Convocation to be Celebrated Virtually in May

Spring Convocation will be virtual for the Class of 2021 and will be live-streamed on the Saint Mary’s University website and Facebook page on Friday, May 28, 2021 in three ceremonies:

• 10 a.m.  Sobey School of Business and Graduate Studies in Business

• 2 p.m.   Faculty of Science and Graduate Studies in Science

• 4 p.m.   Faculty of Arts and Graduate Studies in Arts

All times are listed in Atlantic Daylight Time (ADT).

A virtual convocation in May ensures the university’s continued adherence to public health requirements. While we are disappointed not to be in person and on campus, we know that the livestream of convocation reaches graduates, families and friends both locally and around the world. All members of the Saint Mary’s University community are invited to watch the convocation ceremonies at the times listed above.

“I am very proud of the graduates of May 2021,” says Dr. Robert Summerby-Murray, President and Vice-Chancellor of Saint Mary’s. “In announcing a virtual convocation for May, we are also acknowledging the resilience and continued commitment of all our graduates. We know from our earlier experience with virtual convocations that the ceremonies will be warm, vibrant and celebratory. We will do our very best to highlight your significant accomplishments as you complete your academic programs.” 

For more information related to convocation, visit www.smu.ca/graduation

Reflection and Resilience: Community Response to COVID-19

Members of the Saint Mary’s University community reflected on the past year during a webinar held on March 24, 2021. Building Resilience During the COVID-19 Pandemic was the fourth session of the virtual SMU in Action event series and featured Dr. Robert Summerby-Murray, Dr. Tony Charles, Crystal Witter BA’21 and Dr. Mohammad Rahaman.

Panellists brought their unique perspective to the challenges, opportunities and resilience in communities during the past year. Dr. Tony Charles, who also holds the position of director of the Community Conservation Network, shared the 2020 Report on Nova Scotian Communities & COVID-19: Challenges & Resilience, a study conducted with the help of Saint Mary’s colleagues and students. The report looks at how communities and individuals responded to the pandemic as a measure of resilience, as well as the social and economic impacts that the pandemic had on communities. While communities reported challenges in employment, tourism and education, they also shared inspiring stories of leadership and community action. “It’s amazing what can be done by individuals and by working together collectively,” says Charles.

Saint Mary’s President Dr. Summerby-Murray found many parallels between the Nova Scotia report and how the Saint Mary’s community responded; praising technicians, faculty, staff and students for adapting quickly to new learning management systems and pedagogical innovation while understanding the challenges faced. Other highlights from the past year included the Saint Mary’s University Entrepreneurship Centre’s swift response to supporting entrepreneurs and businesses in Atlantic Canada, donor support to the COVID-19 Emergency Student Relief Fund and the investment in digital transformation of the teaching and learning environment. He credits the past year as an opportunity to learn innovative approaches to teaching, research and community engagement.

“Challenging, yet transformational”

From the student perspective, recent graduate Crystal Witter shared her experience as an international student leader and entrepreneur who navigated the pandemic and graduated as valedictorian in January 2021. While completing her degree, Crystal had to travel home to Jamaica and was forced to close her business, Ilash Icons HFX, due to COVID-19. She admits her final year was a difficult one both mentally and financially. She discussed the added challenges for international students navigating travel restrictions, quarantine measures, and delayed work permits, but credited the Saint Mary’s community for their willingness to help. Receiving a COVID-19 Student Emergency bursary, along with other scholarships, relieved the financial burden due to loss of income, and having caring professors who provided accommodations allowed her to complete her course load and cross the virtual graduation stage. Crystal has since joined the Saint Mary’s University Entrepreneurship Centre team has a Project Manager for the SMU Community Hackathon, which looks at tech solutions to address human trafficking in Nova Scotia. When reflecting on the past year, she says “I couldn’t be resilient without help of my professors, friends and family. It’s not an individual journey.”

Dr. Mohammad Rahaman, Associate Dean of Strategic Partnership & Community Engagement for the Sobey School of Business, moderated the panel’s Q&A period and shared insight on the Sobey Prosperity Network & Community Revitalization Project. In response to COVID-19’s impact on the business community, the Sobey School gathered a network of faculty, industry experts and alumni to offer webinars, discussions and business coaching. Later this year, the Prosperity Network will release a report to the community outlining the lessons learned to help inform policy makers in Atlantic Canada.

