At March's Research on Tap, join a UPEI chemist who will defend both the honour of his profession, and the much-maligned so-called enemy of the environment: plastic. The discussion starts at 7 p.m., March 9, in the bar at Mavor's in the Confederation Centre of the Arts.

Dr. Michael Shaver is an assistant professor of chemistry with a focus on 'green' chemistry. His lab is developing biodegradable, plant-based polymers to replace conventional plastic.

'There are bad plastics out there,' argues Shaver. 'But the benefits of using plastic-the right plastics-can't be ignored.'

Shaver will also help dispel misconceptions people have about his chosen profession.

'Chemists take their name from ‘alchemy,' so we're partially to blame,' says Shaver. 'People consider chemistry to be a mysterious black art. But we're working to change that image.'

Research on Tap is a series of public discussions with UPEI's researchers in a comfortable environment. Every month of the winter we bring a UPEI researcher to a local pub-in this case, Mavor's-to discuss his or her area of expertise.

For more information, call (902) 620-5117, or e-mail datkinson@upei.ca.

Research on Tap is presented by UPEI's Office of Research Development.

The UPEI Career Showcase and Job Fair will take place on March 10, 2010, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., in the W.A. Murphy Student Centre on the campus.

'This is an excellent opportunity for students and graduates seeking employment to meet with varying industry and company representatives looking to recruit employees,' says Kylah Hennessey, a career counsellor with UPEI's department of student services.

New this year, with sponsorship from PEI Works, is a showcase that will feature people from a wide variety of professions who will talk to participants about their careers. Professions represented will range from accounting and broadcast journalism to the RCMP and nursing.

As well, 18 private companies and public organizations will be recruiting during the event. These include Veterans Affairs Canada, PEI Department of Tourism and Culture, Cogsdale Corporation, Skills PEI and more.

During the fair, there will be a chance for attendees to win some great prizes, including an iPod Touch and a netbook with case. People attending the fair can park without charge in the MacLauchlan/Cari parking lot, and free snacks will be provided.

The job fair is just one of the services offered to students by UPEI's Career Services Centre to help them relate their skills, and interests to career options. Other services include individual career counselling, assessments, presentations, mock interviews and access to resources.

For detailed information about this event, please visit the UPEI Career Showcase and Job Fair website or contact the Career Services Centre at (902) 566-0488.

Graduation is almost here! In just 58 short days, the Class of 2010 will graduate and join the ranks of over 19,000 UPEI Alumni!

The UPEI Alumni Association invites the Class of 2010 to a Countdown to Convocation event on Thursday, March 11, at the W.A. Murphy Student Centre, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Find out what you need to know about graduation and after graduation! Order your degree frame. Participate in draws for great prizes, including a Wii. And enjoy free pizza.

For more information, contact the UPEI Alumni Office at 566-0687 or visit us in Main Building 212.

On March 16, the University of Prince Edward Island's Institute of Island Studies and MP Shawn Murphy will co-host Challenges and Opportunities: the next 25 years, a public event to engage Islanders to join the process of planning for the Island's future.

This event will take place at 6:30 p.m. at the Carrefour de l'Isle-Saint-Jean (5 Acadian Drive, Charlottetown).

A panel of local and regional speakers will identify current strengths and future opportunities for building a more vibrant, progressive and sustainable Island society.

'To get there from here involves coming to grips with some serious challenges,' warns Dr. Irene Novaczek, the director of the Institute of Island Studies, 'But we also have enviable human, cultural and natural resources that will help us redefine the future and its challenges, while still capitalizing on emerging opportunities.'

Discussions will focus on the economy, the environment, health, education, arts and culture. Taking into consideration some of the unique challenges we face on P.E.I., including fiscal constraints, an ageing population, and climate change.

Speakers include:

• Blake Doyle, economy
• Joanne MacDonald, life long learning
• Dr. Noni MacDonald, e-health
• Wendy MacDonald, demographic challenges
• Todd Maclean, culture and community
• Christina Macleod, climate change
• Shawn Murphy MP, fiscal challenges
• Dr. Irene Novaczek, environmental challenges

Forum participants will have an opportunity to work in small groups, discuss these themes and report back with key ideas that will help to move the Island forward.

'This is a first step, a call to action, where we can all participate in the conversation about where we want to be in the future,' notes Charlottetown MP Shawn Murphy. ' I believe there are a number of issues that do require a public discussion.'

For more information, please contact: Dianne Porter at (902) 892-4923 or porter@pei.sympatico.ca.

The Robertson Library at UPEI will be the site of a unique musical 'informance' on Tuesday, March 16. Cellist Julia MacLaine, violinist Jennifer Curtis, and violist Margaret Dyer will perform a lunchtime concert and chat with the audience in the library foyer from 11:45 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

This event is free, and everyone is welcome to attend.

MacLaine, daughter of Dr. Brent MacLaine, chair of the UPEI English department, is one of today's prominent cellists. Critics have consistently singled her out for her rich tone, sweet, throbbing vibrato, and superb playing. She has performed at Carnegie Hall as a member of Ensemble ACJW and as a soloist and chamber musician throughout Europe, North and South America, and Iceland. She is a member of The Knights Chamber Orchestra, The Beauséjour Trio, Troika, Tres Americas Project, and Pangea. With her duo partner, Ilya Kazantsev, she won a first prize in the Chamber Music Foundation of New England's 2008 International Chamber Music Ensemble Competition. She studied with Antonio Lysy at McGill University, and with Timothy Eddy at The Juilliard School and the Mannes College of Music.

