and divisive a political impact as the prosecution of the Rosenbergs."

Before moving to Prince Edward Island, Bruce Craig represented the historical and archival communities on Capitol Hill for seven years. He served as Executive Director of the National Coalition for History in Washington DC, and his efforts were directly responsible for the public release of the records of the notorious House Committee on Un-American Activities.

Dr. Janet Bryanton, Associate Professor with the UPEI School of Nursing, is passionate about nursing.

For her passion, she received a national nursing award from Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Health Minister Tony Clement at the official launch of the Centennial Year of the Canadian Nurses Association (CNA) in Toronto on February 1.

Dr. Bryanton is one of 14 extraordinary and diverse Canadian nurse leaders from across Canada who received a CNA Nurse to Know Centennial Achievement Award for their contributions to the health system and the health of Canadians during the ceremony.

Prime Minister Harper praised the over 270,000 registered nurses in Canada for their essential work on the front line of health care, and in research, advocacy, innovation, health policy development and education.

'CNA's nurses are setting national standards for our public health system, increasing patient safety, enabling technology, and ultimately improving access for all Canadians to get the care they need at the right time, in the right place. Our nurses are collaborators and leaders who have made a tremendous difference in the lives of all Canadians,' said the Prime Minister.

A native of P.E.I., Dr. Bryanton has been a nurse and a nurse educator for over 30 years. After graduating from the University of New Brunswick's nursing program in 1977, she worked for a year in the maternity unit of Charlottetown's now-closed Prince Edward IslandHospital. She moved on to the Prince Edward Island School of Nursing and spent the next 15 years instilling her passion for nursing in her students.

Her love for education inspired her to further her own credentials; she became a certified perinatal nurse in 2000 - the same year she began teaching at the University of Prince Edward Island's School of Nursing. And she received her PhD from McGill University in 2007.

At UPEI, she teaches third-year students in the nursing degree program. She teaches them about the importance of making parents feel as good as possible about themselves and their parenting skills. 'If they (parents) feel confident, their baby will benefit,' she says.

In addition to her teaching and research responsibilities, Dr. Bryanton sits on CNA's perinatal certification exam committee and has been closely involved with the Association of Registered Nurses of Prince Edward Island, having chaired its board of examiners for 13 years. Currently, she is a member of the PEI Breastfeeding Coalition, a provincial working group dedicated to promoting breastfeeding in PEI.

Dr. Marlene Smadu, president of the CNA, and associate dean of Nursing at the UniversitySaskatchewan, acknowledged the nurses recognized at the launch for applying their nursing education and skills to advance many important areas in the health system, and called on young Canadians to consider nursing as a career choice.

At the event, the CNA launched its new centennial website, www.CNA100.ca, outlining a number of activities throughout 2008 which will celebrate the centennial and commemorate the achievements of registered nurses to date.

Photo (left to right): Minister of Health, Tony Clement; Marlene Smadu, president of the Canadian Nurses Association, Janet Bryanton; and Prime Minister Stephen Harper

Newfoundland-raised novelist Michael Winter returns to PEI with his new novel, The Architects Are Here. Winter will give a public reading on Monday, February 11, at 7:30 p.m. in the UPEI Faculty Lounge, Main Building. A reception and book signing will follow.

Winter was born in England, grew up in Cornerbook, and divides his time between Newfoundland and Toronto. After university, Winter started writing semi-autobiographical fiction about his family and friends and his romantic troubles, some stories set in St. John’s, others in Toronto. A recurrent main character and alter-ego, Gabe English, emerges in this early fiction and his breakthrough novel, This All Happened (2000), which won the Winterset Award and was nominated for the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize.

The Big Why (2004) was loosely based on New York artist Rockwell Kent’s sojourn in Newfoundland in the early twentieth century, and was nominated for Ontario's Trillium Book Award and the Atlantic Book Awards’ Thomas Raddall Fiction Prize, and long-listed for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.

Gabriel English returns in Winter’s new novel, The Architects Are Here. Gabe is drifting into middle-age, settling into a domestic idyll with his girlfriend Nell, and being led into trouble by his childhood friend David, a dot-com millionaire. About this novel and Gabe, Winter says, “I think we’re all struck by the moment we realize we are the same age our parents were when they had us. You’ve succeeded in some ways and failed in others.”

Michael Winter’s reading is sponsored by the UPEI English Department, with support from The Canada Council for the Arts.

Climate and environmental change, and biomedical physics will be the hot topics at the 2008 Atlantic Undergraduate Physics and Astronomy Conference (AUPAC), which will be held at the University of Prince Edward Island from February 8 to 10.AUPAC is an annual conference that showcases the research activities of undergraduate physics and astronomy students across the region.