Watch a recording of the session

SMU archaeologist brings history into focus with LiDAR and 3D tech

Dr. Jonathan Fowler is bringing Nova Scotia’s historic settlements into sharper focus, using advanced digital tools to combine archival maps with landscape data in his research and teaching at Saint Mary’s.

“This is about as close as you can get to time travel without a DeLorean,” says the associate professor of archaeology. Instead of going Back to the Future, the texture mapping technology offers a fresh approach to viewing the past, showing in stunning detail how our farmlands and fortresses looked hundreds of years ago.

In a current project, Fowler shows how Fort Anne National Historic Site would have looked in 1706, combining a centuries-old military map with a 3D terrain model created from current aerial Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) data. 

“Airborne LiDAR has become a powerful tool for archaeologists to tell the stories about our heritage while also providing historical information for us to study and interpret,” says Fowler, who teaches in the Department of Anthropology.  

LiDAR technology has been around for decades, but the provincial government’s open data model is enabling an explosion of new research in many disciplines. Free LiDAR data is now available for much of Nova Scotia through GeoNOVA’s DataLocator Elevation Explorer portal. Aircraft mounted with LiDAR transmitters and receivers fly over landscapes across the province, emitting pulses of light energy. This provides detailed data about the ground surface, and archaeologists can filter out trees and other high vegetation to see a bare surface model.

To process LiDAR data, Fowler’s go-to is the Surfer surface mapping platform from Golden Software of Golden, Colorado. He has been using it for years to visualize geophysical survey data, and more recently to collate and analyze LiDAR data with old maps. The technology “essentially drapes historical maps over digital 3D models, creating a vivid visualization of the former landscape,” he explains.  

For his Fort Anne images, Fowler used high-resolution scans of historic maps of the fortress: a 1706 military map from France’s National Archives, and a 1753 map from the Library of Congress, showing the site under British rule. He put them through a georeferencing process in a Geographical Information System (GIS) program, then used LiDAR data to create a ‘bare Earth’ 3D surface model of the area’s current topography, minus vegetation and buildings. Combining them in Surfer created a 3D map revealing the original layout of buildings within the fort’s ramparts and beyond.   

“Interestingly, most of the fort’s buildings no longer exist, but some structures still stand today in [the town of] Annapolis Royal and are among the oldest buildings in Canada,” says Fowler.

Fowler hopes to unearth new information about Fort Anne and its surroundings. As he has in Grand Pré and other projects, he can use the new 3D imagery as a guide to return with Ground Penetrating Radar to further investigate what remains hidden beneath the surface.

“Dr. Fowler’s research demonstrates the value of visualizing and modeling multiple diverse data sets to gain deeper scientific insights,” adds Blakelee Mills, CEO of Golden Software.

In another study of the Fortress of Louisbourg National Historic Site, Fowler used a map dating back to 1745, after the New England siege. Though Parks Canada rebuilt much of the town’s outer wall during the 20th century, LiDAR data shows evidence of the craters left when the British military attempted to demolish the site in the mid-1700s.

Aside from its research benefits, fun, and aesthetic value, this approach to historical mapping holds great potential for explaining landscape histories with vivid visualizations.

“Rather than asking someone to imagine a past environment, we can digitally render it in 3D, resulting in a much more immersive experience of the past,” says Fowler.

“As a teacher of history, archaeology, and heritage resource management and interpretation, I am thrilled that these tools are becoming more affordable and user friendly. We are presently integrating them into several of our archaeology courses, including Archaeological Remote Sensing, Landscape Archaeology, and Cultural Resource Management Archaeology.”

For more details on the Fort Anne project, read Dr. Fowler’s articles on LinkedIn and Facebook. Follow his updates on Twitter at @ArchInAcadie.  

Entrepreneurship student wins Frank H. Sobey Award

The Sobey School of Business is thrilled to announce Morgan Baker-Tucker, a fourth year Entrepreneurship student, has won a Frank H. Sobey Award for Excellence in Business Studies. Morgan is one of nine business students from Atlantic Canadian universities who have been named recipients of the generous $30,000 awards. 

