UNews - first Director

Hill introduced as first Director of Centres and Institutes and Research Advocacy

trevor.kenney — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 16:46:02 +0000

David Hill, a respected manager and administrator with more than 40 years experience in government, not-for-profit and advocacy work will join the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge as the first Director of Centres and Institutes and Research Advocacy.

Hill, a long-time Lethbridge resident who has called Edmonton home for the past six years, is presently the Executive Director of Water Resources for Alberta Innovates-Energy and Environment Solutions.
"In his new role, David will be responsible for assisting in the growth, development and ongoing administrative needs of centres and institutes at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge, as well as facilitating government and industry interaction with ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge centres, institutes and individual faculty members," says Dr. Dan Weeks, the U of L's vice-president (research). "We are extremely pleased to see David return to Lethbridge and to have him on our team."
As the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ has grown its research base, it has recently developed several research centres and institutes to combine the talents of faculty, technical staff and community partners. Growth of research centres and institutes in strategic areas and the continued development of existing centres and institutes is a key feature of the Strategic Research Plan of the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge.
Weeks says Hill's career experiences, which have a strong focus on developing relationships with government, researchers, regulatory agencies and policymakers, will be a key asset to the
U of L.
"As we bring more people together, and enhance our work with regional, national and international partners, we need people such as David, who has a proven ability to move ideas forward to a wide variety of audiences."
Hill is well known both provincially and nationally as a key advocate for water research, water use policies and irrigation management, two key elements of his previous career experiences and, through the Water Institute for Sustainable Environments (WISE), a pillar of research strength at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge.
He has led public-private sector research initiatives and collaborated on international research and policy. He has served as a member of the Alberta Water Council since its inception, representing first irrigated agriculture, and has represented the science and research community since the fall of 2007.
Hill is active in a number of organizations critical to the development of sound water policies, among them the Canadian Committee on Irrigation and Drainage and the Canadian Water Resources Association. He is the Water Policy Co-Chair (along with Representative John (Bert) Stevenson of Idaho) for the Pacific Northwest Economic Region, is a member of the Board of Trustees of Inside Education, a member of the Board of Directors of the TEC Fund Limited Partnership (Edmonton) and has been a participant of the Rosenberg International Forum on Water Policy (��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of California, Berkeley) since 2004.
Additionally, he has served on Alberta's Endangered Species Conservation Committee, the Alberta Environmentally Sustainable Agriculture Council and was an advisory member of the Board of Directors for the Northwest Irrigation Operators Inc. in Boise, Idaho for five years.
Hill will join the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge Office of Research Services on Sept. 1, 2012.

Foot headlines Prentice Session

trevor.kenney — Wed, 13 May 2009 19:55:32 +0000

The ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge's Prentice Institute is off and running with the recent appointment of Dr. Susan McDaniel as its first director. Now, the Institute presents a special keynote speaker, Dr. David K. Foot, as part of the 2nd Annual Prentice Session.

Foot, professor of Economics at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Toronto, is co-author of the best-selling books Boom, Bust & Echo: How to Profit from the Coming Demographic Shift and Boom, Bust & Echo: Profiting from the Demographic Shift in the 21st Century. These books reflect his research on the relationships between economics and demographics and on the resulting implications for both private and public policies.

On Friday, Foot presents Inevitable Surprises: Demographics and Economics in a Global Context. The event is open to everyone and begins at 3 p.m. in the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ Theatre.

The aging Boomer generation and the coming of age of their children, the Echo generation, are having major implications for businesses, governments and nonprofit organizations as well as for economic performance.

Based on predictable behaviour over the human life cycle, Foot explores the many varied implications of changing demographics from slowing economic growth and the ineffectiveness of interest policies to the rise of the service sector; from school closings to the growth in gardening and bird-watching. Change can be anticipated, but without an understanding of demographics, it arrives in many forms as yet another inevitable surprise.

Foot's research has resulted in contributions to a variety of specific fields such as marketing, human resource planning, corporate organization, saving and investing, housing, health, education, recreation and leisure, unemployment, migration, government expenditures, and intergovernmental relations.

The two-day Prentice Session event runs Friday and Saturday at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ and also features presentations by Dr. Alfons Weersink and Dr. Angus Thompson. They will address Demographics and Economic Hard Times. For more information, contact Deirdre Coburn at 403-380-1814 or via e-mail at deirdre.coburn@uleth.ca

Prentice in good hands with McDaniel as lead

trevor.kenney — Tue, 12 May 2009 20:43:16 +0000

��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge President Dr. Bill Cade chats about what's happening in the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ community

It was with great pleasure that the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ announced the appointment of Dr. Susan McDaniel as the first Director of the Prentice Institute. When the Institute was first established in 2006, thanks to the generous donation of the Prentice family, the mandate was to create an internationally recognized centre for the research of big-picture issues relating to global population change and demographics. At that time we expected to attract someone of great prominence to the role of Director because of the opportunity it presented.

Dr. McDaniel is exactly the calibre of researcher we envisioned filling this role and I am excited to have her join the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ. I look forward to watching the Prentice Institute take shape under her stewardship.

As we approach Spring Convocation, I want to congratulate personally all those who will be participating in this joyous occasion. You have worked hard over your years here at the U of L and it is exciting to see that work pay off in the culmination of your goals.

I have been through many convocation ceremonies and while they are all similar in nature, each one is unique in its own right. I want to thank the many people who make the event happen, from the convocation committee to the volunteers to the Registrar's Office. I am sure they encounter a variety of glitches behind the scenes but year after year, the ceremonies continue to run like clockwork and are presented flawlessly.

