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Co-operative Education & Career Services Tel: 519-824-4120 Ext. 52323

www.coop.uoguelph.ca www.careerservices.uoguelph.ca

THE PORTICO •

WINTER 2006

CONTENTS [3 -

president's page ] • [ grad news -

36 ]

IN AND AROUND THE UNIVERSITY

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ALUMNI MATTERS

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CELEBRATES

a recent grad's selection as a Rhodes Scholar and the naming of two faculty to the OrderofCanada.The campus held International Education Week in November, featuring guest speakers, films, a performance evening hosted by the Indian Students Association and information sessions about the University's study-abroad programs.

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[ 6 -

cover story ]

LEARNING ABOUT THE WORLD

NE GRAD'S

biotech company could hold the key to helping women prevent the transmission of HIV/ AIDS. Alumni in the U.K. gathered to support U of G's London Semester program, while local alumni welcomed new international students to campus and the University celebrated the 20th anniversary of the President's Council giving group.

This special issue of The Portico features the University of Guelph's international community and commitment.

Internationalism is a strategic goal pursued by the entire University family to ensure that we bring a global perspective into our classrooms, pursue research that considers world needs, and enrich our campus communities by inviting the world to U of G, attracting more international students and making it possible for our Canadian students to study in partner institutions around the world.

32

SPECIAL INSERT INSIDE on the cover Phocus Ntayombya, PhD '93, spoke about food security and the need to educate children in Rwanda during the University's Hopper Lecture in International Development.

Photo by Dean Palmer

At the centre of this magazine, you'll find a special alumni newsletter if you're a graduate of the Colleges of Arts, Biologi· cal Science, Physical and Engineering Science, and Social and Applied Human Sciences or the Ontario Agricultural College. Look for these publications as regular inserts in The Portico, brought to you on behalf of your academic college or alumni association. Please note: Ontario Veterinary College graduates receive their newsletter in a separate mailing.

U of G alumni receive The Portico in countries around the world.

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Winter 2006 1

ÂŁPORTICO Winter 2006 â&#x20AC;˘ VOLUME 38

ISSUE I

Editor Mary Dickieson Director Charles Cunningham Art Direction Peter Enneson Design Inc. Contributors Jennifer Brett Fraser Barbara Chance, BA '74 Lori Bona Hunt Rebecca Kendall, BA '99 SPARK Program Writers Stacey Curry Gunn Andrew Vowles, B.Sc. '84 Advertising Inquiries Scott Anderson 519-827-9169 Direct all other corresponde11ce to:

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The Portico magazine is published three times a year by Communications and Public Affairs at the University of Guelph. Its mission is to enhance the relationship between the Un iversity and its alumni and friends and promote pride and commitment within the University community. All material is copyright 2006. Ideas and opin-

V oted No.1 Eastern North America 's four-season, international destination resort Terry Goodyear, OAC '67

ions expressed in the articles do not necessar il y reflect the ideas or opinions of the Un iversity or the editors.

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2 THE PORTICO

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UNIVERSITY 9FGUELPH

MAKING STRATEGIC CHOICES TO IMPROVE ACADEMIC QUALITY

NIVERSITIES ARE ALWAYS PLANNING forthe future, and 2006 will be no exception as the University of Guelph transfers to a fully integrated planning process that considers goals, priorities and resource commitments across the whole institution. The result will be a five-year plan that reduces the effect of uncertain and often-changing government funding and enables us to move forward from an era of making change to making choices that arc more informed, more effective and more successful.

The University's international activities represent one area where we need to be more successful. In 1995, internationalism was reaffirmed by U of G as a strategic goal, yet fewer than 12 per cent of our undergraduate students engage in any form of educational experience outside Canada as part of their Guelph degree program. And only two per cent of undergraduates are international students. In an increasingly global world, that must change.

We must also change the way we develop academic programs to ensure that we are teaching with a global perspective in our Canadian classrooms.

This is not to suggest that Guelph has failed to improve in the area of international education, but the pace has been far too slow during the last decade of dealing with unprecedented increases in the domestic demand for post-secondary education.

Across the colleges and through the Centre for International Programs, the University does indeed offer some excellent travel opportunities for students, but we need to provide more and make it easier for Canadian students to participate. Many of our faculty have expertise that is sought after worldwide, but we want to increase the capacity for all faculty to gain international experience. Our campus benefits from a cadre of international students who willingly share their cultures, but we should do more to build our reputation as a destination of choice for international undergraduates. And we should make a greater effort to involve alumni who live and work outside Canada. There is much that we can learn from their experiences.

Another choice that speaks to the quality of the University is the creation of a new College of Management and Economics (CME). This college represents a natural evolution of the development of business and management interests at Guelph. It will enhance the standing of our business degrees and improve the employment prospects of our students.

Since the 1997/1998 academic year, enrolments in the bachelor of commerce program have increased 88 per cent, and graduate enrolments have also grown sub-

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CME will provide an appropriate administrative unit to handle growth and create a more focused academic group. At the same time, there will be an opportunity to review and strengthen the important programs and research in agribusiness and agri-policy.

The University Senate has also approved a recommendation to place the Faculty of Environmental Sciences within the Ontario Agricultural College. The environment is one of the cornerstones of OAC's mandate, and most departments in the college already participate in the delivery of the bachelor of environmental science curriculum. This won't change the importance of collaboration with other colleges, but it will provide a distinct home and champion for programs in environment and environmental research .

Rethinking our approach to internationalism, creating a new college to advance the reputation of our management programs and taking advantage of OAC's capacity in environmental science are good choices that pay careful attention to the strategic alignment of the University's academic enterprise at all levels.

ALASTAIR SUMMERLEE PRES I DENT

Winter 2006 3

PEOPLE IN THE NEWS â&#x20AC;˘

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CAMPUS HIGHLIGHTS

IN &AROUND A taste of travel

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helpers in the Centre for International Programs and dedicated travellers. During International Education Week in November, they held a bake sale featuring some of their favourite international treats. The proceeds went to support the World University Service of Canada's student refugee program. Clockwise from top: Robert Gibbs, agricultural business; Sheeba Thallury, an international student from

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Rhodes Scholar fulfils dream RANI KAJENTHIRA, A 2005 engineering graduate of the University of Guelph, has won a prestigious Rhodes Scholarship to pursue graduate studies in earth sciences at the University of Oxford.

She is one of two students from Ontario- and II nationwide- to receive a Rhodes Scholarship in 2005.

The award, which covers tuition and fees and provides a living allowance, is worth about $35,000 US per year.

"I have always wanted to go to Oxford; it's been a dream of mine since

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high school;' says Kajenthira, who lives in Scarborough, Ont. "!just didn't think it would ever be financially feasible!'

She hopes her graduate work in earth sciences will lead to her developing cost-effective remediation technology to remove contaminants from soil and groundwater in developing countries. She became interested in the subject while conducting a research project as a U of G student with Engineers Without Borders. "I was working on introducing a clean water supply to a rural community in Tanzania;' she says. " It really opened my eyes."

Her long-term career goal is to work as a liaison between industry and non-governmental organizations. ''I'd like to connect the experience of people in industry with the passion and contacts that NGOs have. We need to bring them together to create a greater impact."

India studying biochemistry; Roxanne Li, food science; Heather Nugent, engineering; Delancy Greig, international development; and Virginia Roberts, biomedical sciences. Among them, they've travelled for study to Australia, Austria, Colombia, France, Hong Kong, India, japan, Swaziland, Switzerland, Thailand, West Africa and Zimbabwe.

UNIVERSIT GLOBAL ECONOMIES PROFIT FROM EDUCATION

• Profs. Judith Thompson and

Robert Enright have been named to the Order of Canada. Considered one of Canada's finest playwrights, Thompson was recog-

education are among the key factors affecting human capital and a nation's economic well-being, says econom ics professor Thanasis Stengos.

"Investments in human capital benefit countries in different ways," says Stengos, who drew data from 51 nations for his research. "The developing world is benefiting from educating women, whereas the western world is making more use of the human capital attained by males."

In developing countries, the primary education of women is the most advantageous form of human capital,

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ENDER AND LEVEL OF

he says. For example, educating women about fami ly planning and alternative food production methods that aren't as labour-intensive often decreases the number of ch il dren born, increasing per-capita income. Keeping females enrolled in school past the primary level also pays off, he says.

With the rise of an informationbased economy in developed nations, however, the leading human capital investment for nationa l economic growth is the post-secondary education of males. Stengos says women haven't profited as much economically from their college and university educations.

In many cases, employers overlook women because of the added expense of maternity leave and the training it requires, he says.

According to Stengos, Zimbabwe, Mexico, Malaysia and Ecuador arc among nations seeing the least amount of return on educational investment, whereas Ethiopia, Ireland, the United States and japan rank among the highest. Canada is in the middle group of countries that includes the United Kingdom, Germany, France and Italy.

nized for her outstanding contribut ions in arts and writing.

Enright, a renowned cultural journalist and U of G research professor, is edito r-at-large of the magazine BorderCrossings.

• Prof. John Walsh , former associate dean of Guelph's Faculty of Management, has begun a five-year term as vice-provost of the University of Guelph-Humber.

• U of G's Ridgetown Campus turned sod in October for a $7.2million rural development facility.

The Rudy H. Brown Rural Development Centre will be home base for the University's bachelor of bioresource management program, which starts in September 2006.

• Prof. Chris McKenna, associate vicepresident (research), has been appointed interim dean of the University's new College of Management and Economics. A former chair of the Department of Economics, McKenna says the new college, which officially opens May 1, will advance teaching and research programs in Guelph's management and business-related programs.

• Prof. Georgia Mason, Animal and

Opening doors for international vets

Poultry Science, travelled to Berlin, Germany, last summer to accept an

Ontario's veterinary profession and the

oper of the program, which will also sup-

inaugural international award co-

provincial government have launched a new

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sponsored by Charles River Labo-

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trained veterinarians continue their careers

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in Ontario. The Veterinary Skills, Training

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have passed the North American veterinary

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Winter 2006 5

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BEFORE we photographed Phocus Ntayombya for the cover of this special international issue, I chatted with him about the weather forecast for Guelph and the climate in his native Rwanda. It was Dec. l, and he'd just travelled half way around the globe to deliver the University's annual Hopper Lecture in International Development. He would speak that evening about his work as a project officer for UNICEF. UST

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He asked me if I had visited any Afr ican countries and was visibly disappointed when I admitted that I've never travelled outside North America." I guess you Ca nadians don't need to travel," h e sa id. "You already have everything."

Whi le the shutter clicked to expose his image to film, tayombya exposed his frustration with westerners who appear to ignore the underdeveloped world. Maybe Canadians can afford to be indifferent about

world travel, but he sees it as a necessity in his life and an important part of higher education for people in developing countries.

His message, I think, was clear: "To travel is to learn how to make your life better."

Ntayombya, who earned a PhD at Guelph in 1993, spoke eloquently about his belief that education holds the key to his country's future. As long as children remain uneducated and li ve in poverty, they will know on ly what they've seen, he said, and

LEARN

BETTER WORLD nalizing the campus community Introduction by Mary Dickieson â&#x20AC;˘ Signature photos by Dean Palmer the world will surely witness a repeat of atrocities like the violence that turned to genocide in Rwanda in 1994.

From his viewpoint as an environmentalist, he used the Hopper Lecture to discuss food security in Rwanda and asked Canada and other western countries to form partnerships with his country. Mentoring relationships between organizations and businesses would provide another valuable form of education and training, he said.

I' m confident I could find 400 future Guelph graduates who would agree with the message of this African alumnus. That's the number of undergraduate students who st udied abroad during 2005. Those who contributed to this special issue of The Portico were adamant that their international experiences have changed their lives. " It's such a diverse and interesting world, and you don't realize it's accessible to you until you go there;' says Virginia Roberts, a bio-

medical sciences student from Newmarket, Ont., who studied in Australia.

Shymal Chandra spent a semester at U of G in 2002 as part of his studies at the University of the South Pacific in Fiji. Like Roberts, he called the exchange "one of the greatest experiences of my life" and a "window to the world through which I met people with different cultures, languages and religions, most of which we have never seen back home."

Winter 2006 7

U OF G ADVANCES INTERNATIONALISM AS A STRATEGIC GOAL FIFTEEN YEARS AGO,afederalCommission oflnquiry on Canadian University Education received a report from the Canadian Bureau of International Education that said internationalism was key to Canada's scientific, technological and economic competitiveness and advised that "Canada's universities must become bastions of internationalism."

The University of Guelph began that process back in 1967 when it was the first university in Canada to establish an administrative unit devoted to international programs. The involvement of faculty overseas -particularly in development work -led to the early recognition that Guelph should be outward- looking in its responsibilities.

Internationalism is now one of the University's strategic objectives.

While Guelph's international portfolio compares favourably with other Canadian institutions, it falls short of our own institutional expectations. By the time they graduate, about 12 per cent of Guelph undergraduates have studied outside Canada as part of their degree program. On ly two per cent of undergraduates are international students.

The year 2006 dawns on a new plan to boost our international involvement. The University's international portfolio is now shared between three offices: the Office of Research (Prof. Anthony Clarke, acting vicepresident (research and international relations), the Associate Vice-President for Student Affairs (Brenda Whiteside), and the Associate Vice-President for Academic Programs (Prof. Alan Shepard).

Working with registrar Brian Pettigrew, international student advisor Benny Quay, and Lynne Mitchell, director of the Centre for International Programs, these administrators are proposing new strategies to internationalize both the campus and the curriculum.

In regrating overseas activities in to Guelph degree programs is one idea. Shepard hopes to develop international faculty exchanges and team teaching that would have Guelph students working via the Internet with students taking the same course at a foreign university. He also envisions service learning opportunities with international organizations.

8 THE PORTICO

Shepard says academic departments will look more closely at ways to incorporate international sources and case studies in course material. Future graduate courses may require some international study or include a foreign language component. It has been suggested that Guelph consider additions to its own language offerings and the establishment of an Asian studies program based on faculty expertise in this geographic region.

Clarke adds that faculty involvement is central to the University's international strategies. In today's academic climate, virtually every faculty member has a network of international colleagues and research collaborators. The next step is to use those grassroots connections to strengthen the globa l perspective within our curriculum as well as in our research programs.

No doubt influenced by his December 2005 participation in an Ontario government trade mission to China, Clarke says it's important to consider whom we want to partner with and then create on-campus interest groups or centres of interest based on geography.

The Office of Research already takes a campus-wide approach to applications to the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and the International Development Research Centre. Such co llaboration resulted in two successful CIDA grants in 2005 for major projects in Africa.

Increasing the number of Guelph students who study outside Canada means dealing with a myriad of financial and organizational roadblocks.

"You pay the same tuition when you study abroad, but you also have to pay for airfare and all your accommodation and living costs;' says Shepard. "As a result, studying abroad is not an option for some students."

As a first step in reducing travel costs U of G approached Aeroplan to join its charitable pooling program. Any Aeroplan member can donate accumulated miles to be used by undergraduate and graduate students travelling internationally for exchanges, semesters abroad, research or study.

In terms of where our students study, Guelph offers a lot of choice. We have several field courses, five semester-abroad programs managed by U of G and student exchange agreements with 63 universities in 29 countries. These partners provide a

breadth of opportunity for study in all regions of the world and all disciplines taught at Guelph, and they arc attracting a growing number of applicants.

Semester-abroad programs in England, Poland, India, Guatemala and France are fully subscribed with groups of 20 to 25 students each time they are offered. The number of students who go on exchange programs has grown from I 7 in I 992 to 160 in 2005. The Guelph demand for exchanges is high, says Mitchell, but our partner institutions don't always have students ready to study in Canada. Shepard plans to re-evaluate these agreements and look for opportunities to increase the number of Guelph students being accepted.

It would also help to increase bursaries and scholarships for foreign students, says Mitchell. Although Guelph has maintained the lowest international tuition fees in the province, they are still twice what Canadian students pay. Shymal Chandra was able to come from Fiji because he received a scholarship from the Commonwealth Universities Study Abroad Consortium. U of G also provides a$ I ,000 annual scholarship to a full-time visiting exchange student, but such awards are limited.