The winners of the Frank H. Sobey Award for Excellence in Business Studies were chosen from 32 exceptional nominations provided by the Deans of their respective business schools, based on their entrepreneurship, supporting the communities in which they live and work, their employment experience and academic excellence.

Morgan exhibits the entrepreneurial spirit of Atlantic Canada, saying her career aspiration is to run her own non-profit, ideally here on the East Coast. She says that winning the Frank H. Sobey Award has also allowed her to consider going to grad school, an opportunity she wouldn’t have previously thought possible.

Research Expo showcases the exceptional talent of Saint Mary’s researchers

A screenshot from this year’s virtual expo.

Sixteen talented researchers from Science, Arts and the Sobey School of Business at Saint Mary’s University gathered to share their research on March 5, 2021.

Each year Research Expo offers a wide range of topics, and this year’s event —held virtually for the first time—was no exception. Open to both the Saint Mary’s community and the public, Expo had more than 170 registered participants.

Panelists were asked to condense their research—sometimes months or even years in the making—into a three-minute presentation, in the same format as the 3-Minute Thesis competition our graduate students participate in.

The wide range of topics showcases the breadth of research expertise at Saint Mary’s. Professors spoke about their work on measuring dark matter, ultra-fast laser scanning microscopes, the psychology behind video interviews in hiring practices, and Colombian post-traumatic literature. 

Kevin Buchan, Director of the Office of Innovation and Community Engagement (OICE), facilitated a question-and-answer period after each presentation session, providing an opportunity for panelists to offer more detailed explanations of their work.

Events like Research Expo are key to building partnerships across different departments within the university as well as external partnerships. OICE is looking forward to continuing to highlight the excellent research happening here at Saint Mary’s University.

The Office of Innovation and Community Engagement (OICE) at Saint Mary’s facilitates research relationships between faculty members and government departments, private companies, industrial associations and international agencies. To learn more about the Research Expo and the Office of Innovation and Community Engagement, click here.

An evening across the ocean with Doireann Ní Ghríofa

William Wordsworth defined poetry as “the spontaneous overflow of feelings; it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility …” On March 4, the Irish Studies program welcomed acclaimed Irish writer Doireann Ní Ghríofa as guest speaker for its annual D’Arcy McGee Lecture, showing that Wordsworth is not alone in seeing poetry as a matter of feelings and inspiration. 

Ní Ghríofa is a poet and essayist who writes in both Irish and English. Her prose bestseller A Ghost in the Throat, an inventive hybrid of essay and fiction, was crowned Book of the Year at the 2020 Irish Book Awards. She also has six award-winning poetry collections, the most recent of which is Lies (an Irish Times Book of the Year and Irish Independent Book of 2018). 

“To give a lecture like this isn’t something that I’m used to at all,” Ní Ghríofa confessed at the outset of the virtual public lecture, which drew over 100 people. “I’ve no academic expertise that would qualify me to do so, well beyond what I’ve taught myself in quite a muddled way. I’m just a person who has slowly, over many years and with many missteps, taught themselves to become a writer.”

Doireann Ní Ghríofa

Ní Ghríofa added that she came to writing comparatively late in life: “I held a passion for reading, though, much earlier – I was a very bookish child, the kid who wants to bring home more books from the library than my arms could ever carry – but I only began to write in my late twenties, and I’ve never shaken off my astonishment at the fact that a life can take a drastic turn like that, that we can suddenly become absorbed in a new devotion, that feels like it comes upon us totally unexpectedly, and we find that it has changed everything.” 

Through her poetry, Ní Ghríofa explores the journeys of birth, death, desire, and domesticity. In her talk, she revealed how grief and motherhood sparked her way into poetry: “For a long time, I struggled to speak of that grief, but poetry allowed me a way to speak of the pain and longing and the loss that I felt, even after my subsequent children were born, for that first lost pregnancy,” Ní Ghríofa said before reciting a selection from “Sólás” in the book Lies, her collection of poems with a refreshing yet crafty presentation in both tongues.

“This poem grew from the moment I learned that in Irish folklore, the souls of miscarried and stillborn infants were believed to return as little birds – sedge-warblers – to comfort their mothers with birdsong,” she added. 