“AUPAC really gives students the opportunity to share and discuss their ideas and knowledge with friends and colleagues from other universities in a friendly, slightly competitive environment,” says physics professor Dr. Sheldon Opps, who is chairing the conference along with students Chris Lund and Ali Fatehi Hassanabad.

The conference, which will be attended by over 125 delegates, including more than 100 undergraduates from across Atlantic Canada, will include invited talks by high-profile researchers, presentations by the students, a poster session, an NSERC panel discussion and a graduate fair.

Dr. James Drummond, Canada Research Chair in Remote Sounding of Atmospheres in Dalhousie University’s physics and atmospheric science department, will give a plenary speech on Friday, February 8, at 7:30 p.m., about the role that Canada has to play in the International Polar Year (IPY), a scientific program focused on the Arctic and the Antarctic from March 2007 to March 2009. One component of Canada’s contribution to IPY is the Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory (PEARL), a laboratory in Eureka, a laboratory in Eureka, Nunavut, where scientists conduct research in the areas of climate, ozone and air quality.

Island native and UPEI physics graduate Heather Auld will speak on Saturday, February 9, at 4 p.m., about her work as a meteorologist and climatologist for Environment Canada for nearly 29 years. Currently a manager with the Adaptation and Impacts Research Group of Environment Canada, she has worked as a weather forecaster across Canada and as an engineering climatologist.

On the biomedical side, Dr. Bill Whelan, Canada Research Chair in Biomedical Optics at UPEI, will be the guest speaker at the conference banquet, which will be held on Saturday, February 9, at 6:30 p.m. An associate professor in the UPEI physics department, Dr. Whelan will speak about his research into the use of light and sound to diagnose, treat and monitor disease.

On Sunday, February 10, at 11:30 a.m., Dr. Cécile Fradin, assistant professor of physics and astronomy at McMaster University, will talk about her research on fluorescence and how it can be used to detect the motion of proteins in living cells, and how biological systems such as cells and molecules can be used to probe or modify physical systems.

The presentations by Drummond, Auld and Fradin take place in the Duffy Science Centre Amphitheatre and are free to the public.

Award-winning playwright Don Hannah will give a public reading at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, February 15, in the Main Building Faculty Lounge, University of Prince Edward Island.

Born in Shediac, N.B., Hannah is also a prolific director and novelist. The East Coast has long been a focus in his work. His first plays, The Wedding Script (winner of the Chalmers Award), Rubber Dolly and In the Lobster Capital of the World, were produced at Toronto’s Tarragon Theatre. The Wooden Hill, based on the journals of L.M. Montgomery, won the AT&T OnStage Award. In 2002, Hannah was nominated for the prestigious Simonovitch Prize for Outstanding Playwright.

Of The Wise and Foolish Virgins, his first novel, The Globe and Mail writes, “Hannah's novel uses sprawling energy and a dozen colourful characters to break the pattern of ‘dour’ and ‘morose’ Maritime fiction.”

In his new novel, Ragged Islands, it is September 2001, and eighty-five-year-old Susan Ann Roberts lies dying in a Toronto hospital, when she resolves to return to the places in the Maritimes that defined her as a girl, wife, and mother. Her children are at her bedside, but her dearest grandson Tommy is stuck in New York, where something dreadful is happening. Susan begins her magical journey at the family farm where she spent childhood summers. She then travels to Ragged Islands, N.S., and the house she shared with her husband – pondering why she was given away to relatives at birth, when siblings born earlier and later were kept.

Hannah has been writer-in-residence at the Tarragon and Canadian Stage theatres, the University of New Brunswick, and for the Yukon Library System. He is a founding member of the Playwrights Atlantic Resource Centre and, for the last eight years, has directed the Tarragon Theatre’s Young Playwrights Unit. He is associate program dramaturge for the Banff PlayRites Colony, and works in the playwriting department at the National Theatre School of Canada.

Hannah’s reading is sponsored by the UPEI English Department, with support from the Canada Council for the Arts.

The UPEI Department of Psychology and the Psychological Association of Prince Edward Island will mark February as Psychology Month with a series of lectures, starting on Valentine’s Day.

On Valentine’s Day, Thursday, February 14, Dr. Stacey MacKinnon will give a presentation called “Finding and Keeping Love in the New Millennium” in Lecture Theatre A of the Atlantic Veterinary College at 7 p.m.