"When we provide funding to African students, for example, we attract students who would not otherwise be able to come to Guelph and open up opportunities for our students to go there," says Mitchell.

In order to get a Study Permit/Visa, Immigration Canada requires international students to have sufficient funds to pay for one full year of tuition fees and living expenses, approximately $22,000 CON. That's an essential requirement because foreign students are not allowed to work off campus.

Whiteside says the Council of Ontario Universities has been actively lobbying government to change the policy and now hopes to see the change enacted by fall 2006.

She sees lots of job opportunities for international students in the Guelph area and says off-campus work could make a tremendous difference to their financial situation

and their transition to Canadian life.

"When Canadian students get into financial difficulty, they can drop a course and take on a part-time job. International students don't have that option. Many have such tight budgets and commitments that they can't afford to stretch out their time in Canada."

U of G already offers a number of specialized transition programs for international students. As with Canadian students, these orientation programs kick into gear over the Internet even before the students arrive in Guelph. International student adviser Benny Quay is ready to help students after they arrive in Guelph and also co-ordinates volunteers who act as campus and community advisors to help students get oriented.

If international students feel comfortable at Guelph, they'll be more successful and will contribute more to campus life, says Whiteside. Her office is encouraging the start of new social and cultural clubs for international students. She is looking for ways to improve ESL support and promote English chat buddies and writing programs already offered by the Library Learning Commons.

Many international students develop lasting friendships in the Guelph community by becoming volunteers off-campus and through connections made at the annual international student dinner hosted by the Alumni-in-Action group.

The attention international students receive on campus mimics the assistance given to Guelph students leaving Canada on approved U of G programs and exchanges.

In 2002, Guelph staff collaborated with international educators at York and Queen's universities to develop an online academic travel orientation program called DepartSmart.

It has become the standard for 15 other Canadian universities that use the program's comprehensive information on everything from safety and health and travel preparation to cultural adaptation.

"Our goal is to help students get the most out of their intenational experience and bring a new perspective to their studies and campus activities," says Mitchell.

CREDITS: Writers: Barbara Chance, Andrew Vowles, Rebecca Kendall, Lori Bona Hunt, Rachelle Cooper, Robert Fieldhouse, Barry Gunn, Christine Loomis, Madelaine Hill, Kristina Rody, Alicia Roberts, Marianne Clark and Kristy Nudds. Photographers: Martin Schwalbe, Grant Martin, Rebecca Kendall, Dave Carter (Guelph Mer路 cury), Paula B1alski, Kevin Hogg, Mary D1ckieson, Sally Humphries, Madelanie H1ll, Tamsyn Murray, S. Wei路 burn (DFID), )ana )anakiram and NASA.

Winter 2006 9

to take advantage of international programs being offered. We want to examine ways to make their transitions in other nations smoother."

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HELPING VETERINARIANS HELP ANIMALS â&#x20AC;˘ Mira Ziolo, B.Sc. '02, says she's one of hundreds of veterinary students in Canada interested in international veterinary work.

That's part of her motivation for joining the newly formed Veterinarians Without Borders/ Veterinaires sans frontieres-Canada (VWB-VSF-Canada). The first such group in North or South America, VWB was launched last July in Victoria, B.C. Guelph population medicine professor David Waltner-Toews, PhD '85, was elected president.

He says many Guelph graduates were involved in establishing the group, which sent a team to Sri Lanka as its first official project.

Ziolo, who was born in England and grew up in Ontario, is working with students at all four of Canada's veterinary schools to develop partnerships through VWB, the Global Vets program and the International Veterinary Students' Association.

TULANE STUDENT AT U OF G • When Tulane University closed after hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, Christopher Kent didn't th ink he could afford to take a semester off from his graduate work, so h e ch ecked out the other universities offering to take Tulane students and found U of G to be a good fit for his studies in 18th -century Atlantic world history.

Kent says he was nervous when he arrived at the border in Port Huron, Mich., last September. "I didn't know what to expect or whether they'd let me cross." All he had was a letter from Guelph professor Karen Racine and some telephone numbers.

The immigration official ended up being aU of G graduate. "She was a joy. She went on and on about how much she loved Guelph and would I say'hi' to professor so-and-so in philosophy. She was unbelievably kind."

Kent returned to Lousiana at the end of December with parting thanks: "I can't describe how grateful I am, how kind the offer was for me to come here."

DEBUGGING THE U.S. NAVY • Chemistry professor Mario Monteiro has been collaborating with the U.S. navy for the past three years to develop a carbohydrate-based vaccine for Campylolwcter.

Often picked up from improperly cooked chicken, this bacterium is a leading cause of food poisoning.

If hundreds of sailors in a naval vessel get diarrhea at the same time, it's a big problem, says Monteiro.

An even bigger problem worldwide is the prevalence of another common gut microbe, Helicobacter pylori, which can lead to gastritis, ulcers and stomach cancer. About half of the world's population is affected by H. pylori during their lifetime, including nine out of 10 people in developing nat ions and some 30 per cent of people in developed countries.

In early 2000, Monteiro was part of a group that d iscovered the surface carbohydrates of Helicobacter can mimic those on human b lood cells, explaining why the pathogen is so prevalent and why reinfection is common. Once a person gets Helicobacter, it can stay forever, so developing an arsenal of vaccines against it could be a tremendous help.

Monte iro explains that all bacteria and

viruses have distinctive carbohydrate structures projecting from their surfaces. The body's immune system recognizes these carbohydrates as a way of identifying the pathogen, then responds by releasing pathogen-fighting cells to attack and destroy them.

He's using organic chemistry too ls and techniques to dup licate the carbohydrates of Campylobacter and H. pylori. By introducing these synthetic carbohydrates to the immune system, he believes he can train the system to respond with disease-fighting cells, as if the real pathogen had invaded.

The idea of making vaccines based on sugars arose early in the 20th century, but then along came penicillin and a subsequent reliance on antib iotics.

Recent concerns about growing microbial resistance to drugs have sparked interest in alternatives, but few pharmaceutical companies make carbohydrate-based vaccines because of their complex chemistry.

Most traditional vaccines are based on whole cells or proteins and carry a risk of contamination that is eliminated by Monterio's duplicated carbohydrate strategy. He stresses that it can take 20 years before a drug is ready for market.

TEXAS PHANTOM GETS A NEW LEASE ON LIFE • A nine-year-old Clydesdale from Texas has a new lease on life thanks to a technique pioneered at the Ontario Veterinary College.

Phantom was successfully treated for atrial fibrillation (irregular heart rhythm) by using catheter-mounted intracardiac electrodes to deliver a high-voltage jolt to the heart. The 885-kilogram patient is the largest ever treated using the technique, says OVC staff veterinarian Kim McGurrin.

OVC has successfully treated 54 of the 55 horses brought there since 2002. That's a 98-per-cent success rate. In comparison, traditional drug th erapy works on 75 to 90 per ce n t of horses.

Phantom's owner, Stan ley W hi te Jr. of Argyle, Tex., searched for treatment alternatives for nearly a year. Finall y, his veterinarian heard about the technique developed at OVC by a team that includes McGurrin, B.Sc. '98, DVM '98 and D.V.Sc. '04; Prof.

Peter Physick-Sheard, GD '73 and M.Sc. '82; and staff veterinarian Dan Kenney.

Winter 2006 11

WHEN TWO CULTURES MEET • What began as a casual visit to the University of Guelph led to a story that involves fate, friendship and the blending of two cultures.

Mexican-born Alejandra Regand met her Swiss-born husband, Stephan )an1pen, in 1998 at U of G's Department of Food Science. She was considering doing her master's degree abroad and had come to see what Guelph had to offer. She met briefly with then department chair Prof. Rickey Yada, who suggested she take a look around campus and through some of the labs. He asked )am pen, a master's student who happened to be in the office at the time, to do the honours and give Regand a tour. She returned to Mexico soon afterwards, and her only contact with her tour guide was a few follow-up letters requesting academic information, which jam pen gladly sent.

Regand, who now teaches at Ryerson, returned to Canada the following year to begin her master's degree. )am pen, B.Sc. '95 and M.Sc. '99, had started working at the Guelph Food Technology Centre at U of G, but stumbled across her again while meeting up with some friends in Food Science to go out for his birthday.

"I had a mid-term the next day and, in theory, should have stayed home to study," says Regand, "but I thought I'd go out with him anyway." They were married in 2002.

As a couple, they enjoy sharing their cultures with each other. jampen, who became a Canadian citizen 20 years ago, is rediscovering his Swiss roots, while Regand continues to adapt to life in a country far different than her own.

She says one of the draws for studying in Canada was her belief that it's a country open to diversity and welcoming of all people. "Mexico is fairly homogenous in terms of culture, so Canada's diversity is quite impressive," she says.

Here, she has developed friendships with people from all over the world. jam pen, meanwhile, enjoys finding people through work and on campus who speak his first language, Swiss-German.

There aren't many big Swiss communities in Canada, he says, but somehow the Swiss always find one another wherever they go.

The couple say their cultural differences only serve to enhance their lives.

12 THE PORTICO

MEXICAN SCIENTIST BRINGS BEE EXPERTISE • In his new faculty position in the Department of Environmental Biology, Mexican honeybee expert Ernesto Guzman is consulting with Ontario beekeepers on some of the industry's most critical concerns, including the potential for introducing the Africanized or so-called killer bee.

He arrived in Canada just after the federal government opened the border to imports of honeybee queens from the United States, ending an 18-year ban on shipments of American mainland bees.

Killer bees belong to the same species of Apis mellifera as the garden-variety honeybees found in Ontario. But having developed in a different environment, Africanized bees are more aggressive.

"Africanized bees can sting seven to 20 times more than European bees," Guzman says, adding that the venom is the same in both strains. Although European bee stings don't usually kill people, Africanized bees have killed thousands.

Guzman and his colleagues in Mexico and the United States were the first researchers to pinpoint the gene responsible for defensive behaviour in killer bees. As a research entomologist at the National Institute for Agricultural and Animal Research, he led Mexico's apiculture research program and was an adjunct professor at the National University of Mexico.

At Guelph, he'll work closely with the Ontario Beekeepers Association, not only on killer bees but also on such problems as honeybee diseases caused by mites and bee-breeding programs. In Ontario, Guzman is studying the development of bees resistant to varroa mites and testing natural control products that leave honey residue-free.

ARTIST EXHIBITS IN MEXICO • Studio art professor Susan Dobson, MFA '98, had two exhibitions of work on display in Mexico City in the fall at the National Center for the Arts and at the Musco Universitario del Chopo. In September, she visited Mexico City to lecture at a symposium held in conjunction with the International Photography Biennial Fotoseptiembre.

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FOLLOWING A DREAM • Master's student Anibal Castillo comes from a working-class family in Montevideo, Uruguay, where few young people earn a university degree, even though tuition is free at the country's public university. He and his twin brother, Adrian, represent a new generation as the first in their family to attend Universidad de Ia Rcp(Iblica. Like most other successful scholars in non-traditional programs (biology and philosophy), they must immigrate to other parts of the world to pursue graduate studies and careers.

Castillo had never heard of the University of Guelph until he searched the Internet to find a graduate adviser in his field.

He arrived in September to work with Profs.

Moira Ferguson and Roy Danzmann in the Department of Integrative Biology, and says he was able to come to Canada because U of G is paying him to work as a teaching and research assistant. He's happy with his decision: "Eve ryone here in the lab and the department acts like: 'We need your help.'

They received me with a nice attitude and a natural friendliness."

ALL THE WORLD'S HER CLASSROOM

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• As an undergraduate, Riley Dillon, BA '05, spent almost as much time studying abroad as she did here at U of G. Over the course of her degree, she participated in three semesters abroad- in Mexico, India and Guatemala.

An international development student minoring in Spanish, Dillon was encouraged to complement her coursework with an international experience. And once she'd spent her first semester abroad, she realized there was much to be learned outside the classroom. Prior to this, her travel experience had been limited to a few trips with her parents, who live in Newmarket, Ont. Dillon says her experiences travelling abroad with classmates helped her grow both personally and academically, giving her a chance to discover her strengths, weaknesses and limitations. She notes, for example, that spending 40 hours straight on a train travelling through India was a good lesson in group dynamics and human interactions.

Above all, she says, international travel has given her a sense of herself within a global context.

In between semesters abroad, Dillon maintained an active involvement in international activities on campus, working for the Centre for International Programs, volunteering with the Learning Commons' Conversation Partners program, and attending a variety of other internationally oriented club events and lectures.

"Even if you don't have the opportunity to study abroad, it's still possible to have an internationally oriented experience at Guelph," she says.

Now employed at Queen's University as an international education intern, Dillon says: "The most important thing is for students to get out there because you learn so much no matter where you go."

WHERE IS GUELPH? • Three Canadians helped motivate Peter Gibbs, M.Sc. '73, to app ly for graduate work at the University of Guelph in 1971: a visiting professor at his alma mater, the University of the West Indies (UWI) campus in Barbados; a tourist from Guelph

14 THE PORTICO

whom he met on the beach; and a girl named Anita from the Toronto area.

Gibbs had never heard of Guelph before, but he sent an application to the Department of Physics and ended up studying with Prof. Jim Hunt.

He and Anita married in 1972 and have made their home in Barbados, where Gibbs is on faculty at UWI. They have two grown children and five grandchildren .

Over the years, his research has moved from molecular spectroscopy to condensed matter physics using computer simulations and, more recently, electronics control and instrumentation. He now teaches mainly electronics and robotics.

When he's not working, Gibbs is often swimming, biking or running- or sometimes doing all three. One of six siblings in a well-known athletic family, he swam in the first organized age-group championships in Barbados in 1964 and played on the national water polo team until 1998.

While attending U of G, Gibbs was captain of the Gryphon men's water polo team.

Coincidentally, his UWI colleague Robin Mahon, M.Sc. '76 and PhD '8 1, also played on the Guelph team.

After water polo came masters swimming and triathlon. Gibbs has competed in masters swimming for the past 20 years and represented Barbados three times in the Masters World Triathlon Championships, In 2004, he took time off from these sports to train for a long-distance swim that made headlines in Ontario. At age 56, he became the second-oldest person to swim across Lake Ontario and the first from the Caribbean Basin. The 50-kilometre swim took 18 hours and 40 minutes.

PROJECT CULTIVATES HONDURAN FARMERS • Prof. Sally Humphries, Sociology and Anthropology, has been working for more than 10 years with Honduran agronomists in a non-governmental organization called Fundaci6n para Ia lnvestigaci6n Participativa con Agricultores de Honduras (FIPAH), which is dedicated to supporting participatory agricultural research with Honduran hillside farmers. With funding from the Canadian International Development Agency, she helped start a youth program in 200 I that

was developed by the International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (known by the Spanish acronym CIAT) in collaboration with U of G and the University of British Columbia.

The program involves students in experiential field projects such as organic vegetable growing experiments, organic fertilization of fruit trees, research and testing of natural insecticides, comparing different com posting methods, forms oflocal garbage management, and the reforestation of micro-watersheds.

It has trained more than 240 young people aged 12 to 19, preparing budding farmers, researchers and rural extensionists for productive agricultural careers, says Humphries.

GLOBAL VETS IN PERU â&#x20AC;˘ Global Vets is a student-run organization at the Ontario Veterinary College that sends second-year veterinary students to volunteer in developing countries. The aim of the program is to gain knowledge, exchange ideas and develop the principles of the international veterinarian.

Eleven students participated in the summer of 2005, travelling in small groups to East Africa, South Africa and Peru.

The team of Christine Loomis, B.Sc. '02, Madelaine Hill and Christina Mohos went to Peru to work on four different veterinary projects, including a placement at the Taricaya Research Center located deep in the Amazon jungle. Taricaya's main focus is conservation, particularly through sustainable farming practices. A sustainable farming model shows local farmers how to provide enough food to support their family without destroying the precious rainforest.

In discussions with Taricaya staff, the OYC students discovered that a major production loss in their herd of goats was due to high mortality in newborn kids. Baby goats were being born in the overnight shelter but were being trampled to death by the older goats. "Our suggestion was to build a maternity barn for the pregnant goats and place them there 48 hours prior to birth," says Hill.