The poet also explained why her lecture focused on these interconnections between grief and literature. “My younger sister Éibhleann died very recently,” she said. “It’s such a painful loss, and something I can’t really bring myself to speak about very much. It’s a particularly lonely time to lose a family member, with the pandemic, when we’re are deprived of the company and comfort of others. But my writing practice has helped me through these difficult days and kept my head above water, if only barely some days, by connecting again with how grief has been such a deep source of my work.”

After thanking her audience in both Irish and English, Ní Ghríofa reminded us that reading and writing poetry is good for healing and transformation: “[Poetry] has never failed to bring me comfort, even now, as we persevere through such dark, uncertain times.”

Saint Mary’s researcher looks at teaching spelling and reading in a new way

Saint Mary’s University psychology department professor Dr. Nicole Conrad.

A researcher at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax is studying a fundamental skill in education: learning to read.

Dr. Nicole Conrad, a cognitive psychologist and professor in the Psychology department, has received a prestigious federal research grant to pursue how spelling facilitates the development of reading skills in elementary school children.

A $92,000 Insight Grant from the federal Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) agency will allow her to pursue a research project titled “Spelling matters, too! The role of spelling practice on the development of reading skill.”

Conrad’s project involves research in elementary schools focusing on how memory is involved in the process of reading. This research will continue virtually with families around Nova Scotia, with COVID-19 safety precautions in mind.

“I am looking at how spelling and reading develop, interact, and help or facilitate each other,” says Conrad. “This is the first of a longitudinal study, tracking their relation over a period.”

“When I talk about what kids are learning when spelling, it is about how they are putting that information into memory, storing it, and accessing it at a later time when they are reading.”

Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) awarded Dr. Nicole Conrad of Saint Mary’s University a $92,000 Insight Grant to continue her research that’s essential to the betterment of instructional practices for Canadian teachers..

Conrad’s undergraduate students play an integral role in this research, administering reading and spelling tests to elementary school children—while practicing vital research techniques themselves.

In one study the researchers first teach words with specific orthographic or letter patterns to early readers. After a period of time, they retest the children to study the effect of learning the patterns of letters — ick, ing, for example — on their word reading and reading comprehension.

 “Decoding words is critical,” says Conrad. “Our written language represents our oral language, so at an early age children must learn how reading and spelling map together.”

She notes English is one of the most challenging languages to master.

“It is very inconsistent in terms of the mappings between the letters and sounds. We have letters that make more than one sound, and we have sounds represented by more than one letter. We want to determine how spelling might aid with learning these mappings,” she says. “I usually start working with kids in Grade 2, and by that point there are kids who understand that they are not strong readers. When they struggle to read it harms their self-confidence, which is heartbreaking to see.”

SSHRC is a federal research funding agency that promotes and supports post-secondary based research and training in social sciences and the humanities. The Canadian agency recognized Conrad as an established national leader in research devoted to understanding reading.

Conrad’s research looks at the underlying mechanisms of how children learn to read, with an ultimate goal of creating best practices for Canadian teachers through greater understanding of how children learn language.

“There is vast variability in teaching our kids to read,” says Conrad. “A public inquiry by the Ontario Human Rights Commission is currently underway, examining whether teaching practices in Ontario are based on what science says works.”

Along with her students, Conrad eagerly awaits the results of this public inquiry, expected this spring.

“My students and I will then evaluate the implications of these results on instructional methods used in Nova Scotia and incorporate these findings into our research.

Going beyond the laboratory and getting first-hand research experience in schools is exciting and empowering — bringing everything into perspective.

“I love being able to hire students through multiple programs offered at Saint Mary’s, allowing them to mix their course work with experiential learning and original research,” says Conrad.

Psychology graduates studying under Conrad have pursued their dream careers in clinical psychology, education, school psychology, and speech-language pathology, to name a few.

Conrad says her inspiration to be a professor stems from a love of teaching students to be productive, well-respected citizens. But the “a-ha!” moment for this passion came later in life.

Dr. Nicole Conrad’s son is the inspiration for the current research on the spelling-reading connection.

“My young son makes my research come alive. It is magical when I watch him read. He puts into perspective everything I learned and shows me what I do is real,” she says. “I always wanted a career that made me excited to get up in the morning, and I have met those expectations at Saint Mary’s.”

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This story first appeared in The Chronicle-Herald.

