Members' Posting

This page for members to post events, surveys and items of interest to circulate to other members. Please forward the information to the CCUBC Secretariat info@ccubc.ca for posting.

Reports

Report on the Role of University Size in Assessment of NSERC Discovery Grant Applications(PDF)
Prepared by: Douglas Morris, Group Chair, Evolution and Ecology, 20 April 2011

Surveys

Posted: November 11, 2011

In your University, can adjunct professors assume full supervision of graduate students?
If yes to 1, at both MSc and PhD levels?
Do your adjunct profs teach courses in your department?
If yes to 3, is it a requirement of being an adjunct to teach a course?

Please send your response to:

Ed Byard
Associate Professor and Chair
Department of Biology
University of Winnipeg
515 Portage Avenue
Winnipeg, MB R3B 2E9
e-mail:e.byard@uwinnipeg.ca
Phone: 204-786-9723 (W); 204-257-0919 (H); 204-891-8372 (cell)
FAX: 204-774-2401

Survey from Imogen Coe

Posted: September 8, 2011

From Imogen Coe, York University. Please download the Survey, (Word document format) complete and send to Imogen Coe: coe@yorku.ca

The current funding situation in Canada is generating a lot of discussion. Various approaches are being instituted or considered by departments, faculties and senior administration to address falling success rates. One commonly cited approach that is widely believed to help increase success rates in, for instance, tri-council competitions is internal peer review. Recent proposals to institute internal review processes in our department have triggered a lot of discussion. I’m interested in what the situation is at other biology departments across Canada. I hope to be able to present these findings at the meeting in November. Many thanks for your assistance and any information you can provide – even if its simply that no, you don’t do any internal review at all and have no intention of doing so.

This is a short, informal questionnaire to find out what the current state of grant review is in departments of biology (CCUBC members) across Canada. The questions are a mix of yes and no and open ended responses.

Please be as expansive or as concise as you like.

Does your department have an internal review process (of any kind)?

Yes / No

If yes, is it for all grants regardless of funding agency?

Yes / No / Some agencies

If no, is it something that is being considered? Is it even feasible in your department?

If you have an internal review process, is it mandatory?

How does it work?

Is it tied to future eligibility for bridge funding?

If you don’t have internal review, is it something that your department, your dean or anyone else is considering at your institution?

Has your department discussed the implications for academic freedom and/or intellectual property rights that might be considerations for some individuals if required or mandated to provide a grant application to other individuals for review before submission?

Letter Campaign

Posted: September 30, 2011

Dear Biology Chairs:

Please click on this link to access the letter in Word format that I have penned, along with our Department Research Committee Chair, Dr. Tony Percival-Smith, and sent to Hon. C. Paradis, Minister of Industry, and copied to Industry Critics from the other major parties, as well as our local MPs and the President of NSERC.

Please feel free to use this letter as a template if you are inclined to send a similar one to your local MPs.

Presentation and discussion on this matter will take place during the CCUBC November meeting formally on Saturday, November 26, 2011 at 10:30 am after the NSERC Discovery Grant session and informally during the various social networking opportunities at the meeting. So come and talk with me.

See you in Halifax,
Mark Bernards
University of Western Ontario