"The Taricaya staff loved this idea, and the next day there was a boat load of lumber waiting for us. We cleared a plot of land with machetes and rakes and, over the next several days, set the barn's foundation. We left Taricaya satisfied that we had fulfilled

our Global Vets objective to share our knowledge and skills."

KAYAPO STAVE OFF DEFORESTATION â&#x20AC;˘ Look at that solid green space in the middle of a satellite map of the Brazilian Amazon, says Barbara Zimmerman, B.Sc. '79 and M.Sc. '82. That verdant oasis about the size of Austria amid surrounding deforested land has resulted from her project to help a group of indigenous people conserve their traditional lands and resources.

As project director with Conservation International, a non-governmental organization based in Washington, D.C., Zimmerman divides her time between her home in Toronto and a research station in Kayapo territory in central Brazil. The project she began in 1992 in a single village lent support to the Kayapo people in their successful bid for official protection of a territory spanning more than 110,000 square kilometres- part of some one million square kilometres of indigenous lands now officially recognized by the Brazilian government.

Add in protected areas such as national parks, and about one-third of the Brazilian Amazon has at least some degree of protection, says Zimmerman. But that leaves two-thirds of the area vulnerable to development- and even those protected zones need constant vigilance, she says.

Numbering about 6,000 people, the Kayapo are holding their own- for now -against various deforestation threats, including encroachment from ranching, farming and mahogany logging.

"They need NGO support," says Zimmerman, who describes the indigenous group's lands as an island in a sea of deforestation. "Their world is changing really fast:' Her first taste of the Amazon came when she answered an ad in her second year at Guelph for a research assistant on a manatee project there. She studied frogs in the Amazon for her master's at U of G and a PhD at Florida State University during the 1980s.

Today Zimmerman still spends about four months a year in South America, enduring the six-day trek by air and land. She hopes to see other conservation agencies join the project, for the sake of indigenous peoples and the wider world around them.

Winter 2006 15

PROMOTING EDUCATION AND HOPE When children grow up poor and uneducated, they have no opportunity to see "a better life" or better ways of doing things. Guelph graduate Phocus Ntayombya says the only way to prevent a reoccurrence of atrocities like the 1994 Rwanda genocide is to protect and educate children.

Ntayombya earned a PhD in environmental biology at U of G in 1993 and worked for Rwanda's environmental ministry for several years. But he wasn't cut out to be a career administrator, so he accepted a position working at the grassroots level as a project officer with UNICEF. He returned to Guelph in November to deliver the annual Hopper Lecture in International Development. His message was simple: "Come to Rwanda." He notes that in 12 years of working in Rwanda with many United Nations agencies, he has met only one other U of G graduate and few Canadians. The country has built schools but needs to build partnerships with the industrialized world to boost trade and improve the economy, he says.

EDUCATION HAS POliTICAL IMPliCATIONS Political science professor Carol Dauda, MA '92, developed an interest in African politics when she lived and taught in Nigeria in the early 1970s. She later completed PhD research in Uganda and Zimbabwe looking at decentralization policy as it has affected African countries historically and, more recently, under global restructuring.

In the late 1990s, Dauda completed a Canadian International Development Agency project on local government effectiveness in East London on the Eastern Cape of South Africa. She focused on the ability of the new local government to reach out to previously excluded communities, including informal settlements.

Her current research involves the policy of Education For All under the auspices of UNESCO's call for universal primary education around the world by 2010. Having observed the political implications of such programs for public participation at the local level in Uganda, she is interested in the implications for implementation of such policy elsewhere in sub-Saharan Africa.

LEWIS CONDEMNS LACK OF POliTICAL LEADERSHIP When Stephen Lewis addressed a packed house in War Memorial Hall Oct. 6, he described himself as an angry man. As the United Nations special envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, he is frustrated by the insidious nature of the virus that kills two million people each year. But he is angry at the world's political leaders, who have, in his words, shown very little leadership on the AIDS issue.

"I would like to throttle ... those who've waited so unendurably long to act, those who can find infinite resources for war but never sufficient resources to ameliorate the human condition;' he said. Lewis added that anti-viral drugs are readily available in the industrialized world, but not in Africa, where life expectancy in many countries has declined from the mid-60s to under 40.

When a student asked what he would change if he had the power to change one thing in the world, Lewis said he would ensure the equality of women. Of the 26 million people in Africa living with AIDS,

60 per cent are women. These women don't have the power to abstain from intercourse or to demand that their partners use condoms, he said.

Lewis noted that there are more than 14 million orphans in sub-Saharan Africa and that this number is expected to rise to 20 million by 2010.

MAKING RESEARCH MORE ACCESSIBLE Over the next three years, faculty in the Department of Agricultural Economics and Business will participate in a series of seminars on agriculture and rural development at partner institutions in Africa- the universities of Nairobi and Ghana and Sokoine University of Agriculture in Tanzania. The seminar series is being supported by the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) to enable the developing country partners to access recent research and provide a regular forum for discussing it. Part of the IDRC program includes an assessment of the effectiveness of such remote international seminars.

MCDERMOTT HEADS liVESTOCK INSTITUTE A fascination with livestock led Prof.

John McDermott, DVM '81, to Africa in the early 1980s to study through the Ontario Veterinary College's Farm Service- and he's still there. In fact, he's now deputy director general of research for the Nairobi-based International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI).

Appointed in 2003, McDermott had previously worked at ILRI from 1997 as a veterinary epidemiologist.

Many of his former graduate students, most of whom are from developing countries, now hold senior positions in leading universities and research institutes around the world.

The ILRI uses knowledge gained through livestock health and management research to help rural farmers in developing countries raise healthy livestock. That's an ideal fit with McDermott's research on livestock healthdelivery systems and the control and spread of tropical infectious diseases. Currently, twothirds of the world's domestic animals are kept in developing countries, where more than 90 per cent are owned by rural smallholders.

Winter 2006 17

HISTORIAN CAUGHT IN VIOLENT STRIKE Nigerian-born Femi Kolapo has studied and taught African history on both sides of the Atlantic. Now a professor at U of G, he is pursuing an interest in international trade and the impact it has on the political and social stability of West African societies.

During a research trip to Nigeria in 2004, Kolapo was caught in the middle of a clash between the government and commercial transportation and labour unions, which were arguing over subsidies. "At every crossroads, people were there with daggers and broken bottles," he recalls. "People were killed and wounded. I was holed up for a good 10 days. Movement was paralyzed in the city and between cities. 1t was very, very frustrating."

When the strike ended, Kolapo went to Lagos, Nigeria's former capital city on the coast, where another crisis derailed his plans to travel to the east. He learned via television that the governor of the eastern state of An am bra had apparently been kidnapped.

The historian waited again until the situation resolved. Despite the obstacles along the way, he managed to achieve most of his research objectives. He believes that understanding the historical influence of trade and colonialism in lower Niger River communities can provide insights that might help decision-makers determine the best course of action for future development.

MALARIA DIDN'T STOP HER Since leaving her small hometown of Azilda, Ont., fourth-year international development student Manon Germain has become a woman of the world. Her work in international development began in 1997 with a trip to Nigeria, where she worked with a Vancouver-based grassroots organiza tion to supply learning resources to schoolchildren struggling with abject poverty in the midst of a military dictatorship.

"A lot of the teachers had not been paid, and there were no supplies for more than six months," says Germain.

While there, she helped set up a resource library and resource centre located between two rural villages in the Osooro region of southwestern Nigeria, but she caught malar-

18 THE PoRTico

ia and had to return to Canada to recover.

As soon as she was back on her feet, however, she headed back to Nigeria. "!went back because this was a new pilot project and I wanted to develop the curriculum and plans for how it would be implemented," she says.

Germain's efforts, coupled with the support of the Vancouver organization, resulted in the 1998 launch of the Zebulon International School, a facility providing primary education for 66 local children as well as workshops for children, youth and women.

The school has been operating out of a rented building since it opened, but it recently acquired land of its own to build a penn anent schoolhouse for the community. This achievement is due, in great part, to the advocacy efforts of Germain and a nonprofit organization she founded in 2002 called Women of the World.

She notes that women are often in a position where they feel a lot of stress related to providing for their families but have little political influence or bargaining power. That's why she wanted women to be mentioned in the name of her organization, even though its work is intended to help entire communities.

"Our priority is addressing poverty and seeking security while acknowledging what the community wants and needs," she says.

GUELPH FACULTY HAVE GONE THE DISTANCE More than 10 years ago, Prof. }ana janakiram and retired professors Ab Moore and Doug Pietsch, ADA '58 and BSA '62, School of Environmental Design and Rural Development, initiated a distance-learning program at Cameroon's University of Dschang, to help local farmers increase their crop yields. That program expanded to three streams of study, and five other universities in Cameroon adopted the model to develop their own distance-learning programs.

U of G research has also facilitated distance-learning programs in rural development, seed technology and farm management in Egypt, India and Russia, respectively. These programs focused on developing rural extension materials in the distance-learning format written in clear language that could be easily understood by rural farmers or their school-going children.

FINDING ADVENTURE IN SCIENCE Milena Palka explained to her mother that whale sharks don't have functioning teeth. "Yes, they're huge, but they've never eaten anybody. Maybe you could fit in their mouth, but they would spit you out."

With those comforting words, the adventure-loving student took off to spend a summer studying the plankton-eating sharks in the Indian Ocean. At the Marine Conservation Society of Seychelles, Palka flew in an ultralight aircraft used to spot migrating pods and snorkelled with the sharks. But she kept a respectful distance from the world's largest fish, which can grow up to 20 metres long and weigh several hundred tons. She also studied sea turtles and beach erosion rates.

Palka had spent the previous summer at the Clearwater Marine Aquarium in Florida and managed to take two field courses- in New Brunswick and China- while completing a Guelph degree in marine biology.

She finished her courses in December and is now preparing to begin graduate work at Victoria University ofWeUington, New Zealand, where she will study the symbiotic relationships of sea anemones in coral reefs.

SPENCER HENSON, RIGHT, SURVEYED

CIDA FUNDS NEW GHANA PROJECT Ghana is an agricultural country where prime crops include cocoa, vegetables, fruits, nuts and fish. But getting those products to market is a problem in a country with a hot climate, a poor transportation system and few storage facilities. Spoilage runs up to 40 per cent in some crops.

That's unacceptable to Prof. Spencer Henson, Agricultural Economics and Business, who sees opportunities for small entrepreneurs to first supply local markets and then, with proper training, learn to process those crops into products like jams, juice and peanut butter for export.

That's one of the marketing strategies that could be promoted by a new agriculture business centre Henson is about to establish at the University of Ghana. The national centre will train poor Ghanians to support themselves by creating small agricultural businesses.

Henson heads a Guelph development team that has received a $1-million grant from the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) to work with the University of Ghana. The University of Guelph will continue a Guelph/Ghana exchange program for faculty and students that began in the 1970s when CIDA funded the eightyear Guelph-Ghana Project.

Directed by now retired professor jim Shute, the first Guelph-Ghana venture combilled joillt projects m agriculture, family and consumer studies and veterinary medicine.

It mvolved a full-scale exchange program that enabled Ghanian students to earn graduate degrees at U of G and sent Guelph faculty, staff and equipment to the University of Ghana to support co-operative research .

Trammg programs for agricultural extension personnel were also set up in Ghana.

Over the years, 13 Guelph faculty and seven graduate students received valuable international experience in tropical agriculture, and 43 Ghanaian students studied at Guelph.

In the new CIDA project, Henson's goal is to improve Ghana's capacity to undertake sustainable agribusiness development in a way that reduces poverty and promotes gender and social equality.

"The failure rate of new enterprises remains high, especially among those operated by women, and there is a significant

20 THE PORTICO

impact on the ability of people to work their way out of poverty."

Henson has travelled around the world helping small-scale farmers and producers in developing countries meet the tremendous challenges of rapidly changing global supply chains for agricultural and food products. Most recently, his research trips have taken him to Africa, India, the Caribbean and Latin America.

ALFRED SHARES KNOW-HOW IN WATER QUALITY U of G's French-language campus, College d'Alfred, is home base for two CIDA-funded projects aimed at improving water quality in coastal Morocco and updating university-level agricultural training programs in Chad, a landlocked country in north central Africa.

Totallmg almost $1.4 million, the two projects are led by Prof. Charles Goubau, head of rural innovation and training at Alfred.

In Morocco, he plans to establish watertreatment and -recycling practices and to train engineers and technicians in waste-water management.

The project in Chad is designed to improve the country's agri-food sector and contribute to sustainable development.

WORLD TRAVEL A WAY OF LIFE â&#x20AC;˘ For Sarah Wolfe, who grew up in southern Ontario, world travel is now a way of life. She studied at the University of Haifa in Israel for a year, travelled in western Europe and worked in Lebanon, Egypt, Kazakhstan and Rome with the Food and Agriculture Organization. She's been a visiting fellow at the World Conservation Union's South Africa office in Pretoria and conducted PhD research last summer in South Africa and the Middle East.

Her research examines social networks, knowledge and water-demand management in these two regions as well as in Canada.

Wolfe says she realized how little she knew about the water situation in her own country when she got a job as a rapporteur with the Walkerton inquiry in Toronto, where she co-authored summaries from the expert meetings.

"Reading all those commissioned papers and listening to the expert testimonies and discussions were my 'crash course' in Ontario's water issues," she says.

Wolfe first became interested in water resources while studying in Israel as an undergraduate student. After comp leting Guelph's program in collaborative international development studies, she earned a master's degree at the University of Toronto in political science and environment. After the Walkerton inquiry, she completed a ninemonth stint with the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), where she co-authored a compendium of 30 years of IDRC-funded research on local water supply and management. The combination of these experiences eventually led her to pursue PhD research in Guelph's Department of Geography and helped her earn a $20,000 IDRC award to conduct field studies.

After returning from South Africa in 2005, Wolfe told Guelph Mercury reporter Brian Whitham about the stark contrast in water use between the country's affluent urban areas and its destitute rural communities.

Whitham wrote: "Walking down a main street in Pretoria, South Africa, the 30-yearold saw pipelines extending to restaurant patios to constantly spray diners with a fine soft mist. 'Drive about an hour and you'll see people who don't have water, walk a long way to get their water, have a tap for a community of 50 people, or the water is trucked in and it may not even be clean,' she said.

'They have major water problems. The extent of the need was just stunning.' " Part of the problem facing South African authorities is a lack of money to carry out conservation projects, said Wolfe, and that funding is not readily available from development agencies because of Africa's larger problems of HIV/ AIDS and poverty.

SCIENCE AND ART MEET AT THE LOUVRE Science met art in October in a rather unlikely pairing that saw U of G physicist lain Campbell lecturing groups of European scientists and art curators at the Louvre Museum in Paris.

Campbell visited both the Louvre and the University of Florence to introduce researchers to recent upgrades to GUPIX, a

software package he developed at Guelph with software consultant John Maxwell. In turn, Campbell's visit gave him a first-hand look at a fascinating cultural use for that software.

Based on characteristic X-ray patterns, his software package provides a visual spectrum of elements in specimens, even down to a speck no wider than a human hair.

(AJthough the software was developed here at Guelph, the analytical technique- called proton-induced X-ray emission or PIXEwas invented by a Swedish scientist in the early I970s.)

It is more widely used as a tool for scientists at nearly I 00 research labs worldwide, but European curators have adopted it to examine works of art.

"PIXE is a very powerful technique for studying what the Europeans call items of cultural heritage," says Campbell. "We had a tour of the Louvre and saw some objects on display that had been analyzed by PIXE. For example, jewels of the second Queen of France from the fifth century were proved by PIXE to have come all the way from India."

SCOTTISH MINISTER VISITS GUELPH The University of Guelph played host in October 2005 to a visit by Scottish First Minister Jack McConnell, who came to campus to learn about the University's Scottish studies program a nd archives.

McConnell met with various U of G representatives and viewed part of what is th e largest Scottish library collection outside of the United Kingdom.

During a public lecture introduced by Prof. Graeme Morton, U of G Scottish Studies Foundation Chair, McConnell spoke about historical and current links between Scotland and Canada.