Dr. Sara Malton researching hunger and fasting in the Victorian era

Current cultural dialogues about womanhood and agency are popular topics of inquiry in today’s social science research, yet society’s apparent need to contain the female body has been a poignant issue for centuries. Dr. Sara Malton has been researching the representation of women’s bodies – and women’s physical and psychological health – by revisiting understandings of fasting, starvation and selfhood in 19th-century literature and culture.

Dr. Sara Malton

“This research could help us approach with greater care our thinking about women’s relationships with their bodies and questions of agency and help us critically consider the ways that we tend to pathologize everything,” says Dr. Malton, a Professor in the Department of English Language & Literature.

Malton’s current research focuses on representation of the “fasting girl,” which she describes in her research abstract as “a phenomenon which became the focus of much scrutiny in British, European, and Anglo-American medicine and the popular press, as well as nineteenth-century literature. Fasting girls were frequently purported to survive on nothing but the Eucharist and sips of water often for weeks, months, or sometimes even years. On the one hand, such young women evoked a pattern of behavior that recalled that of earlier miraculous saints, such as Saint Catherine of Siena (1347-80), who was renowned for what was then termed anorexia mirabilis. Yet into the latter decades of the nineteenth century, doctors largely discredited the entire notion of anorexia mirabilis.”

Last summer, Malton received a federal SSHRC Insight Development Grant for her project, entitled “Wondrous Hunger: Salvation, Starvation and the Nineteenth-Century 'Fasting Girl.'” Further investigation on the subject has led her to the Welsh girl Sarah Jacob, a figure who has been addressed by authors ranging from Charles Dickens to Emma Donoghue in her recent historical novel, The Wonder [2016]. Cases such as Jacob’s “were at the nexus of this transition from the perception of self-imposed starvation as redemptive sacrifice to a pathologized illness, anorexia nervosa, which was defined in 1873,” says Malton in her abstract.

With “intermittent fasting” becoming popular again as a weight loss strategy, Malton hopes her research will contribute to current discussions on gender, agency and the body, as well as tensions that remain between medical practice and religious belief.  

“There has been a battle of authority between religion and science, and during the Victorian era there was a desire to pathologize and reclassify. Prior to the late 19th century, there was no specific medical pathology for anorexia. So, who controls these women’s stories? After their deaths we have trial records and medical records, but no records from the women,” Malton explains.

“In a time when we are so polarized in our discussions, I think that it is now useful to add nuance to historical issues where religious discourse relates to scientific discourse,” she adds.

In much of her research, Malton explores the intersections of fiction, finance, technology and law, as well as consumer and commodity culture. Her publications include the book, Forgery in Nineteenth-Century Literature and Culture: Fictions of Finance from Dickens to Wilde (Palgrave-Macmillan 2009).

She is the current Secretary and a past Trustee of The Dickens Society, and hosted the international 20th Annual Dickens Society Symposium at Saint Mary’s in 2015. A few months ago, Chicago's Remy Bumppo Theatre Company invited her to present Between the Lines: The Chimes, a pre-show lecture for its virtual performance of the 1844 Christmas story by Dickens.

Learn more about Malton’s work at saramalton.com and follow her on Twitter at @saramalton.

SMU receives federal funding for major new chemistry centre collaboration

This week a major $518-million funding initiative from the Canadian Foundation for Innovation (CFI) was announced by the federal government, giving support to 102 projects at 35 post-secondary institutions across Canada.

Saint Mary’s is proud to be a collaborating partner on a project at Memorial University in Newfoundland. The new ACESCentre: Atlantic Canada Environmental and Sustainable Chemistry Centre was granted $6.7 million in federal CFI funding; Saint Mary’s will see approximately $485,000 of the total. The total value of the project with funding from other organizations will be $16.9 million.

This new world-class research centre will address challenges related to the environment. Many faculty members across campus, including those in Chemistry, Geology, Biology and Environmental Science will benefit from this investment.

At Saint Mary’s the funding will provide the installation of three new instruments for the Centre for Environmental Analysis and Remediation (CEAR) lab, which will serve the university and the greater community for the next two decades.

These significant investments in science and technology will provide our team with the ability to build on a history of collaborative research excellence, with a focus on sustainable chemistry and materials,” says Dr. Christa Brosseau, Chemistry researcher at Saint Mary’s and co-applicant on the project.