It is with great pleasure that we present a number of awards at convocation. We should be proud to celebrate achievement and recognize those individuals who have distinguished themselves. As a researcher and educator, I take particular note of the Ingrid Speaker Medal and Distinguished Teacher Award honours. Congratulations respectively to Dr. Brian Titley and Dr. Ian McAdam.

Welcome back to Dave Adams, recently named the new head coach of the Pronghorns men's basketball program. Dave brings a great deal of enthusiasm to the program and I wish him well in his goal to grow what he deems, "Horns Nation". I share in his vision of a national championship team playing to sellout crowds at the 1st Choice Savings Centre.

A number of sporting dignitaries with strong ties to the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ were inducted into the Lethbridge Sports Hall of Fame recently. In fact, the entire evening was a Blue and Gold affair, right down to the event's master of ceremonies (alumnus Toby Boulet) and guest speaker (alumnus Neil Langevin). Congratulations to inductees and alumni Dori (Rodzinyak) Johnson, Danny Balderson and Don Chandler as well as Kinsmen Sportspersons of the Year and Pronghorn athletes Jim Steacy and Ashley Patzer.

Congratulations to Keith Robin, recently named the Rotary Club of Lethbridge's 2008 Citizen of the Year. A Chancellor Emeritus of the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ from 1987 to 1991, Robin was heavily involved in the LINC fundraising effort and is someone who we still see often at the U of L and associated events.

Finally, I look forward to the upcoming Board of Directors retreat later this month. It will be held at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ for the first time in quite a while and will help the Board appreciate what it is like to be a student here on campus. It promises to be an enlightening event.

Prentice Institute taking shape with McDaniel appointment

trevor.kenney — Tue, 12 May 2009 16:15:48 +0000

Numbers can be cold, hard and impersonal. Put them in the hands of Dr. Susan McDaniel however and they can be used to influence policy decisions that effect change at the most personal of levels.

The newly appointed director of the Prentice Institute for Global Population and Economy is an internationally renowned sociology researcher and demographics expert, combining her love for mathematics with a penchant to study people and society's big-picture issues. It was a research focus that was initially unintentional but has proven to be a life's work.

"Demography allows you to see how individual actions don't add up to what you think they'll add up to," McDaniel explains.
"The collective outcome of individual actions is very different than what the individuals intend and it's that kind of mystery that entices me. To me it's phenomenal because some of it is counter-intuitive and I'm still fascinated by that."

McDaniel returns to Alberta (the place she mostly refers to as home) from Utah where she was a senior scholar at the Institute of Public and International Affairs and Professor of Family and Consumer Studies at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Utah. Previously, she'd spent 15 years at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Alberta as a full professor of sociology and another three years at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Windsor.

Her return is a testament to the U of L, its vision and the opportunity afforded her as the first director of the Prentice Institute.

"There were no push factors for me leaving Utah, it was all pull," McDaniel says. "I'm hoping to really build this institute as a centre that people will say, 'The Prentice Institute is a leader on . . .'. That would really be great."

The mandate of the Prentice Institute is to promote the research of big-picture issues relating to global population change and demographics, among other topics. McDaniel is enthused by the opportunity to be in on the ground floor of constructing the Institute and its reputation.

"My goal is building something that's not just flash and dash but something solid that will last for a long time, and when people think about population issues and economy, they think about the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge," she says.

Getting to this point has been a long and non-traditional route for McDaniel.
Entering post-secondary study as a math major, a bad experience in her first course turned her eye elsewhere and she found demography.

"It was a question of using mathematics to study people and I thought, wow, I've found my calling," she says.

Through demography she slowly made her way into studying the societal impacts of her demographic research. Ironically, she is now world renowned as a research sociologist, has written an introductory sociology textbook and taught the course at a post-secondary level but because she entered the field through the back door, never actually took introductory sociology.

McDaniel's extensive research, publishing and teaching record reflect her varied interests and research on demographic aging, generational relations, family change and the social impacts of technology.

The arrival of the Prentice Institute comes at a perfect time for the U of L as it continues to emerge as a leading comprehensive university. McDaniel revels in building graduate programming, has a long record of collaborating with the best doctoral and post-doctoral researchers and trumpets the concept of community outreach, from local to international levels.

"The idea is to build interdisciplinary research that will have public and policy interest, but also to have outreach to the community. I want to see public issues of importance addressed here, and in a profound way," McDaniel says.
"What interests me is the notion that this is global. This is a new concept at the U of L and an area of strength that we're planning on building."

GET THE FACTS

• The Prentice Institute for Global Population and Economy was established in late 2006, when John Prentice, a Calmar, Alta., based agri-business entrepreneur, with his wife, Connie, donated $8.25 million to the U of L – the largest private philanthropic gift the U of L has received in its 40-year history.

• McDaniel took her undergraduate studies at ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Massachusetts, studied a master's degree at Cornell ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ and her PhD at ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Alberta.

• A lover of bird watching, walking and jogging, McDaniel is apt to be spotted enjoying the outdoors with her one-year-old Maltese puppy Victoria

• Her research on gender and aging issues led to her involvement in the Dove soap self-esteem campaign

• McDaniel is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada

• In addition to her role as director of the Prentice Institute, McDaniel will also teach an undergraduate course at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ

UNews - first Director

Hill introduced as first Director of Centres and Institutes and Research Advocacy

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Prentice in good hands with McDaniel as lead

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