U of G offers the only graduate program in North America for the study of Scotland and people of Scottish descent.

FOUR-PART COLLABORATION An international collaboration intended to help improve research and learning in increasingly critical aspects of human health will group Guelph researchers and students with counterparts at three other leading universities around the world.

Winter 2006 21

The so-called 4- University Group will increase the number of student exchange opportunities and strengthen research ties in studies of exercise physiology, nutrition, metabolism, obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease, says Prof. Terry Graham, chair of the Department of Human Health and Nutritional Sciences.

Guelph is represented in the group by Graham and his faculty colleagues David Dyck, B.Sc. '89, M.Sc. ' 92 and PhD '95; Lawrence Spriet; Arend Bonen; and Lindsay Robinson, who will work with counterparts at the universities of Copenhagen in Denmark, Maastricht in the Netherlands and Deakin in Melbourne, Australia. )

•

GETTING OFF TO A GOOD START • For years, U of G has been recognized in Canada for its orientation programs that help new Guelph students get to know the campus and each other. Now, the University has expanded its START program to provide additional services for international students.

Sara Suliman, a Sudanese-Ethiopian who was raised in Saudi Arabia, has helped get START International off the ground. She helped co-ordinate the program in 2005, providing new exchange and international students with a full day of campus tours and information sessions on a variety of topics, including academics, job hunting, health insurance and services and programs available to them on campus.

"It's good to get an advance idea of what campus is like and to get a variety of perspectives," says Suliman. "You feel more knowledgeable and secure."

She says her own experience coming to Guelph in 2002 was easier than she expected, but she recognizes she had several advantages that might not be available to most of Guelph's 800 international students.

Her older brother Ayman, B.Sc. (E ng. ) '04, was already studying at Guelph and is now enrolled in a master's program at U of G. An uncle living in Kitchener with his family made a difference, too.

Now in her last year of a biomedical sciences degree, Sara Suliman admits that getting past the language barrier took a bit of work. Although she was well-versed in conversational English, it was a different story

22 THE PORTICO

in her science-heavy classes. She credits the University with being proactive in providing students with programs and resources and offering an open and accepting environment. That's made it easier for her to get involved with campus life both academically and socially.

TRAVEL IS A GREAT TEACHER • Political science professor janine Clark says many students admit they take her classes because they want to be able to understand what they're hearing in the news.

She specializes in the Middle East and is known for her research on the role of women in politics. She explores women in Islam and the success of non-governmental organizations, such as health-care facilities, that were started by the Islamic movement. Recently, she has looked at the conditions under which ideologically opposed political parties such as Isla mist and Communist parties co-operate, and what impact this co-operation is having on state-society relations.

A Toronto native, Clark first travelled to the Middle East as a university student. She planned to spend a couple of months taking language courses at Hebrew University in jerusalem, but ended up staying a whole year.

The experience cemented her academic career.

"The culture just fascinated me right from the start. The religions, the politics, everything was so different from anything I had studied previously."

During her frequent trips back to the Middle East, Clark says, she is constantly reminded that many western perceptions of the culture are based on false assumptions or biased media reports. For example, many westerners consider Islam to be anti-feminism and anti-women's rights. " But an extremely high percentage of women in the Middle East are supportive of the Islamic movement, and during elections there, about 50 per cent of the votes come from women. The female members don't believe Islam holds women back. In fact, they believe the opposite. They feel it presents women with opportunities, gives them rights they may not otherwise have."

Clark says helping her students gain the kind of knowledge it takes to form their own opinions is one rewarding aspect of her work.

LENDING A HELPING HAND â&#x20AC;˘ Madiha Rana, left, and Mom ina Mir collected donations of clothing, food and medical supplies to help the earthquake relief effort in Kashmir and Pakistan. They joined other supporters from the Mus lim Students' Association at U of G and members of the Guelph community to collect the supplies and $13,000 in cash.

Mir, a fourth-year student in biological engineering, has relatives near the KashmirPakistan border where the earthquake struck Oct. 8. Her family members were safe, but up to 2.5 million survivors were left homeless.

Rana is a third-year marketing student and president of a new Pakistan Students' Federation on campus that will focus its programming on cultural events rather than religious ceremonies. Both organizations welcome non-Muslim members.

PROFS SAW HISTORY IN THE MAKING • Just over a year ago, U of G political science professor Fred Eidlin spent the Christmas break in Kiev as an observer of the second Ukrainian presidential election.

The first election a month earlier had been widely disputed amid allegations of media bias, intimidation and the poisoning of candidate Viktor Yushchenko.

The purpose of inviting international observers, says Eidlin, was to make sure the second election was fair and free of fraud.

He says the election officials he observed in Rivne Province were careful to follow proper procedure.

A specialist in countries of the former Soviet Union, he says he was impressed to see at least seven of the Canadian observers were graduates of Guelph's political science and international development programs.

"I think it's evidence of the international focus of the University," he said. just as Eidlin returned from Ukraine, his colleague Prof. William Christian was preparing for a similar trip to the Middle East. He was one of only 20 Canadian observers keeping close watch over the Jan. 9, 2005, election to select Mahmoud Abbas as the new president of the Palestinian Authority, following the death ofYasser Arafat.

WUSC OFFICIALS VISIT U OF G CAMPUS • Karima Kara, BA '9 1, has a new job co-ordinating university and college programming for World University Service of Canada (WUSC). Based in Ottawa, she helps to match Canadian students and faculty with development projects that address local needs in developing countries around the world and, in turn, support the international mandate on Canadian campuses.

Kara visited her alma mater in November with Velupillai )eyarajasingam, WUSC deputy director in Sri Lanka, who delivered a public lecture on the impact of the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami and the rehabilitation efforts that have resulted. With 16 years of experience in Sri Lanka, WUSC was a valuable ally for the Canadian Red Cross.

WUSC is one of Canada's leading nongovernmental development agencies and

24 THE PORTICO

the largest Canadian NGO in Sri Lanka. )eyarajasingam said WUSC activities take a multi-stakeholder approach in the island country of Sri Lanka in recognition of longstanding political conflicts. The organization works with people from all ethnic groups and provides vocational training to boost employment and other educationbased programming designed to alleviate poverty among women, plantation workers and whole communities.

While on campus, Kara and Jeyarajasingam visited with Prof. )ana janakiram, one of five people who took part in a tsunami fact-finding mission with WUSC last spring. A professor in the School of Environmental Design and Rural Development, janakiram joined representatives from WUSC and four other universities - Manitoba, Queen's, Trent and Waterloo- in Sri Lanka.

Their goal was to identify opportunities for Canadian post-seco ndary institutions to take part in reconstruction initiatives, facilitate research and partner with local organizations and academics. They also assessed the potential for creating new service and co-op learning opportunities for Canadian students.

WUSC partners with more than 50 Canadian universities and colleges, including the University of Guelph, which counts dozens ofWUSC alumni among its graduates. Guelph president Alastair Summerlee currently serves as vice-chair of the WUSC board of directors.

Before joining WUSC, Kara trained as a teacher and honed her development skills in Central Asia and Northern Pakistan.

CHINESE ART BOUND FOR GUELPH ART CENTRE • judith Nasby, director of the Macdonald Stewart Art Centre, was visiting curator at the Sichuan Institute of Fine Art in Chongqing, China, last May. She selected works by I 0 Chinese artists that will be exhibited in Guelph in the fall. The artists address the incredible changes affecting the largest city in the world as it transforms itself into a technological powerhouse. A joint English/Chinese catalogue will be copublished by the art centre and the Sichuan Institute, whose president, Luo Zhongli, will make his first trip to Canada to speak at the

official opening of the exhibition.

Nasby completed a three-city speaking tour to Hangzhou, Chengdu and Chongqing, and wrote an essay on the art centre's Donald Forster Sculpture Park for publication in Chinese in the Sichuan Institute's Contemporary Artists Magazine. The sculpture park includes a bronze sculpture titled The Sickle and the Cell Pho11e by artist Gu Xiong, who is originally from Chongqing.

HISTORIAN DISCOVERED 'WOMEN'S WRITING' â&#x20AC;˘ History professor Norman Smith admits that when he travels to China to do research, he gets unusual reactions when people learn that he's a specialist in Chinese history.

"And when I reveal that I'm actually studying Chinese women's history, they think I'm really insane," he laughs.

Smith first became interested in his area of research when he stumbled across a kind of writing from the south of China called "women's writing" or niishu while doing his MA at the University of British Columbia.

"It's a form of writing invented by women for women to use to communicate with other women;' he says. " It's incredible that such a form of writing once existed but hardly anybody knows about it today."

Once he finished his MA, Smith remained at UBC to complete a PhD. His dissertation focused on female Chinese writers in Manchuria during the Japanese occupation.

"At first, I just wanted to know how Chinese women experienced the occupation," he says, "but eventually I was able to bring to light a whole world of women's literature and feminist criticism."

He discovered a group of female Chinese writers who were able to critique colonial society during the occupation.

"Because colonial officials believed women were so useless that whatever they wrote was meaningless, these women were able to emerge as strong social critics."

Before arriving at Guelph in January 2004, Smith spent two years at the universities of Washington and Oxford doing postdoctoral research on how feminist ideals played a role in the work of the writers he studied. He has published his research in a book called Wielding Pens as Swords.

BUSY LIFE IN CHINA SUITS CANADIAN FARMER â&#x20AC;˘ Rob Watson, B.Sc. (Agr.) '89, allows that he sometimes misses his former family dairy farm in Ontario. But he says he's just too busy in China these days to dwell on the past.

The animal science graduate moved to China in 1997. Before heading overseas, he had hired someone to manage his farm in Palmerston, north of Guelph, for a year while he explored opportunities abroad. That exploration took less time than he'd expected. "! realized six months into my work here that I couldn't go back to milking cows twice a day and sold out the operation in Canada," says Watson. "Life and work in China are too exciting and fast-paced to go back to dairy farming."

He was initially a technical adviser for the China-Canada Dairy Cattle Breeding Project. Begun in I 993, the project- funded by the Canadian International Development Agency and delivered by Guelphbased Semex Canada- aimed to improve milk production in China. As one of several OAC alumni involved in the project, Watson looked after farm management, breeding and genetics at sites throughout China.

That project, which ended in 2003, led to the establishment of a dairy herd improvement program run by the Chinese government that included more than 60,000 cows.

Watson now works for Agricorp China, based in Beijing. The company distributes semen, mostly from Semex Alliance, to dairy farms. He deals directly with the farms, which can have anywhere from five to 10,000 cows.

He lives in Beijing with his Chinese wife, Helen, and their two children: Duncan, 2, and May, l. The family visits Canada often; while here, they like to drive by Watson's former homestead in Palmerston.

"My wife was surprised by the size of the farm," he says. "At 200 acres, it is small by Canadian standards but large by Chinese standards, and she enjoys the stories of my previous life.

"There are times that !miss the farm. At the end of each day, you knew exactly what you had achieved. Life was simpler then. At the same time, the dairy industry in China is changing dramatically, and it's a very exciting time to be involved in the industry here:'

Winter 2006 25

IMPROVING LIVESTOCK PRODUCTION IN CHINA â&#x20AC;˘ In an impressive ceremony held in Liaoning, China, animal science professor Roger Hacker was presented with a medal signifying his new status as an honorary member of the Liaoning Provincial People's Government of China.

The award recognizes the significant contributions Hacker made in 2004 and 2005 to improve the livestock husbandry skills of the people in Liaoning. His focus was on biosecurity measures to prevent the spread of disease in dairy and swine operations. He says ideas like limiting access to barns, changing boots and using disinfectants are not easily accepted by Chinese producers, who have a long-standing preference for treatment rather than prevention of infections.

Hacker first visited China in the 1980s and since then has made at least six trips to the northeastern provinces of Liaoning and Helongjiang as part of Ontario Agricultural College efforts to maintain a co-operative relationship with Chinese agriculturists.

WHY SALAMANDERS MATTER â&#x20AC;˘ Zoology professor Jinzhong Fu is a genealogist of sorts who uses evolutionary ecology and molecular biology to work out lineages among species of frogs and salamanders and where those creatures came from in the first place. So diverse is one steep river valley on the eastern slope of the Tibetan Plateau in his native China that he has discovered some 10 species of reptiles and amphibians since his first trip there in 1999. Explaining the paradox of finding new species even as experts sound alarms over dwindling biodiversity, he says best estimates of creatures are just that: estimates.

Thinning numbers, on the other hand, are well-documented. Fu grew up on a farm in eastern China where evenings were alive with the sounds of frogs and toads. Today, the nighttime chorus has diminished noticeably. He blames habitat loss, as growing demand for irrigation water has reduced the height of the water table.

A survey of scientists done in the late 1990s by the American Museum of Natural History identified species disappearance triggered by habitat loss as the number-one threat to the globe, ranking it ahead of pollution, global warming and the thinning of the ozone layer. Many believe that ha lf of all species of plants and animals alive today could become extinct sometime this century.

This summer Fu will begin a new research project in the Hengduan Mountain range which constitutes the eastern escarpment of the Tibetan Plateau. He will use specimen collection and molecu lar examination of DNA to identify amphibians. He expects a large number of new species will be discovered and a much better estimate of the biodiversity in the region will be achieved. Such information will provide solid ground for conservation groups to persuade the government to re-consider the planned construction of hydro dams in the region and make policies that regulate the eco-tourism industry.

JAPANESE RITUALS CHANGING In Canada, the question is: Cremation or burial? In Japan, where 99 per cent of the deceased are cremated and it's illegal to bury a body intact without special permission in many cities, the new con trover-

sial question is not how to dispose of the body but what to do with the ashes.

The growing trend of having one's ashes scattered is a symbol of change in Japan's cultural practices, says anthropology professor Satsuki Kawano. She's been studying memorial rituals there for the past four years.

"In japan, it's customary to maintain a grave for multiple family members because it's a symbol of the family continuing;' says Kawano. "The scattering of ashes is a way of contesting that cultural practice. It's a declaration of a person's independence."

A long-standing taboo on scattering ashes in the hills or the sea began to be challenged when the Grave-Free Promotion Society was established 15 years ago. Kawano has interviewed some of the group's II ,000 members to determine why they've chosen to break traditional japanese customs.

"Previously, adult children were responsible for conducting the rituals for their parents, but demographic changes mean there are fewer children available to look after the family grave plot," she says.

The trend is also driven by costs. It's not unusual for a family to pay $30,000 to buy a family grave plot in Tokyo, and that doesn't include the $100 yearly maintenance fee.

Ahead of that, the average Tokyo funeral costs about $35,000. And in the Buddhist faith, family members may pay not just for one service but for memorial services in subsequent years.

Small wonder that scattering ashes, with a one-time fee of $1,000, is growing in popularity. "It's practical;' says Kawano.

CANADA-JAPAN TEAMWORK IN CANCER RESEARCH A Guelph research team has discovered why some people are more susceptible than others to colon cancer, a finding that could lead to more effective treatments for the deadly disease.

Their research was published in September in the international journal Cancer Research, published by the American Association for Cancer Research.

Prof. Brenda Coomber, B.Sc. '79 and M.Sc. '82, Biomedical Sciences, worked with aU of G team and scientists from McMaster University and the International Medical Center of Japan to look at why some people are genetically more likely to get colon cancer.

Winter 2006 27

Cancer is caused by a mutation of DNA in a cell. Normally, the human body is equipped to fix those mutations. The team discovered that some people are less able to because of genetics.

"If we understood what's going on, we might be able to come up with ways of modulating it with drugs;' says Coomber.

UN SESSIONS STYMIED

BY LACK OF LEADERSHIP

BY MAGDA KONIECZNA

â&#x20AC;˘ Barry Smit is almost embarrassed to be Canadian. The University of Guelph geography professor says our efforts to fight climate change leave us little to be proud of, despite the fact Canada hosted the 2005 United Nations conference on the issue.

"People almost laughed (at Canadians). Canada was supposed to reduce (greenhouse gas) emissions by six per cent, but we're up 24 per cent," he said after returning from the 10-day UN Climate Change Conference in Montreal.

Smit, who chaired a conference session, said this country's failure didn't end there.