“We are grateful to be able to share this knowledge with the next generation of scientists, and with this strengthening of our Centre for Environmental Analysis and Remediation, we look forward to highlighting Atlantic Canada's abilities and goals on an international stage,” says Dr. Brosseau.

“Researchers at Memorial University and Saint Mary’s will collaborate to “address, study and solve problems related to several key, interrelated areas of environmental and economic importance pertaining to sustainable resource development and environmental knowledge in Atlantic Canada,” reads the project proposal.

“The tools requested will provide chemists, ocean scientists, biochemists, and engineers access to world-class instrumentation for characterization of molecules and materials for both sustainable resource processing and product development, and environmental understanding and monitoring.” 

About the Canada Foundation for Innovation

For more than 20 years, the CFI has been giving researchers the tools they need to think big and innovate. Fostering a robust innovation system in Canada translates into jobs and new enterprises, better health, cleaner environments and, ultimately, vibrant communities. By investing in state-of-the-art facilities and equipment in Canada’s universities, colleges, research hospitals and non-profit research institutions, the CFI also helps to attract and retain the world’s top talent, to train the next generation of researchers and to support world-class research that strengthens the economy and improves the quality of life for all Canadians.

Saint Mary's University hosts March madness pitch competition

It is pitch season. The Saint Mary’s University Entrepreneurship Centre (SMUEC) is hosting a new pitch competition styled after the famous NCAA March Madness basketball competition. Sixty-four student entrepreneurs from 25 post-secondary institutions across Canada have been selected to compete head-to-head as they strive to be declared the best in the country.  

“When we began planning for our latest pitch competition, we asked ourselves, how do you engage students in an online world? How do you make things exciting and interesting? This competition is our answer,” says Michael Sanderson, Director, SMUEC. “Students will share their business ideas before panels of expert judges made up of successful entrepreneurs from across the country. The event will have a big match feel, with prizes to match.”

Student participants will receive the date and time of their pitch session, a pre-existing pitch rubric, and a list of questions that will be randomly posed at presentation time. Participants will have development sessions to prepare them for their month-long battle to victory. After the final events, the student entrepreneur with the best idea or business will win the grand prize.

The Government of Canada, through the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA), provided SMUEC with a $132,111 non-repayable contribution to carry out this competition along with other student entrepreneurship and business skills training activities.  

“Students and young entrepreneurs breathe new life into the start-up community,” says Andy Fillmore, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Infrastructure and Communities and Member of Parliament for Halifax. “Our support for projects like this one helps new ideas take shape, builds a diverse economy and sets our business leaders of tomorrow up for success.” PS Fillmore made the announcement on behalf of the Honourable Mélanie Joly, Minister of Economic Development and Official Languages and Minister responsible for ACOA.

“Metronome United is honoured to be presenting the March Madness Pitch Competition in partnership with Saint Mary’s University Entrepreneurship Centre,” says Shannon Susko BComm’89 BSc’92, SMUEC Entrepreneur-in-Residence, and the Founder & CEO of Metronome United. “I love having the opportunity to help young entrepreneurs get focused on their business. I remember being a young entrepreneur in my early 20’s and I want to ensure that no one goes through the struggles I went through growing my companies. This is a wonderful opportunity for entrepreneurs to take the next step in becoming the leaders of tomorrow. I look forward to seeing all applications come through and work with the winning recipients.”  

The brackets, along with times for the Facebook Live event for each head-to-head battle, will be posted in the competition bracket located on the competition page of the SMUEC website. All times are set at the competition’s outset allowing students who make it through each round to encourage friends, family, and other supporters to log on to view their next pitch. This also allows the pitch competition to become a spectator sport, with anyone from the community can watch any head-to-head matchup.

To participate, or learn more, visit https://smuec.ca/march_madness/.

Saint Mary’s scientists enter into five-year partnership with Atlantic Gold to research remediation of historic gold mine tailings in wetlands

Dr. Linda Campbell and Dr. Emily Chapman in their research lab at Saint Mary’s University.

Saint Mary’s University’s research into environmentally sustainable and cost-effective remediation of historic gold mine sites across Nova Scotia is receiving a boost in the form of a five-year partnership with Atlantic Gold, a wholly owned subsidiary of St Barbara Ltd, based in Australia.