A winner of Astral's 2006 National Auditions, Curtis is also the recipient of the inaugural Milka/Astral violin prize, designated for a violinist invited to join the Astral Artists roster. Noted for her dynamic performances, she appears regularly as a featured soloist and collaborative chamber musician across the U.S. and abroad. She is also an accomplished composer; her works have been performed in New York City, Italy's Spoleto Festival, and the Verbier Festival de Musique in Switzerland, among others. She is the founder and director of the Tres Americas Project, a non-profit, community-focused exploration of the musical traditions of the Americas. Curtis holds a Bachelor of Music degree from Mills College in California and a Master of Music degree from The Juilliard School.

Dyer has charmed audiences worldwide as a chamber musician and soloist in New York City's Merkin Hall, Carnegie Hall, Jordan Hall in Boston, numerous venues in Europe, Mexico, and along the Amazon River in Peru. She is a founding member of the self-conducted string orchestra, A Far Cry, acclaimed by the Boston Globe as 'one of Boston's most promising classical music groups.' She has performed with musical personalities such as Roger Tapping, Markus Schirmer and Gil Kalish, and recorded with several non-classical artists, including Humanwine, Grizzly Bear, the Monolith and David Saw. An award-winning musician, she holds a bachelor's degree from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and a master's degree with academic distinction and graduate diploma from the New England Conservatory.

For information, contact Suzanne Jones, Robertson Library, at (902) 566-0393 or sjones@upei.ca

Dr. Heather Morrison, Chief Health Officer for PEI and a UPEI alumna (BSc 1991), will give a public presentation on Tuesday, March 16, at 7:30 p.m., in the Alex H. MacKinnon Auditorium (Room 242), Don and Marion McDougall Hall.

A reception will follow in Schurman Market Square. This is the third and final presentation in the UPEI Student Union's 2010 Inspiring Speakers series.

Dr. Morrison graduated from UPEI with a BSc in 1991. She was the first graduate of UPEI-and the first woman from Prince Edward Island-to attend Oxford University in England as a Rhodes Scholar. There she completed her master's and doctorate degrees, with an emphasis on Comparative Social Research and Social Policy, with a particular focus on health care.

She received her Doctor of Medicine degree from Dalhousie, and did her medical training in Community Medicine and an Emergency Medicine Fellowship at the University of Toronto. She became Chief Health Officer of PEI in July 2007, and continues to work part-time in the Emergency Room at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

Dr. Morrison lives in Charlottetown with her husband and two young daughters, aged 18 months and three years.

For information about her presentation, contact the UPEI Student Union at (902) 566-0530.

Professor Mark Lapping of the University of Southern Maine will give a public talk about food security on Thursday, March 18, at UPEI.

The Institute of Island Studies is hosting this event from noon to 1 p.m. in the Main Building Faculty Lounge. People are invited to bring their own "brown bag" lunch; drinks and sweets will be provided.

A newly appointed research associate with the Institute, Lapping will speak about food security as it relates to rural areas, land use policy and community planning. He is currently working on a project in Cumberland County, Maine, to identify vulnerable populations, assess their levels of food insecurity and develop a plan to tie them together with food banks, farmers, farmers' markets and other agencies to address food insecurity problems.

As a result of this project, he is working with Maine's Good Shepherd Food Bank to determine how the food bank will provide an estimated 36,000,000 meals this year to hungry people, using more local food production and sources. He is part of a group that is working to establish a system of community foundations to handle what will be one of the largest transfers of wealth in American history over the next 20 years.

Lapping is the Distinguished Professor of Planning and Public Policy at the University of Southern Maine. He is author of eight books and several hundred chapters, articles and papers, and sits on the board of directors of the National Campaign for Sustainable Agriculture. He has been working on food security issues for close to 20 years.

For more information, contact the Institute of Island Studies at (902) 566-0386.

Dr. Alison Neilson of the University of the Azores, Portugal, will give a presentation called 'Environmental Justice--Creative Collaborations for Challenging Stories' at UPEI on Thursday, March 18.

Neilson's talk will take place in McMillan Hall, W.A. Murphy Student Centre, from 7-8:30 p.m. She is one of three candidates for the position of director of environmental studies at UPEI.

She will explore the relevance of environmental justice to research, teaching and community development in PEI. She will also examine how seeking environmental justice can support innovative collaboration for dealing with complex environmental issues on islands, drawing from her research with environmental educators from Brazil, Iran, Colombia, Tanzania, Paraguay, and Canada; and fishers in the Azores, Portugal and outport Newfoundland. She will highlight concrete examples of practices that seek environmental justice and engage the audience in short activities for overcoming barriers of language and drawing out multiple perspectives.

For more information, please contact Dr. Pamela Courtenay-Hall, UPEI Philosophy Department and Environmental Studies Program, at (902) 894-2838 or pcourtenay@upei.ca.

Students who take part in a national survey for the 2011 Globe and Mail Canadian University Report will have a chance to win a $100 cash prize; a $50 or $25 UPEI Bookstore certificate; and a PC Notebook valued at approximately $500!

The Globe and Mail Canadian University Report online survey is active now and will be available until April 30, 2010. It should take you approximately 15 to 20 minutes to complete. If you have any questions or comments, please contact Edyta Kaznowska at ekaznowska@higheredstrategy.com

Click here to complete the survey:

Lee Danisch, president and founder of Measurand Inc. of Fredericton, NB will give a public presentation from 1:30 to 2:30 p.m. on Thursday, March 18 in MacDougall Hall, Room 242. His topic will be "Snake Sales: The customer is always right"--Talking about Technology, Business and Entrepreneurship. Everyone is welcome.

Danisch was the recipient of the 2007 Manning Award for Innovation. His business illustrates a successful experience in taking unique ideas developed in New Brunswick to the world stage. He has shown that innovation in a small city in Atlantic Canada can take on the big players around the world and win. This talk outlines some experiences he has had taking Measurand from a basement business to an award-winning, growing company.