He said the conference hasn't achieved much, partly because of a lack ofleadership on Canada's part. "If you're of the belief that every journey begins with a small step, well, we made a tiny step;' the professor said.

But Canada isn't the only country to blame, Smit said. It's an issue that needs global leadership, said the professor, so the United States' rejection of even a watereddown proposal for future talks on cutting greenhouse gas emissions makes it hard to expect progress.

"It's difficult when the most powerful country in the world chooses not to play the game," he said. "If it was a hockey game, they're not even in the arena. They're in the parking lot playing shinny."

Part of the conference's failure has come from the fact that many rich countries want commitments from large developing nations like China, India and Brazil, which are poised to become big polluters, he said.

But those countries aren't keen to make commitments until developed nations do.

"They were arguing: 'We haven't caused a problem, it was you guys,"' Smit said.

28 THE PoRTICO

It could mean a change in cancer therapy many years down the road. The team found that some conventional therapies might be making tumours worse rather than curing them. Coomber says they' re now looking at how to combine their findings with current therapies to make those more effective.

There's also a worry among some developed nations that reducing emissions will hurt their economies. But European countries have shown that doesn't have to be the case, he said. And the problem is, success depends on a united effort coming out of that fragmented discussion. "If everyone does their own thing, we won't get anywhere;' Smit cautioned.

It also requires a united effort to prepa re for a world that's already experiencing climate change. Smit said that change will produce a world of starvation, drought, rising water levels and more intense and frequent storms.

But the Montreal conference has failed on that front, too, he said. It takes some serious changes, like finding new, more efficient sources of water in areas that will be hit by drought, and new income sources for people like farmers whose livelihood depends on a stable climate.

"Poor countries who came (to Montreal) expecting there might be something to help (went) home empty-handed, which is just as well because they'll need their hands to scoop the water lapping around their houses;' Smit said.

"If some degree of climate change is inevitable, then we should prepare ourselves for that;' said U of G researcher Suzanne Belliveau, who also attended the UN conference.

Ontario farmers are already adapting by diversifying their crops and moving into non-agricultural activities, she said. That's not because they're afraid of climate change, but rather because of low market prices.

But it will help them prepare for a world that could be hotter and drier, she added.

And she's hopeful the message is getting out. "I think the push from the scientific community to policy people is getting the ball rolling," she said.

Reprinted with permission from the Guelph Mercury

STARTING A NEW LIFE New Zealand-born Michelle Elleray says U of G's School of English and Theatre Studies is the perfect place for her to teach and do research. " !knew Guelph had a long history of post-colonial studies, and I work in colonialism, which is a relatively new area in Victorian studies," she says.

Her research focuses on how people who emigrated from Britain to co lonial countries such as New Zealand and Canada were able to define themselves through their writing as settlers or locals rather than as colonials only temporarily out in the colony.

Herself an emigrant from one colonial country to another, Elleray joined the U of G faculty in 2003. She has settled into a house in Toronto with her partner and two daughters; son Kingsley was born Dec. I 0 and is the first true Canadian in the family.

One of the few scholars in North America who studies literature from the Pacific, she recently published a novel called Crossing the Beach that's based on the real-life story of a British missionary to Tonga who adopts native life and then tries years later to return to English society.

THE ANSWER IS BLOWING IN THE WIND • Guelph geography professor Bill Nickling is one of the few people who have visited the Taylor Glacier in the Taylor Valley, one of the "dry valleys" of Antarctica. The glacier is one of many that drain the continent's central plateau. No snow cover has existed on the pebble- and boulder-strewn surface for millennia, and cold, dry winds

SAND DUNES ON MARS

blowing off the plateau from the South Pole literally freeze dry these valleys, making them some of the driest places on Earth.

If it seems a far leap from the frigid windswept environs of Antarctica to the sea spray of a California beach, then it appears an impossible distance to Mars, shrouded in enormous clouds of red dust. Research

by Nickling and his longtime colleagues in a research centre in the Nevada Desert connects these disparate locations through something you can't see: wind.

Along with his former PhD student Jack Gillies, B.Sc. '83, M.Sc. '87 and PhD '95, and Nick Lancaster, both researchers at the Desert Research Institute in Nevada, Nickling studies the transport of wind-borne dust and sand and the effects of wind erosion on air quality and dust emissions. The research trio visited Antarctica together for the first time in january and February 2002 at the beginning of a three-year research project to develop a model of surface wind dynamics for NASA. Besides learning more about the effects of wind erosion here on Earth, their work in disparate places on this planet may help scientists to better understand dust storms on Mars and to ultimately improve the operation of robotic probes.

ments take readings from rock and soil and measure their chemical composition.

Those readings pointed to the former presence of water on the red planet and encountered several unexpected objects, including an iron-nickel meteorite. Gellert says another rock outcropping showed striking similarities to a meteorite found in Antarctica about two decades ago, further confirming that the so-called Martian meteorites did indeed come from that planet.

Both rovers are still beaming their findings back home, and Gellert continues to receive data from the Earth-bound mission team. That data will be analysed and refined with a computer package called GUPIX developed by physics professor lain Campbell's research group for his PIXE (protoninduced X-ray emission) facility.

Referring to a full-size accelerator called the Guelph Scanning Proton Microprobe housed in Campbell's basement lab, Gellert says: "The measuring method we're using on Mars is quite similar to lain Campbell's work. We use a small radiation source, but the principle is the same."

OUT OF THIS WORLD

Australia's Great Barrier Reef and the Antarctic are the first sites outside Canada to be documented by U of G's CyberNatural Software group. Yet these locations are no more ambitious than the group's most recognized Polar Life project: a documentation of the life and environments of Canada's Arctic.

Polar Life involves two websites- Canada's Polar Life and Canada's Polar Environments- two reference CD- ROMs, two video CD-ROMs and two videos. It's an integrated package of educational materials for schools and the general public.

Established in 1996 with the encour-

• Two robotic rovers sent to Mars in early 2004 continue to trundle around the red planet beyond their expiry dates. They're sending back information about the planet's surface to scientists here on Earth, including Guelph physics professor Ralf Gellert.

He is the principal investigator for a project to design, calibrate and operate a critical instrument to be installed on NASA's Mars Science Laboratory for a planned 2009 mission to Mars. Project partners include Guelph investigators, the Canadian Space

30 THE PoRTico \

)

•

Agency, MDA Robotics, NASA's jet Propulsion Lab and U.S. scientists.

"We don't know what we'll find or what to expect there on the next mission;' Gellert says. But he's obviously thrilled by the opportunity to look.

Before coming to Guelph, he and teammates at Germany's Max Planck Institute for Chemistry built an X-ray spectrometer for the current rovers, Spirit and Opportunity.

Mounted on flexible rover arms, the instru-

CLICK TO LEARN ABOUT BIODIVERSITY

agement of Prof. Paul Hebert, Integrative Biology, CyberNatural Software is a not-forprofit organization focused on educating people about biodiversity. The group's websites now attract nearly a million visitors each year, and its CDs have won numerous national and international awards.

To gain an overview of CyberNatural activities, visit www.cybernatural.ca.

FROM SLIME TO SILK • The revolting ooze produced by a primitive ocean creature may seem like an odd research subject to some. But a U of G scientist's ground breaking work on hagfish slime may help create new biomaterials, including stronger-than-steel silk.

"Initially, I was interested in how it works," says Prof. Doug Fudge, M.Sc. '96, Integrative Biology, referring to the oozing mess that hagfish produce when they are provoked or stressed. The slime contains not only slippery mucins but also fine fibres or "slime threads;' which are believed to add strength and cohesion to the ooze.

His new research has determined that hagfish slime is apparently designed to trap large volumes of seawater and may function as a defence against gill-breathing predators.

Fudge is the first scientist to characterize the slime's mechanical properties and apply this knowledge to the function of the cytoskeleton. He has shown that stretching filaments from hagfish slime transforms them into a spider silk-like material that's light but incredibly strong. He hopes this finding will lead to a new, inexpensive source of silk that is "stronger than steel" and has structural uses. Already, he and his collaborators from the University of British Columbia have been awarded a patent for making silk-like fibres using intermediate filaments like the ones in hagfish slime.

Hagfish, which live on the ocean floor, including both east and west coasts of Canada, are not actually fishes but are classed along with lampreys.

U OF G, ICELAND ENHANCE EDUCTATION TIES • A new Iceland-Guelph Institute established in 2004 is building on long-standing relationships between Guelph and H6lar

University College, the University of Iceland, the University of Akureyri and Hvanneyri Agricultural University. The institute will provide faculty, researchers and students with additional opportunities for exchange programs, distance education courses and interdisciplinary research.

Skuli Skulason, rector of H6lar University College, received his PhD in zoology from U ofG in 1991 and was one of its first Icelandic students.

"We've been looking for ways to provide students, faculty and staff with more opportunities for learning and growth;' he says.

"We hope the new Iceland-Guelph Institute will heighten interest and participation at both ends."

U of G has been collaborating with H6lar and other institutions in Iceland for the past 20 years.

"We've learned not only about interrelations between our two countries but also about how we approach environmental, scientific, cultural and ethical issues in our home countries;' says U of G president Alastair Summerlee. "It's a relationship with even more potential."

CANADIAN STUDENTS TRAVEL MORE • When AIESEC Canada Inc. posted its 2004/05 participation figures last june, it showed a five-year high of 183 individuals who took advantage of the Global Internship Program, reflecting a 41-per-cent increase over 2003/04.

AlESEC is the world's largest studentrun organization, with partners in 800 universities across 91 countries and territories. lt works with business and higher education to help students become globally minded responsible leaders.

During the 2004/05 fiscal year, 114 Canadian students and recent graduates lived and worked abroad, and 69 international students and graduates were employed in Canadian businesses through the internship program.

Stephanie Hajer, B.Comm. '05, was U of G committee president when the University hosted an AIESEC provincial conference in late 2004 for 10 provincial chapters.

"AIESEC offers more than 350 conferences, 3,500 international internships and 5,000 leadership positions each year;' she says.

Winter 2006 31

ALUMNI ACHIEVEMENTS â&#x20AC;˘

u ot guetph

EVENTS â&#x20AC;˘

NETWORKING

ALUMN~

Small company a big player in AIDS prevention GUELPH GRADUATE hopes a product made by his Toronto biotech company will help stem infection rates for HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases among women in Africa and other parts of the developing world.

Human clinical trials are now under way to see whether the product, originally made for use in processing instant-camera film, might be used as a microbicide to protect against STDs, including the human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS. Early trials have already shown the potential effectiveness of Ushercell against unwanted pregnancies and disease transmission. If it works, the product- a cellulose sulfate gel that a woman inserts before intercoursecould save millions of lives in countries where the virus has already destroyed lives and livelihoods and where cultural pressures often make it difficult for women to persuade their partners to use condoms.

George Usher, president of Polydex Pharmaceuticals Ltd., calls the unexpected possibilities for the substance in battling AIDS a serendipitous discovery. "We fell over the idea;' he says.

His company makes biotech-based products for the human and veterinary pharmaceutical markets.

HIV/AIDS was only starting to make headlines in the mid-1980s when a Japanese company began studying possible effects of dextran sulfate.

An American researcher looking at potential contraceptives tested several ~ of Polydex's dextran formulations but 0 tS without success. Finally, Usher's father, Tom, suggested they try cellulose sulj fate, which the company had begun iO producing as a photo emulsion addi~ tive for the camera company Polaroid.

6:: "The rest, as they say, is history,"

A

g

32 THE PoRTICO

George Usher runs a company best known for making piglet vitamins, but Polydex has developed a new product that could hold the key to protecting women from AIDS in Africa and other developing countries.

says George Usher.

He studied animal science at Guelph with plans to pursue veterinary science, but joined Polydex after graduating in 1982. His daughter Samantha is now studying commerce at U of G. Ushercell is Polydex's lead product in development. The company is working with CONRAD (Contraceptive Research and Development Program) at the Eastern Virginia Medical School, a program looking for better, safer and more acceptable ways to prevent pregnancy and STDs in developing countries.

Earlier Phase 3 trials of Ushe rcell began in 2004 in Nigeria.

Grants worth a total of $24 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the U.S. Agency for Inter-

national Development will pay for further trials under way in India and four African countries. These trials will evaluate the use of Ushercell for preventing HIV infection among more than 4,600 high-risk women and will also assess the incidence of other STDs. Researchers hope the trials will show that the product cuts HIV infection in half. At that rate, it could prevent 2.5 million infections a year among women in almost 75 developing nations and all sub-Saharan African countries, according to CONRAD statistics.

Polydex's main product is dextran -made by bacterial fermentation of sugar- which is used as a blood substitute and vaccine adjuvant. The company also makes iron dextran to treat anemia in humans and animals.

MATTERS PC

+

U OF G ALUMNI ASSOCIATION

DONORS DO LUNCH!

alumni@uoguelph .ca

ALUMNI AFFAIRS AND DEVELOPMENT Vice-president, Joanne Shoveller

n

OJ

:::s

jsh ove ll@uo guelph. ca

ALUMNI AFFAIRS Director, Susan Rankin srankin@uoguelph.ca College of Arts, Deborah Maskens dmaskens@uoguelph.ca CBS/CPES, Sam Kosakowski skosakow@uoguelph.ca CSAHS, alumni@uoguelph.ca OAC, Carla Bradshaw cb radsha @uoguel ph .ca OVC, Laurie Malleau lmalleau@uoguelph.ca

Keith Bryant, BSA '57. left, and his wife, Martha, came from their home in Ithaca, N.Y., to attend the president's luncheon. He is professor emeritus at Cornell University. They

Events, Jennifer Brett Fraser

are chatting with Janet and David Pelletterio, BSA '57, of Mississauga. He is a volun路

jbrett@uoguelph.ca

teer director of the Ontario Agricultural Hall of Fame Association.

Chapters, Mary Feldskov mfelds ko@u oguel ph .ca

T

HE

20TH

ANNIVERSARY

OF

the President's Council donor group was celebrated last May at the president's spring luncheon. The President's Council was establ ished in I 985 to recognize those who give$ I ,000 or more to the University's annual fund.

The council was founded by a committee consisting of the late Burton C. Matthews, BSA '47, who was U of G president at the time; W illiam Brock, BSA '58, FELL '98, H.D.La. '02; the late Cecil Franklin, H.D.Sc. '88; Kenneth Hammond; Prof. Stewart Lane; Larry

Marsland; Marjorie Millar; Kenneth Murray, BSA '50, FELL '83, H.D.La. '96; and Prof. james Raeside.

Over the years, leadership giving to the University has grown, and so have the donor groups. Today, U of G's leading donors are acknowledged within the umbrella of the University of Guelph Society and recognized as members of one or more of 141ifetimegiving and annual-giving councils.

The 2006 president's luncheon for members of the University of Guelph Society will be held May 13.

Young Alumni, Jason Moreton jmoreton@uoguelph.ca

DEVELOPMENT Assistant vice-president, Pam Healey phealey@uoguelph.ca College of Arts, Deborah Maskens dmaskens@uoguelph.ca ~

~ ~

~

)>

~

~ ~

CBS/CPES, Richard Manning rmanning@uoguelph.ca CSAHS, Jennifer Barrett jeba rret@u oguel ph .ca OAC, Paulette Samson psamson@uoguelph.ca OVC, Stephen Woeller swoeller@uoguelph.ca Athletics, Susan Lawrenson

WELCOME TO CANADA

slawrens@uoguelph.ca Library, Lynn Campbell lynn.campbell@uoguelph.ca

SCIENCE COMPLEX CAMPAIGN

The Alumni-in-Action Committee has

Director, Alice Michaud

made it a tradition to we lcome interna路

amichaud@uoguelph.ca

tiona! students to the University of

GRAD NEWS UPDATES

Guelph by hosting a dinner at Alumni

alumnirecords@uoguelph .ca

House each September. In January, the

ALUMNI ONLINE COMMUNITY

alumni entertain exchange students.

www.olcnetwork.net/uoguelph

Alumni-in-Action chair Shirley Allen says: "The students seem very interested in

U OF G CONTACTS

what the campus, courses and social life

www.uoguelph.ca

were like in our day."