 “St Barbara is a global gold company and is proud to own and operate the Atlantic Gold Operations in Nova Scotia,” says St Barbara Managing Director and CEO, Craig Jetson. “As we operate our business and care for our people, we are guided by our company commitments – including respecting the environment and stronger communities.

“At St Barbara doing the right thing is important to all of us. Saint Mary’s University’s research into environmentally sustainable and cost-effective remediation of historic gold mines across Nova Scotia is aligned with our commitments, including growing sustainably,” says Jetson.  “We believe in learning from the past to secure our future and look forward to seeing this philosophy applied in the important work being done by Saint Mary’s University.”

“This is a significant investment by St Barbara, reflecting the importance we place on finding solutions to actively manage and neutralise the impact of our mining operations, because we care about the environment and the planet,” says Jetson. “We have recently committed to achieving carbon neutrality by 2050 and are pleased to see our Atlantic Gold operations leading to deliver on this promise by 2025.We look forward to updates on the important work being done by the Saint Mary’s University team and thank them for their commitment to this project.”

The funding is part of a new five-year partnership between Saint Mary’s University and Atlantic Gold with the first payment of $200,000 being delivered late in 2020.

Tailings runoff in Montague.

There is a long history of gold mining in Nova Scotia, and methods used 100 years ago are now known to be damaging to the environment. The goal of the Saint Mary’s University research team, led by Dr. Linda Campbell, is to use its proven expertise from previous studies of former mine sites to develop a low-cost remediation strategy. This new strategy is designed to support the natural recovery of wetlands and shallow water environments impacted by 100-year-old contaminated tailings.

“I want to thank Atlantic Gold for their strategic partnership and financial investment in advancing world-leading research that benefits both our local and global communities,” says Saint Mary’s University President Dr. Robert Summerby-Murray. “This partnership is an exemplar of innovation with a community-centred approach. It addresses a challenge with an immediate local connection but with far-reaching national and international implications.”

The scope of the damage to the environment from abandoned gold mines is wide, encompassing 300 abandoned mines across the province in both remote areas and backyards. Contamination from the arsenic and mercury used in historic gold mining can adversely affect human health and present severe environmental contamination risks.

Dr. Linda Campbell

“Saint Mary’s University is proud to be a part of the solution when it comes to remediating the damage done by historic gold mining practices across the province,” says Saint Mary’s University Vice-President, Academic and Research, Dr. Malcolm Butler. “Dr. Linda Campbell and her team are employing innovative research to create remediation techniques that minimize the impact on the environment, wildlife and humans. This research has the potential for significant applications in Nova Scotia, the rest of Canada and the world.”

Mining in Nova Scotia began well before most environmental legislation, and untreated tailings were placed in wetlands and shallow-water areas. Over the subsequent decades, abandoned tailings were left in place, with limited natural recovery taking place. Research at Saint Mary’s completed in 2015-2019 shows that sediment samples from legacy gold-mine tailings in N.S. wetlands remain contaminated and are still severely toxic to aquatic invertebrates.

“We are currently wrangling with the consequences of decisions and actions made a long time ago,” says Dr. Linda Campbell. “Our goal is to ensure legacy arsenic and mercury contaminants will not continue to be a problem for Nova Scotians for another hundred years. We are looking forward to working with Atlantic Gold and our other collaborators to undertake the necessary research and development to help restore ecological vitality of impacted wetlands.”

Dr. Campbell is joined by Senior Project Research Manager Dr. Emily Chapman and a team of researchers that will look at new ways to remediate sites using more effective and less invasive techniques than traditional remediation methods. Those traditional methods can be destructive to the areas that need to be protected. A proof-of-concept study of a new method, which will use a thin layer of a reactive material, is promising in its ability to limit risks of legacy gold mine tailings without compromising wetland function. It is this approach that is being investigated by the research team.

Dr. Emily Chapman

“Wetlands are incredibly important ecosystems, and these sites need help to recover. It is about finding the right blend of ingredients that will reduce the mobility and toxicity of contaminants in the sediment, without adding so much material that wetlands are infilled and destroyed,” says Dr. Chapman. “Having worked on the development of innovative approaches for dealing with these risks for several years, I am pleased to see that this issue is getting some recognition.”