Dr. Fiona Papps will present “‘Dying at 15?’ Living (A) Female Adolescence” on Friday, February 15, at 3 p.m., in UPEI’s Memorial Building, Room 215, at 3 p.m. A reception and discussion will follow.

On Wednesday, February 20, Dr. Christina Campbell will talk about “Sexual Behaviour in University Students” in Lecture Theatre A of the Atlantic Veterinary College at 7 p.m.

Dr. Colleen MacQuarrie will talk about “Feminist Research in Action: Exploring the Nexus of Psychology and Social Justice” on Thursday, February 21, at 7 p.m. in Lecture Theatre A of the Atlantic Veterinary College.

The series wraps up on Thursday, February 28, at 6 p.m., with a presentation called “Almost Famous: Muse or Groupie,” by Dr. Fiona Papps in the Atlantic Veterinary College, Lecture Theatre A. The film, Almost Famous, will be shown, and a discussion will follow.

All are invited to attend these free presentations.

The University of Prince Edward Island's Robertson Library is debuting its new series, Celebrating The Book, on February 15, from 2 to 4 p.m. in the library's recently renovated periodicals section on the second floor.

With this inaugural event, the library acknowledges the continuing importance and relevance of books in this increasingly high-tech world, and it also showcases the renovation of its periodicals area into a more comfortable study and work space for students.

Celebrating The Book, which is open to the general public, features three members of the UPEI faculty who have written or edited recent publications.

Philosophy professor Dr. Malcolm Murray recently published The Moral Wager: Evolution and Contract (Springer, 2007). The Moral Wager illuminates and sharpens moral theory, by analyzing the evolutionary dynamics of interpersonal relations in a variety of games.

Madness, Architecture and the Built Environment: Psychiatric Spaces in Historical Context (Routledge, 2007), edited by UPEI history professor Dr. James Moran with Leslie Topp and Jonathan Andrews, is the first volume of papers devoted to an examination of the relationship between mental health/illness, and the construction and experience of space. The first rigorous scholarly analysis of its kind in book form, it will be of particular interest to the history, psychiatry and architecture communities.

In Agents of Empire: British Female Migration to Canada and Australia, 1860-1930 (University of Toronto, 2007), history professor Dr. Lisa Chilton explores the work of the women who promoted, managed and ultimately transformed single British women's experiences of migration to Canada and Australia between the 1860s and the 1920s.

The faculty members will read brief excerpts from their publications and/or lead a discussion about them.

All are welcome. Refreshments will be served. For more information, please contact Communications and Outreach Librarian Suzanne Jones at (902) 566-0393.

In response to the recent UPEI Senate decision to introduce a new required course that will enhance undergraduate students' knowledge and understanding of important world issues, the University has created a multidisciplinary working group to guide the development and delivery of the first-year course.

Chaired by the Dean of Education, Dr. Graham Pike, the group will develop a writing-intensive curriculum and identify the most effective ways of delivering University 151: World Issues to take advantage of the considerable teaching and international expertise that the Faculty of Education and other members of the campus community have to offer.

The working group is made up of representatives from the faculties of education, arts, science, and business, the Robertson Library, the Webster Centre for Teaching and Learning, and the Student Union. The composition of the group reflects the University's commitment to consider the needs of all students and disciplines. Its members are Sandy McAuley, Joe Velaidum, Andrew Trivett, Sean Hennessey, Mark Leggott, Martha Gabriel, and Willy Gauthier.

"Our priority will be to ensure that this new course is both writing-intensive and thought-provoking; that it will present students with exciting opportunities to consider important world issues and strengthen their abilities to present their ideas about these issues in written form," says Dr. Pike.

The course is part of a larger initiative that requires all students to complete a second writing-intensive course as well. The University is also enhancing its writing support to individual students through the tutoring services of the Webster Centre for Teaching and Learning. In addition, the Webster Centre will work in co-operation with departments across campus to support the integration of writing-intensive elements in existing courses.

The University 151: World Issues working group held its first meeting on February 12. One of its priorities will be to identify a well-qualified co-ordinator for the new course and agree on the skill sets needed for instructors, who will be drawn from the UPEI Faculty Association membership. They will also consider the role that senior students can play as writing mentors.

"We are doing something innovative and valuable by introducing University 151: World Issues, something that other Canadian universities are also considering in different ways," says Dr. Pike. "And while we are looking at the role that peer mentors can play in supporting student writing, we have no intention at all of using students as teachers. This is a very important distinction to make."

The three-credit course will be introduced in September and offered during the fall semester of each year. All students will be required to successfully complete it by the time they graduate. The only exceptions will be those who have already completed English 101.  The University is continuing to offer English 101 to students who wish to take it.