519-824路4120, Ext. 56934

Winter 2006 33

u of g

ALUMNI MATTERS

GRYPHON CLUB HALL OF FAME INDUCTEES FOR 2005 Athletes: • Heather (Noble) Barrett, B.A.Sc. '98, cross-country and track • Kathy Butler, cross-country and track • Chuck Sims, B.Sc.(H.K.) '92, football

Builder: • Tony D'Angelo, Athletics Department Rich Janutka, B.Sc. 'oo, plays the oldest

acter to a greater understanding of self and

Team:

wind instrument in the world, a didgeri-

nature. It requires the musician to use cir-

• 1979/80 women's basketball, OWIAA

doo, which originated with the Aboriginals

cular breathing, a technique that allows

champions with a perfect 12-o

of northern Australia 40,000 years ago.

the player to keep a continuous loop of

Although his Guelph degree is in biology,

sound without pausing for breath .

staff

record in league play.

"

6--<

Members of the team were coach

Janutka has lived in Japan for the last two

Janutka and his wife, whom he met in

Karen Lee, judy Meiners, Sue Lind-

years teaching English and has written a

Japan, are expecting their first child. They ~

ley, Maryon Bruyn, Jan Newcombe,

novel about the ancient instrument.

Tree

visited his hometown of Cambridge in the ~

Ruth Carmichael, Anne Mohtadi,

Weaver Sound is the personal tale of a

fall, and Janutka gave a didgeridoo demon- ;;i

Candy Jirik, Holly Raddysh, Linda

character's journey through life. As it did

stration on campus .

Jolie, Sue Burton, Ingrid Kihl and

for Janutka, the didgeridoo leads his char-

)>

manager Kate Hull.

SAVE YOUR AIR MILES

JOIN A CHAPTER

CouNTING

University of Guelph students could ben-

Guelph grads are establishing alumni chapters in their areas, hosting social and networking events, helping with student recruitment and being ambassadors for the University. Activities are under way in New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia. For a full listing of active chapters and information on how to start a chapter in your area, visit www.alumni.uoguelph. ca or contact Mary Feldskov at 519-824-4120.

TO

efit from your winter holiday or business travel if you collect Aeroplan miles.

U of G is participating in the Aeroplan Charitable Pooling Program, which allows people to donate Aeroplan miles to be used by undergraduate and graduate students travelling internationally for exchanges, semesters abroad, research or study.

The cost of travel is one of the biggest barriers for students wanting to get international experience, says Prof. Alan Shepard, associate vicepresident (academic). "We want every

Aeroplan already works with charitable organizations such as the Red Cross and Engineers Without Borders on mileage-donation programs, but U of G is the first university to participate.

Each year, U of G will hold a month-long campaign to encourage donations. If you're interested in the 2006 opportunity, look for details at www.alumni.uoguelph.ca.

34

THE PoRTICO

The OAC graduating class of 1939 numbered 150.

Many members of the class served in the First World War, and many did not return, said class president Leslie Laking (also H.D.Sc. '71) at the

student to have the opportunities that international education provides."

70

WE CIRCLE THE GLOBE The Portico magazine is mailed to Guelph grads around the globe three times a year, and 25,000 of those readers also get the monthly Alumni £-news. To make sure you're receiving the latest U of G news and alumni notices, keep your postal and e-mail addresses up to date. Write to us at alumni records@uoguelph.ca.

dedication of a new group study room in the U of G Library. The class donated $25,000 to renovate the room as its 65th-anniversary project.

Pictured at the dedication are, from left: Robert Adams, Arthur Willis, Laking, Frank Archibald and Mayna rd Slack. The class has held a reunion every five years, and Laking said the 22 remaining classmates are looking forward to their 70th reunion. They are also saving again to make a $3o,ooo contribution towards an endowment fund for library acquisitions.

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LONDON WAS A HIGHLIGHT

F

OR

HUNDREDS

OF

GUELPH

grads, the London semester was a highlight of their university education.

Those alumni were invited to share their memories online and in person at two fall reunion events. Grads met in London, England, in October and in Guelph in November.

The London event was held at Canada House in Trafalgar Square and was attended by 70 people, including president Alastair Summerlee and College of Arts dean Jacqueline Murray.

Since the London semester began in 1974, its raison d'etre has grown stronger than ever, says Summerlee.

Students who embrace all that London has to offer can see first-hand the subject matter of their studies as renowned cultural institutions and historical sites become their classroom, he says.

How important is that experience?

Ask the former faculty advisers and alumni who participated in the London semester and are now leading a campaign to establish an endowment to ensure the program continues. The College of Arts has absorbed an annu-

Janice Bridgland, B.Sc. 2002, is a reg路

Enjoying the London semester reunion in England are jean Byers, B.H.Sc. '53, left, and Valerie Gossage, BA '86. a! $20,000 operating shortfall for several years, but the proposed $400,000 London Semester Endowment Fund would eliminate the shortfall and provide ongoing support for this program.

View an online scrapbook with comments, photos and a full update on the London semester program at www. alumni.uoguelph.ca/supportlondon. htm. To support the endowment fund, contact Deborah Maskens of Alumni Affairs and Development at 519-824-4120, Ext. 52122.

2006:

MARCH

1:

MARCH 18 AND 19:

KATRINA DEVASTATION WAS A SHOCK

MAY 13:

MARCH 31 AND APRIL 1: JUNE 23 TO 25:

istered animal health technologist in Vancouver who works full time with injured and at-risk marine mammals, but she says nothing could have pre路 pared her for what she encountered in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina.

Bridgland is a member of the Van路 couver-based Canadian Animal Assistance Team (CAAD and was part of the first team of volunteers to reach Louisiana. In total, 82 veterinarians and veterinary technicians went from Canada to help stranded and injured animals as part of seven CAAT volunteer teams.

"We spent a week working in the intensive-care unit at the largest animal shelter for hurricane victims located in Gonzales," she says. "We helped with the search and rescue efforts within the city and staffed an animal triage centre in the middle of the disaster zone.

"The animals we rescued and treated were emaciated, fearful, covered in chemical burns from the toxic sludge, infested with parasites and severely dehydrated."

Bridgland says the effects of being immersed in such a devastating, overwhelming situation will be long-lasting, but she reaffirms that it was the right th ing for her to do.

"I wouldn't take any moment of it back. I am so thankful for the opportunity to give back to animals what they have given to me."

The newly formed CAAT provides more photos of its rescue efforts at www.caat-katrina.org. The organization is planning a spring trip to Fiji to hold a spay/neuter clinic for village hunting dogs.

Winter 2006 35

CAREERS â&#x20AC;˘

FAMILIES â&#x20AC;˘

LIFE EXPERIENCES â&#x20AC;˘

MEMORIES

university of guelph Growing organic in Bermuda

URING ONE OF HER visits to the island of Bermuda, Mary Haggarty- U of G's international admissions co-ordinator - couldn't resist going into Aggie's Garden Cafe on Hamilton Harbour, and that's where she learned that the cafe buys its pesticide-free

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foods from a U of G graduate.

Tom Wadson, ADA '76, and his wife, Nancy, grow just about everything that his sister, judith, needs to keep her restaurant in business: chickens, eggs, zucchini, peppers, corn, potatoes, tomatoes, lettuce, herbs, melon, even bananas.

Haggarty also looked up Wadson's booth at the local farmers' market and found a feature story about him in The Bermudian magazine in which he said he started his farming business right after graduation, despite his mother's advice to get a job in a bank.

Wadson had planned to start a dairy farm, but opted for vegetable farming instead and runs a successful and celebrated organic operation at Luke Farm near Southampton. He uses chickens and sheep to keep his farm operating on a natural cycle of fertilization and crop production.

To enrich the island's sandy soil, Wadson grows grass to provide organic material and nutrients. Once

This soldier marches on

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ASTER CoRPORAL jeremy Blackburn, BA '76, has been making waves in Halifax, N.S., where he is stationed with Canada's Maritime Forces Atlantic. In july 2005, he received the first Soldier Citizen Award presented by Land Force Atlantic Area, and in November, was

~ appointed

by Governor General

5 Michaelle jean as a Member of the u

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2 0

~

Order of Military Merit.

The latter recognizes meritorious service and devotion to duty by members of the Canadian Forces. The Soldier Cit-

36 THE PORTICO

izen Award was created by Blackburn's unit to recognize individuals who are both exceptional soldiers and active members of their commun ity.

A former paramedic, Blackburn is currently working as a pharmacy technician. He is also an accomplished musician and athlete. He frequently

the grass is planted, he runs broiler chickens (which he hatches from fertilized eggs) on the fields. In pens I 0 by 12 feet, the chickens eat grass and fertilize the soil with their droppings.

The fence is moved into fresh grass each day. After that, he puts layer chickens in the field to scratch up the soil and keep the droppings in the ground. They also keep down the flies and lay eggs that he sells, along with free-range broilers, at the farmers' market. Grazing sheep help keep the grass at manageable levels and add more fertilizer to boost production when the field is cultivated for vegetables.

Wadson is something of a lone voice amid Bermuda's economic emphasis on international business and finance, but he told The Bermudian he is committed to environmental protection and invites schoolchildren to his farm every year to spread the word about organic food production.

plays the bagpipes for both military and civilian events and travels to Ireland each year to continue his studies on the Irish concertina.

Blackburn combines piping and athletics in one of his regular undertakings, the historical Nijmegen March held each year in the Netherlands. The event originated in 1909 as a Dutch military effort to increase the long-distance marching ability of infantry soldiers. It evolved into an international event for both military and civilian participants.

Blackburn has participated ll times and was one of 220 Canadian soldiers who marched in 2005 on the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Netherlands.

D NEW_S We remember Unigoo

"G

uelph winters and the Albion are unforgettable." " I miss the

Bullring and Der Keller. " These are some of t he comments we received from Bev Dahmer, B.Sc. '73, and six

She's not horsing around Ruth Benns, B. H.Sc. '64, loved horses

Eq uine Guelph's ed ucation program.

other Guelph graduates who work with her in the Haliburton, Kawartha, Pine

long before she studied art and design,

Ben ns grew up in Toronto, so she

Ridge District Health Unit. Dahmer is

but now as a "retired" grandmother, she

didn't have a horse of her own until she

in the health unit's Port Hope office

has found a way to comb ine her inter-

moved to a small farm near Sunderland,

with

ests and talents. She helped create Fun-

Ont., with her own fami ly. Her three chil-

Colleen (O'Grady) McBride, BA '82, and

nyBones, t he star of Eq uine Guelph's

dren picked up her love of horses, and

Rachel (Moon) Kelly, B.A.Sc. '95路 Lor路

website

youth,

now son Rob is a horse trainer and

na (Healy) McCleary, BA ' 94, and

z www.EquiMania.ca, and has since taken

daughter Wendy competes in interna-

Dearbhla Lynch, M.Sc. '03, work in the

~ on the role of officia l EquiMania artist.

tional endurance competitions.

educationa l

;;:: ~

for

Her largest project to date is the

Benns's art experience is wide-ranging,

Leslie Orpana, B.A.Sc. ' 78;

Lindsay of fice, and Tom Reddering, BA '84, is in Haliburton.

~ painted horse she's pict ured with . The

from fashion illustration, cartoons and sign

Dahmer responded to our invita-

"'~

muscles, skeleton and internal organs

painting to botan ica l and zoologica l illus-

tion to write to The Portico about the

iO

she painted on the li fe-size horse are

tration. She's recently taken cou rses in

Guelph grads in your workplace.

5 anatomically correct. That's important ii:

because t he horse is be ing used for

painting, and her paintings reflect a fascination with the intricate designs in nature.

Mystery Solved

V

eronica Austen , BA '97, was the first to identify our mystery grad

photo in the last issue of The Portico.

We've got a new wedding record

She recognized Corrie Cooper, B.Sc. '99, left, and Heather Musgrave, B.Sc. ' 98, from the varsity figure skating team. During their years as teammates, the Gryphon skating team won gold

T

his photo was taken at the September 2005 wedding of Marcy Ford, B.Sc. (Eng.) '05, and Matthew McKillop, BA '03. The bride and groom are sur路

rounded by 85 of the

89 wedding guests who are graduates and

students of the

University of Guelph. This is a new record for U of G's wedding connection and tops the 41 guests reported by Michelle Axford, B.Sc.(Agr.) '94, on page 42.

and two bronze medals in the OWIAA championships.

W i nter 2006 37

years as pastor of the Peoples Baptist Church of Boston. It is the oldest African-American church in New England, established in 1805 by blacks who wanted to break away from discrimination 111 interracial churches.

1970 The OAC class of 1945 met in Guelph at the Springfield Golf and Country Club in June 2005 to celebrate its 6oth anniversary. Those attending were, from left: Ernie Weiss, Martin Rocheleau, Stephen Beckley, Robb Gowe, Alphonse Aboud, Fred Helson and Malcolm "Bud" Crozier.

1940 • Glen Weir, DVM '49, received his notice of acceptance from the Ontario Veterinary College by telegram and reported to the school seven days later. After graduation, he set up a practice in his hometown of Aberdeen, Sask., and inspired both his son, Doug, who has a practice in Lloydminster, and his grandson, Kent, who is attending the University of Saskatchewan, to follow in his footsteps. Counting all the uncles and cousins who chose the same path, there will soon be 10 veterinarians in the Weir family.

1960 • David Brewster, BA '69, has moved from Darwin, Australia, to Suva, Fiji, to become dean of the Fiji School of Medicine.

• Murray McMullen, DVM '61; Lyle Rea, DVM '62; and

From left: Constance Naylor, Murray McMullen, Lyle Rea and Louise Rea.

38

THE PORTICO

Louise Rea, B.H.Sc. '60, all attended the 2005 Florida reunion of Guelph graduates.

The Florida luncheon has been an annual event for more than 40 years, and all alumni are welcome to attend. To add your name to the mailing list for the 2006 event, contact Mary Feldskov at mfeldsko@uoguelph.ca or 519-824-4120, Ext. 52904.

• Jim Murray, MA '69, recently received the Award of Excellence in Innovation and Design for Lifelong Learning from the University of Alberta in recognition of his pioneering efforts in the development of webbased educational programs.

His Internet courses on change management and negotiating skills are currently offered in a variety of certificate programs through Alberta's Faculty of Extension.

• Bruno Ramirez, MA '69, is a professor of history at Universite de Montreal and author of the script for II Duce Canadese, a CBC-TV production dramatizing Montreal's Italian community during the 1930s and the internment of some of its members during the Second World War. The four-hour special first aired in October.

• Wesley Roberts, MA '68 and PhD '72, recently celebrated 25

• James Ambrose, BA '74, is a private equity manager in Toronto and a partner in the Shotgun Fund.

• Jennifer Cook Bobrovitz, BA '77, has held several jobs since graduation, including working as a columnist for the Calgary Herald. A series of articles she wrote received the City of Calgary Heritage Award. She has also been a librarian at the Calgary Sun, a writer for the Calgary Real Estate News and an archivist at the Glenbow Museum. She is currently archivist/ curator at the Lougheed House National Site.

• Wayne Carney, B.Sc.(Agr.) '70, retired last June as president of the Canadian Salt Company Ltd. (Windsor Salt) and as vicepresident of sales and marketing for Morton Salt, a division of the Rohm and Haas Company. He lives in Auburn, Pa. • Gary Cummings, B.Sc. (P.E.) '72, was an athletic therapist for Concordia University's football team, the Alouettes, before completing his osteopathy diploma in 1999 from College d'Etudes Osteopathiques. With business partners Dave Campbell and Paul Evans, he opened a sports medicine clinic in Pointe Claire, Montreal, called GCD Sports Rehabi litation Centre. Their business has since expanded and is now Concordia Sports Medicine.

• Jean ne (Hartley) Grover, B.A.Sc. '75, and her husband, David, "are enjoying retirement after careers spanning a combined 50+ years working coast

to coast in Canada's food industry." In 2001, they sailed from Midland, Ont., on Georgian Bay to Trinidad and Venezuela.

They now travel south every winter from their home in New Hamburg, Ont. • Doug Hodgins, B.Sc.(Agr.) '70, retired from Parks Canada in 2001 after 32 years. He and his wife, Brenda, now live in Kawartha Lakes, Ont., where he operates a part-time environmental consulting business.