Remediation is a very expensive undertaking, with a 2019 estimate of $48 million to clean up the Crown land portion of two Nova Scotia legacy tailing sites. If proven effective, the new method proposed by Dr. Campbell and her team will have an immediate economic benefit as a more cost-effective, non-intrusive ecological and human health option for impacted wetlands across Nova Scotia and similar sites around the world.

Dr. Campbell is a professor in the School of the Environment at Saint Mary’s. In her research, she uses multi-disciplinary approaches to improve our understanding of anthropogenic and natural impacts in the environment, with a focus on aquatic ecosystems.

Atlantic Gold, a wholly owned subsidiary of St Barbara Ltd, operates the Moose River Gold Mine near Middle Musquodoboit, Nova Scotia, and is permitting three more mines along Nova Scotia’s Eastern Shore. The Company is investing in a research partnership with Saint Mary’s University to explore the remediation of historic gold mine tailings in freshwater ecosystems.

Digital transformation benefits students at Saint Mary’s University

Saint Mary's University, one of Canada's foremost primarily undergraduate universities, is building the learning environment of the future that will give current and future students a world-class engaging and immersive experience. A digital transformation, backed by a series of technology investments, will place Saint Mary's in a leading position for student experience, student choice, and blended learning in Canada and around the world. 

Saint Mary's has partnered with industry-leading experts D2L and Ellucian to innovate and improve the learner experience in an approach that is on the cutting edge for post-secondary institutions. Saint Mary's integrated learning environment will be one of the most sophisticated in Canada. It will bring together all aspects of virtual and in-person learning into a seamless whole, including the management of learning, data records, academic and financial services, credentialing, and learner support. 

“The digital transformation will be a game-changer for our students, removing barriers to higher education related to scheduling, learning style and preferences, finance, accommodation, and location,” says Saint Mary's University President Dr. Robert Summerby-Murray. "New technology and digital services will mean that Saint Mary’s students will be able to learn and engage fully with their professors, fellow students, and research partners in the classroom, from their home and from anywhere in the world. This investment will open up doors for completion of degrees online for some students. For others, their courses and experiences will be the perfect mix of in-person, virtual and online. Our students have spoken, and building on what we have learned during the pandemic, we know they want these options and this flexibility. This is the future and this strategic partnership puts Saint Mary’s in a leadership position nationally." 

Saint Mary's will use D2L's Brightspace platform and leading-edge technology to create the most interactive course content for learners anywhere in the world, provide individualized learning pathways, give learners personalized feedback, and engage them in their learning through gamification, social tools, and video. 

The university's new integrated learning environment will be hosted in the cloud to provide a seamless service to learners across a lifetime of learning. The transformation will encompass all courses, programs, and certificates, and all 6,500 students will benefit from this $9.3 million investment over five years.  

"This investment will lead to significant improvements in the teaching and learning experience and the general operations and systems of the university that will be felt by everyone," says Saint Mary's University's Vice-President, Finance and Administration, Michelle Benoit. "We are removing duplication and increasing student and faculty access to the services of the university while providing them more tools and pathways to enhance their experience. We are automating processes to provide faster response times for students, freeing up staff time to focus on other service delivery areas. This is a very significant moment for our institution." 

Over the project's term, the university's data management system, Ellucian Banner, will be integrated with the university's online learning platform, Brightspace by D2L. Both Ellucian and D2L are key partners for this digital transformation.  

"We are excited to expand our relationship with Saint Mary's University to further accelerate their digital transformation journey," said Laura Ipsen, President and CEO, Ellucian. "SMU's investment in modern systems in the cloud will enhance operational efficiencies enabling more resources to focus on what's most important -- students. Their unwavering commitment to improving the student experience, paired with their vision to become a truly global institution, sets them apart as an innovative leader in higher education." 

"What Saint Mary's University has done is nothing short of remarkable," said John Baker, President and CEO of D2L. "Creating a truly learner-centered, fully integrated learning environment can only happen when you're absolutely committed to student success. It's a real honour for all of us at D2L to be part of such a progressive, innovative and student-centered success story." 

"This investment is about improving supports for teaching and learning and improving processes and data management to allow students, faculty, and staff to focus more on the primary reason we are all here—the creation and the dissemination of knowledge," says President Summerby-Murray.

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