• Peter Ledwith, B.Comm. '75, was a curator at the Ontario Agricultural Museum in Milton, Ont., before moving to a career in farm machinery sales.

For his involvement with the Association for Living History, Farm and Agricultural Museums, he received the 2005 John T. Schelbecker Award. He is the first Canadian to receive the award.

• Doug McKay, BA '76, was named head coach and director of hockey operations for the Trenton Titans in New Jersey in August 2005. Prior to that, he had spent more than a decade coaching in Italy, Switzerland and the Netherlands. After graduating from Guelph, McKay enjoyed a five-year professional career that culminated in 1980 with a Turner Cup Championship with the Michiganbased Kalamazoo Wings. He was an assistant coach with the Toronto Maple Leafs from 1981 to 1983 and had a stint with the New Jersey Devils from 1987 to 1989 that included a Patrick Division Championship in 1988. He then spent a season as head coach of the Binghamton Whalers.

• Robert Millar, BA ' 72, is a psychotherapist and EAP service provider for VISION (Visiting Assistance in Ontario). A resident of Parry Sound, he completed an education degree

at Lakehead University in May 2005. He says proudly: "Not bad for an old geezer."

• Sandra (Leacock) Murray, BA '72, has retired after 29 years of teaching with the Lambton/Kent Board of Education in Chatham, Ont. She is the 2005 recipient of the outstanding elementary teacher award from the Ontario Teachers' Federation and the Ontario Teachers Insurance Plan. Her husband, Bill, BA '72, retired from the Lambton/Kent board in 2003.

• Aakosua Frema Osei Opare, M.Sc. '76, is a member of parliament in Ghana representing the Accra Metropolitan Area, Ayawaso West constituency, and was recently appointed deputy minister of manpower, youth and employment. Before entering government, she was the country director of the British NGO ActionAid Ghana.

• Moura Quayle, BLA '74, has been seconded from her position as dean of the Faculty of Land and Food Systems at the University of British Columbia to serve as deputy minister for the B.C. Ministry of Advanced Education. She is also a member of the Ontario Agricultural College's International Advisory council.

• Rick Savage, BA '72, retired from a 30-year career in the Canadian Air Force and is now a senior business analyst with xwave in Halifax, working on a maritime helicopter project.

• Beth Selby, B.A.Sc. '79, graduated in November from the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto with an educational doctorate.

• Jane Siberry, B.Sc. '79, was honoured by the Canada Council with the 2005 Victor Martyn Lynch-Staunton Award for outstanding artist in the field of music. She's been touring across

Jane Siberry

Canada and the United States since mid-November and will perform at Carnegie Hall in New York March 11. She's then off to England until the end of April.

• Alan Spergel, B.Comm. '76, is founding partner and president of Mandelbaum Spergel Inc. of Toronto, trustees-inbankruptcy, and was recently named chair of the board of directors of the Canadian Association of Insolvency and Restructuring Professionals.

• Polly (DeCarlo) Stringle, BA '72 and M.Sc. '78, is an arts coordinator for the Thames Valley District School Board in London, Ont., and a part-time lecturer at the University of Western Ontario. She is married to Gary and is "mom" to two golden retrievers, Waldo and Rufus.

She urges other alumni who loved their Guelph experience as much as she did to give to the University.

• Gordon Surgeoner, B.Sc.(Agr.) '71 and M.Sc. '73, received the Order of Ontario in September for his distinguished teaching and research career. A retired faculty member in U of G's Department of Environmental Biology, he is now president of Ontario Agri-Food Technologies in Guelph.

• Joachim Voss, MA '74, is director general of Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT) and a member of the Ontario Agricultural College International Advisory

The OAC diploma class of 1955 held a two·part reunion to cele· brate its 50th anniversary. Thirty·nine of the original 59 gradu· ates met in Guelph in July, and a dozen travelled to Bermuda in October. There, they were hosted by classmate Edward Manuel, ADA '55 and B.Sc.(Agr.) '59, and his wife, Marian. Dr. Tom Mar· tin, who went into medicine, writes that his class has made many contributions to society. "First and foremost, they have been the local and community leaders in agriculture. Some of those who did not choose to stay in agriculture went into teaching, the min· istry, academia, government and business. One of our Canadian classmates was even knighted by the Queen of Denmark for his contribution to improving the economic climate for various facets of the Danish economy." As students, this small class excelled in College Royal events and won the intramural assault·at·arms tro· phy for boxing and wrestling in both 1954 and 1955. "This class has always been very proud to be associated with the Ontario Agricultural College," says Martin. "We hope OAC has been proud of our efforts."

Council. CIAT is a not-for-profit organization that conducts socially and environmentally progressive research aimed at reducing hunger and poverty and preserving natural resources in developing countries. Previously, he served as senior research manager at the International Research Development Centre and as a member of the board of governors for the Consortium for Sustainable Andean Development.

• Lee Whittington, B.Sc.(Agr.) '79, completed the Advanced Agricultural Leadership Program in 1989 and earned an MBA in 1997 from the University of Saskatchewan. He is now manager of information ser-

Lee Whittington

vices for the Prairie Swine Centre of Saskatoon. He received the 2005 Animal Industries Award in Extension and Public Service from the Canadian Society of Animal Science.

• Carin Wittnich, DVM '76, spent several days working in 110 F Mississippi heat to treat

Winter 2006 39

reaches 78,000 Guelph graduates

Carin Wittnich

To place your business ad, contact Scott Anderson 519 -8 27-9169,

l

thea nd e rsondiffe re nce@ roge rs .com www.uoguelph .ca/adguide

animals rescued in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina.

A professor at the University of Toronto's medical school, she took supplies donated by colleagues, veterinary practitioners and U of G. The Humane Society of the United States had opened a veterinary triage centre in Hattiesburg, where the converted fairgrounds became home to more than I ,500 animals- mostly dogs and cats but also horses and exotics such as parrots, iguanas and turtles. Rescued animals were treated and given temporary shelter. In the sweltering heat, dehydration was a major concern, and intravenous fluids donated by OVC "were a godsend;' says Wittnich. Some pets were reunited with their owners and many more were relocated with the help of animal rescue groups from across the United States and Canada.

In fact, OVC also loaned a van and supplies to local volunteers who brought several dogs back to Ontario for adoption.

1980 • Amanda Beamish, B.Comm. '89, is a broadcaster living in Taipei, Taiwan. She co-hosts a show called Ivy Leag11e Analytical English over the radio and Internet. She says she "wound up in Taiwan after working and travelling for more than a few years. I've been here for almost a decade, and after several years out of hospitality, I find myself doing consultant work on the side."

• Micheline (Hans) Birkhead, B.A.Sc. '89, lives in Cathedral City, Calif., with her husband, Mark. Together they run a strategy consulting company called ClearPath Strategy. For Toronto seminars in 2006, visit

www.clearpathstrategy.com.

• Robert Carley, M.Sc. '83, has been appointed associate director of curriculum at the Conestoga College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning in Kitchener, Ont. • Kelly Code, BLA '82, is a landscape architect and teacher who has spent the last 20 years living and working in England. She says she still thinks of Guelph and old friends.

• Margarete (Brath) Haefele, BLA '80, married Fritz Haefele in December 2004 and now lives in Stouffville, Ont. • Beverly Hendry, B.A.Sc. '84 and M.Sc. '87, was recently appointed chief administrative officer for Scugog Township in Ontario. She brings more than 19 years of progressive management and municipal experience at the provincial level, where her work centred on financial management and policy development. Previously, she was a regional director for the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing. She is married with two children and lives in Pickering, Ont. • Drew Hunnisett, DVM '88, operates a veterinary practice in Hillsdale, Ont., with his wife, Catherine, DVM '99, and Atlantic Veterinary College graduate Tamara Goff.

The Hunnisetts and their daughter, Gillian, live on a farm where they raise sheep and Canadian sport horses.

• Sandi Kluepfei-MacPherson, B.Comm.

'85, and her husband, Brian MacPherson, B.Sc.(H.K. ) '85, live in Nepean, Ont., with their sons, Spencer, 13, and Logan, 8. Sandi works at the Canada Science and Technology Museum Corporation managing the publishing division for three museums.

Brian is director general of the Canadian Paralympic Committee and is an avid volunteer at the national level for both the Canada Games and Special Olympics. They are busy hockey parents as well, but look forward to hearing from friends at brian.macpherson@sympatico.ca.

• Jennifer LaChapelle, BA '81 and MA '83, is chief executive officer at Clearview Public Library in Everett, Ont. She also holds a BA in religious studies from the University of Waterloo.

• Veronique Marier, B.Sc.(Eng.) '86, has moved back to Washington, D.C., after five years in India with her husband, Bil, and their children, Bianca, 15, and Am ina, 8. In

India, Veronique worked on energy efficiency and environmental CIDA-funded projects for Econoler International and SNC-Lavalin. Friends can reach her at vero marier@hotmail.com.

• Bill Nixon, B.Sc.(Eng.) '81, and his wife, Linda, celebrated their 25th anniversary in July and live in Chesley, Ont. They have two daughters, Kathie and Kaiti, who is in her second year of the diploma in veterinary technology program at U of G's Ridgetown campus. Bill runs a manufacturing and IT consulting business. When he enrolled at Guelph in the 1970s, he was following in the footsteps of his parents, Donne!, B.Sc.(Agr.) '57, and Betty, B.H.Sc. '55, ofWiarton.

• Nancy Roberts, BA '81, lives in Brockville, Ont., and works in sales and marketing. She can be reached at nancyroberts@ripnet.com.

• Carrie Taylor Van Velzer, B.Sc.(H.K.) '89, is founder of and principal ergonomist for Taylor'd Ergonomics based in Cambridge, Ont. • Michael Wolf, B.Sc.(Agr.) '84, and his wife, Marie, B.Sc. '85, have sold their broiler breeder farm and moved to Waterloo, Ont. After 20 years, they are now "city slickers." They have two children, Christina, 5, and Connor, 2. Michael now works for Weeden Environments as an Ontario sales representative.

Grads w1n international awards OCTOBER 2004, THREE GUELPH GRADUATES WERE awardedj.Armand Bombardier Internationalist Fellowships to study and do research abroad. janice Chan, BLA '93; Adair Rounthwaite, BA '04; and Peter Zerek, BA '04, will each receive $10,000 to attend graduate schools in England, Holland and Sweden, respectively.

They are among 25 laureates selected from 650 candidates nationwide.

Chan has worked as a water project intern with Samaritan's Purse Canada in Vietnam and as a landscape architect with Engineering Ministries International in Trinidad. She will use the Bombardier fellowship to pursue a master of philosophy degree in planning, growth and regeneration at the University of Cambridge.

Rounthwaite studied art history and French at Guelph. Since graduation, she has been collaborating on a cross-Canada suitcase gallery tour, which has carried out community-based art activities and public art interventions in 15 cities between Halifax and Dawson City. She will work towards a master's degree in cultural analysis at the University of Amsterdam.

Zerek graduated from U of G's management economics program. He has worked at Ontario Power Generation and Hydro One and is interested in energy markets, particularly in demand management programs and analyzing the economic and financial risks associated with energy investments. He will undertake a master of science degree in industrial and financial economics at Goteborg University's Graduate Business School in Goteborg, Sweden.

The fellowships are awarded by the Bombardier Foundation, which was created in 1965 to continue the humanitarian work of joseph-Armand Bombardier. It has committed more than $1.7 million to the fellowship program.

I

N

1990 • Heather Abbott Howley, B.Sc. '96, married Leonard Howley in Ottawa in 2001 and celebrated the arrival of their first child, Claire Elizabeth, in March 2005. After completing her Guelph degree, Abbott Howley went on to earn a master's degree from the University of Ottawa. She works as a research officer in the Department of Epidemiology and Community Medicine at the University of Ottawa, in the field of genetics and public health. She is still close with her "Guelph Gang;' including Faydra (Lade) Meier, B.Sc. '96; Tracey Steele, B.Sc. '96; Tracy (Davies) Currie, B.Sc.(H.K.) '96; Sara (Taylor) Johnston, B.Sc. '95; and Maggie (Coulter) DiStasi, B.Comm. '96. Despite being spread out from Ottawa to Michigan, the gang manages to get together once a year, lately with little ones in tow, says Abbott Howley. Old acquaintances are welcome to contact her at heather.howley@ rogers.com.

• David Akin, BA '98, won a Gemini Award in November for best news reporting. His story about CIBC inadvertently faxing con-

Winter 2006 41

Two v1ews of Guelph and a new career

Brad Inglis with his mother, Grace, and sister, jennifer.

B

RAD INGLIS, BA '91, WORKED FOR 19 YEARS in social services at the senior management level before taking a break to follow his entrepreneurial dream. With his mom as a business partner, he has opened an eclectic little store in Guelph's Speedvale Mall called What's in the Pantry.

He says his U of G days gave him a different perspective on his hometown and a greater appreciation for the steady stream of new people coming to the city each year.

"New people mean new ideas, different ways of doing things and new business opportunities;' he says. With this in mind, he chose the 1950s plaza to set up his store. It was part of his neighbourhood while growing up in an area popular with young University professors and their families. Inglis says this was the outskirts of town in the 1950s and 1960s.

Before the plaza was built, the site was the home of the local drive-in theatre.

"Going to the University of Guelph created a whole new window into what was right in my own backyard and not only prepared me for my first career but also planted the seed and equipped me for my next one!"

fidential information to a West Virginia scrapyard appeared in the Globe and Mail and on CTV. The story was a runnerup in the National Newspaper Awards last june and was nominated for an award from the Canadian Association of Journalists. Akin grew up in Guelph and started his journalism career at the Ontarian. He has worked for several Canadian newspapers and has been CTV's political reporter since February 2005.

42

THE

PoRTico

• Michelle (Jones) Axford, B.Sc.(Agr.) '94, and her husband, Michael, live southeast of Melbourne, Australia, and run a 220-cow dairy farm with their two children. She says we started something by asking who had the most Guelph grads and students at their wedding.

There were 41 Guelph grads at the Axfords' ceremony in July 1999. "With one or two exceptions, they were aJI OAC grads," she writes. "This doesn't include my brother and several younger

cousins who began their studies at Guelph since 1999. I am the oldest of four children; three of us are OAC grads and three of the 'in-laws' are also OAC grads." Axford guesses correctly that there are others who can top 41. Check out the photo at the bottom of page 37.

• Catherine Bancroft, BA '96, has co-edited a book of women's travel stories and written a story for it from her own experiences. 011tside the Ordinary: Women's Travel Stories was published last fall by Second Story Press in Toronto. Bancroft has lived in Zimbabwe and has travelled throughout Asia. When not travelling or writing, she is a social worker in Toronto.

• Mark BeJJetrutti, B.Sc. '97, is a pediatrician and recently started specialty training in pediatric hematology/oncology at the Stollery Children's Hospital in Edmonton. He and his wife, Joelle, have two daughters, Anne-Marie and Vanessa, who was born July 5, 2005. They can be reached at mbeJJetr@ hotmail.com.

• Ian Chisholm, B.Sc. '95, is a biologist with Health Canada in Ottawa. He was married on Thanksgiving weekend 2005.

• Chris Courneya, B.Sc.(Agr.) '94, has won an Ottawa Business Award for his work as president of prairie Pyre Software.

He was recognized for his contributions to the company's expansion worldwide and for encouraging company involvement in local and international charities. A community volunteer himself, he has edited Hockey Made Easy, an instructional manual targeted at coaches, parents and chi ldren, for more than seven years.

• Kendra (Arthur) Craig, B.Sc.(H.K.) '90, was married in July 2003 to Gord Craig, and they have a year-old daughter,

Carlene Grace. The Craigs live on a small farm outside Exeter, Ont., and Kendra co-owns a therapy clinic caJJed Bio-Connections Health Care Clinic.

• Sheila Gardiner, B.Sc. '94, began her career at the Smithsonian Institution's Conservation and Research Center in Virginia, working as a field assistant, reproductive physiology lab technician and GIS lab administrator and instructor.

She returned to Ontario in 1998 and graduated from Ridgetown College with an associate diploma in veterinary technology in 2000. She worked as a registered veterinary technician m Oakville, Ont., and Burnaby, B.C., but is now employed at Energix Research, Inc. in Burnaby. She also volunteers at the Mountain View Conservation and Breeding Centre in Langley and invites friends to contact her at a6a3000@telus.net.

• Pamela Jacobs, B.Sc. '88 and M.Sc. '90, began a new job last May as associate university librarian in collection resources at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ont. • Anne Joselin, B.Sc.(Agr.) '90, lives in Sydney, Australia, and works for Samaritan's Purse, a Christian relief and development agency. She'd love to hear from any Guelph grads in the area via e-mail: anne@incantatem.com.

• Heather (Musgrave) Kenalty, B.Sc. '98, was one of the mystery skaters pictured in the fall 2005 Portico. She has worked in the pharmaceutical industry since graduation and is now with Serono Canada, a Swiss biotech company. She was married in 2001 to Brendan Kenalty, and they have two sons, Keagan, 3, and Ayden, 1.

• Harry Kerr, ODH '98, received the Star of Life Award for his outstanding work in

emergency services. Residing in Foam Lake, Sask., he worked with Shamrock Ambulance for 15 years as an emergency medical technician. In january 2005, he upgraded to a primary-care paramedic. He serves on the Primary Health Care Board for the Sunrise Health District and teaches first aid and CPR. • Cassidy Klowak, B.Comm.

'97, has been working with CIBC as a personal banker since graduation. She's engaged to Jeff Stroud, and they live in Caledonia, Ont., with their corgi, Casper. The wedding is planned for October 2006.

• Greggory LaBerge, B.Sc. '97, was sworn in july 1, 2005, as director of the Denver Police Crime Laboratory. He's been involved in some of the most difficult forensic cases in Colorado, including the jon-Benet Ramsey investigation and the Kobe Bryant case. He is codeveloper of a legal support website for forensic DNA technology, which has been used worldwide to aid in the prosecution of violent crimes. After earning his Guelph degree in molecular biology and genetics, he completed a master's degree in biostatistics at the University of Colorado and is currently studying for his doctorate in human medical genetics at the Colorado Health Sciences Center in Denver.

Ladner, • Jodi (Staples) B.Comm. '93, recently left her position as director of marketing and communications for Habitat for Humanity in Toronto and moved to St. Louis, Mo., with her husband, Trevor, and daughter, Tatum. Jodi is now volunteering with non-profit organizations and pursuing an interest in photography. U of G friends and classmates can reach her at jodi.ladner@gmail.com.

• Lois Mansfield, MA '90,

earned a PhD in 1994 and is now a principal lecturer in environmental management at the University of Central Lancashire, U.K. She was married in 1996 and has a five-year-old daughter, Laura.

• Alanna May-Gardiner, BA '94, and her husband, Scott, have a one-year-old son, Gregory Owen john Gardiner, born Dec. 17, 2004. They live in Bolton, Ont., and she is an office administrator at Thistletown C.I. in Etobicoke.

• Karen McCoy, B.Sc. '95 and M.Sc. '97, lives in Sauteyrargues, France, with her partner, Thierry Boulinier, and son, Dorian. She's a research scientist at the Institut de recherche pour le developpement, studying host-parasite interactions.

• Jennifer McNaught, B.Sc. (H.K.) '95, graduated from medical school at the University of Toronto in I 999, then completed a five-year residency in obstetrics and gynecology in Winnipeg. In May 2004, she passed her certification exam for the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, then did a one-year fellowship in contraception and pediatric and adolescent gynecology at Queen's University.

She has now set up practice in Winnipeg as an assistant professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Manitoba. On july 16,2005, she and registered nurse John Balagus were married in Oakville, Ont. The wedding party included Tiffany (Lay) Meier, B.Sc. '96.

• Malcolm Murray, ADA '96, farms with his father at Athol Farms Inc. and lives in London, Ont., with his wife, Jennifer johnson, and their children, Mason and Eleanor. He welcomes news from '95 and '96 alumni at mjmurray@uniserve.

DuPont applauds Summers

The Alumni Concourse in Rozanski Hall was an appropriate place for Bill Summers to receive a volunteer award from DuPont Cana· da. From left: Joanne Shoveller, U of G's vice-president (alumni affairs and development); Summers; Thor Cruse, DuPont business director for Crop Protection Canada; and OAC dean Craig Pearson.

ILL SuMMERS, B.Sc.(AGR.) '82 AND M.Sc. '84, is one of four employees of DuPont Canada who have been honoured for their volunteer efforts. Each year, DuPont's parent corporation acknowledges the volunteer efforts of 148 company employees (or teams) worldwide who donate their time and talents to improving the quality of life in their communities.

In addition, a grant of $1,000 US is presented to the organization for which the employee performs volunteer service.

Summers has designated the University of Guelph as the recipient of the grant.

A DuPont Canada employee for 21 years, Summers is currently registration and development manager. He has volunteered with the University of Guelph Alumni Association for seven years and served as president for two terms. He was instrumental in negotiating the UGAA's $500,000 donation to the construction of Rozanski Hall and designation of the building's Alumni Concourse.

Summers also has strong family ties to the University. His father, john Summers, BSA '53 and MSA '59, is a University professor emeritus who retired from the Department of Animal and Poultry Science in 1997. Two brothers are also Guelph graduates- Peter, B.Sc.(Agr.) '79, and David, B.Sc.(Agr.) '80 -as is an uncle, Bradley Schneller, BSA '53. Summers' maternal grandparents, Edna, DHE '25, and Wilfred Schneller, ADA '24, started the U of G family tradition.

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Winter 2006 43

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• Alison Pick, BA '99, writes poetry and fiction. In 2002, she won the Bronwen Wallace Award for her unpublished work in poetry. Her first book of poetry, Question & Answer, was short! is ted for the Gerald Lampert Award. Her newly published novel, The Sweet Edge, is the story of two lovers separated by summer jobs. One critic called it "powerful, funny and terribly sexy." Originally from Kitchener, Ont., Pick now divides her time between Toronto and St. John's, Nfld.

• Monique Sluymers, BA '95, has been teaching in the United States for seven years while pursuing a PhD part time. She's a new mother to Owen Tenzyn Sluymers and would love to hear from old friends "to see what everyone has been up to over the past 10 years."

• Kosta Sotos, B.Sc. '92, moved to Arlington Heights, Ill., after graduation and is a chiropractor at North Shore Spinal and Sports Rehab.

• Harry Stoddart, B.Sc.(Agr.) '92 and M.Sc. '95, and his wife, Silvia, B.Sc. '95, recently moved their organic farm operation to Little Britain, Ont. Harry also resigned from IBM after seven years as a management consultant to launch his own consulting business. The couple has five children- Connor, Cavan, Harrison, Abigayle and Rebekah.

• Tammy Tipler-Priolo, B.A.Sc. '90, recently changed the name of her genealogy research and consulting business to the Ancestor Investigator. She graduated from the National Institute for Genealogical Studies in partnership with the University of Toronto in 2004 and has a professional learning certificate in genealogical studies. She has traced ancestors in England,

44

THE PORTICO

Ireland, Scotland, Italy, Canada and the United States and also gives workshops on how to start a family history. Her website (www.ancestorinvestigator.com) even includes genealogy puzzles and games she's created.

• Andrew Wagner-Chazalon, BA '92, has published his first book, Muskoka Traditions. He says the book " looks at the enduring ways of life that make Muskoka a special region."

Wagner-Chazalon took his first steps towards a writing career while studying at Guelph. He wrote for the Ontarian, then was the first student hired for SPARK, a student writing program in the Office of Research.

"With the clippings and the experience I gathered at that program, I was able to get a job at a weekly newspaper;' he says.

He's the editor of The Muskokan and lives in Bracebridge, Ont., with his wife, Sharon, BA '90. They were married while still students at Guelph in a ceremony at the Arboretum.

• Mark Wojcicki, B.A.Sc. '90, is a territory manager in pharmaceutical sales and marketing for Bayer Healthcare in Guelph.

He worked previously at Homewood Health Centre,

Wojcicki family

Guelph General Hospital and Bristol-Myers Squibb and has completed courses in human resources at both U of G and Conestoga College. He and his wife, Jackie Kukla, have been

married nine years and have two children, Hanna and Peter.

2000 • Michelle Consul, B.Sc. '02, works in Toronto as an emergency management program adviser for the Ontario government.

• Leanne Hardman, B.Sc. '00, is an insurance adjuster with The Co-operators in Newmarket, Ont. She's also a new mother to jacob, born jan. 27,2004.

• Rhys Henderson and Diane Horn, both B.Sc. '04, had never met at U of G, but they became friends not long after graduation. Both joined the Canadian Forces and were assigned to the same platoon for basic officer training in St. jean, Que. They graduated together in April 2005 and still keep in touch despite being moved to opposite sides of the country for sec-

Originally from Liberia in West Africa, he works with Capra International Inc. and has implemented a successful micro finance program for refugees and local people in Ghana, drafted a variety of policy documents and development programs in Liberia, developed an alternative community-based approach for rehabilitating child soldiers and war-affected children, and worked to establish a rule of law and governance "think tank" for Africa.

• Juli (Biro) Langhorne, B.Sc. '95 and M.Sc. '00, married Jason Hayden, B.Sc.(Agr.) '95, in Sep-

juli Langhorne and Jason Hayden

Diane Horn and Rhys Henderson

ond-language training. Second Lieut. Henderson is now working on his Common Army phase in gagetown, N.B. Acting Sub- Lieut. Horn is stationed in Esquimalt, B.C., with the navy.

Friends can contact her at can_eh_diane@hotmail.com.

• Adam Ireland, B.Comm. '03, and julie McDougal were married April 23 at Country Heritage Park in Milton, Ont. • McAnthony Keah, BA 'Ol and M.Sc. ' 03 , is a consultant with expertise in policy and community development, governance, human rights and micro- fi na nee development.

tember 1999. She worked for Growmark Inc. as a lawn and garden technical product specialist while developing a Body Wise business. He worked for Cormdale Genetics, and they lived in Guelph until he died in 2001 from cancer. Langhorne moved to Toronto in 2003 and expanded her nutritional counselling and personal training business. She recently married Andrew Langhorne. "I would love to hear from any of my classmates I've lost touch with;' she says. "Please e-mail me at vitalityforlife@rogers.com."

• Tiffany (Hecnar) and Michael Moore, both B.Sc. '01, were married Oct. 8 in Lindsay, Ont. They both work at Lakehead University- Tiffany as a laboratory and biosafety specialist and Michael as a trout technician at the Aquatic Toxicology and

PASSAGES Janis Acheson, BA '79, Feb. 25, 2005 Eric Baldwin, DVM '52, July l, 2005 Gordon Boylan, DVM '46, Oct. 29,2005 John Boyle, BA '78, June 2005 Nathan Budgell, DVM '39, June 22, 2005 Lloyd Busch, BSA '42, Dec. 20, 2004 Monica Buschold, B.Sc. '86, Jan. 2, 2005 Robert Cammidge, BSA '62, Oct. 26,2005 Brock Cleland, DVM '49, Dec. 6, 2003 Paul Clutterbuck, B.Comm. '93, June 20, 2005 Dale Cunningham, BSA '61, Nov. 25, 2005 Stirling Dawley, DVM '49, July 8, 2005 Carina (O'Reilly) Dekker, BA '84, June 27, 2005 Leonard Dolan, DVM '50, June 8, 2005 Wallace Donaldson, BSA '40, March 29, 2004 Gordon Dunlop, ADA '79, unknown Peter Dyson, BSA '52, Aug. 25, 2004 Dirk Felius, DVM '64 and GD '72, Jan. 15, 2005 Neil Foster, PhD '79, July 2005 Jamieson Gourley, B.Sc.(Agr.) '80, July 1, 2005 Edith (Simpson) Hanna, DHE '27, Oct. 27,2003 Kathleen (Wurm) Hastings, DHE '33, April 29, 2005 Nancy Hawkins, B.A.Sc. '87, March 31, 2005 Paul Johnson, ADA '56, Sept. 2, 2005

Tiffany and Michael Moore

Research Centre. They can be reached at tiffany.moore@

William Katarynczuk, BSA '58, October 2003 Ian Kirby, DVM '52, Sept. 7, 2005 Henry Kock, B.Sc.(Agr.) '77, Dec. 25, 2005 Donald Kreager, B.Sc.(Agr.) '71, June 2005 Donald Lindo, DVM '67, March 24, 2005 Thomas Lockridge, DVM '54, Sept. 10, 2005 Margaret ( Cardno) MacKenzie, DHE '35, Aug. 5, 2005 Delmer Maize, BSA '62, May 13,2005 Paul McArth ur, ADA '88, july 28, 2005 William McEachern, BSA '42, July 30, 2005 Esther Mitchell, B.Sc. '77, January 2004 Sundy Mitter, BA '91, Oct. 10,2005 Lloyd Mollison, DVM '41, Aug. 13, 2005 Timothy Morgan, DVM '72, Aug. 28, 2005 Brock Neely, BSA '48, unknown John Oakley, BSA '48, Aug. 11, 2005 Jan Ochalski, DVM '57, Aug. 31, 2005 John Pazur, BSA '44, july 30, 2005 Elsie (Hume) Pettit, DHE '34, Oct. 28, 2005 Carmen Purdy, BA '71, Aug. 8, 2005 Rhonda Rathbun, BLA '95 and M.Sc. '98, Nov. 12,2005 Frederic Rigden, MSA '50, April 7, 2005 Barbara (Alsop) Roberts, DHE '49, june 3, 2005

lakeheadu.ca and mnmoore @ lakeheadu.ca.

• Cameron and Lindsay (Leckie) Morrison, both DVM '04, met in their first year of university and were married in August. They're both working with Sydenham Veterinary Services in Kingston, Ont. • D' Arcy Roff, BA '04, headed for the Kashmir region of Pakistan in October right after the massive earthquake, which is estimated to have killed more

Keith Robson, DVM '49, June 8, 2005 Gerald Ruby, B.Sc. '71, May 17, 2005 Hugh Sheppard, B.Sc.(Agr.) '49 and DVM '56, unknown Daniel Smith, BAS '38 and DVM '42, Jan. 18, 2005 Mildred (Fleck) Snyder, DHE '34, Aug.24,2005 Sue Stevenson, DHE '54, Aug. 26, 2005 Jean Sulian, BA '85, September 2004 Jane Taylor, B.Sc. '87, Aug. 1, 2005 Susan Terrill, B.Sc.(Agr.) '73 and DVM '78, Aug. 5, 2005 Joseph Vandane, DVM '47, unknown Mary Ann (Miltenburg) Vandersluis, B.A.Sc. '78, Oct. 16, 2005 Peter Van'T Hof, B.Sc. '85, Oct. 11, 2004 Heide (Frost) Walsh, BA '99, Nov. 28, 2003 Judith (Robson) Wanamaker, DHE '39, Dec. 31, 2003 William Western, BSA '53, Aug. 12, 2005 janet (Kerry) Willetts, DVM '45, unknown Maxine (Roberts) Wilson, DHE '35, Aug. 9, 2005 Mark Woodley, B.Sc.(Agr.) '80, july 1, 2005 Victor Worthy, BSA '60, July 25, 2005 William Wright, DVM '56, March 8, 2005 Send deceased notices to Alumni Records at alwnnirecords@uoguelph.ca.

than 80,000 people. A Guelph native, he is a logistics officer with Canada's Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART ) and commands a platoon that ensures DART officials have everything they need, from aid to vehicles to medical supplies.

In an interview with the Guelph Mercury, he said he was amazed by the devastation but also by the actions of local people: "I've seen how resilient people can be.

They will have tears in their eyes

when they shake your hand."

• Mark Stewart, BA '02, recently completed an MA at the University of Ottawa and has been hired as the legislative assistant to MP David Tilson, the member for Dufferin-Caledon.

Between degrees, Stewart taught English in Japan for a year.

• Stephen Young, MA '01, is in his second year of teaching at Rosedale Heights School of the Arts in Toronto. He teaches history, civics and law.

Winter 2006 45