Welcome to the fourth annual research conference here at the University of Regina. Last year’s research conference was a great success featuring presentations and poster exhibits by over seventy graduate students and upper-year undergraduate students. The conference is a public event and all students (graduate and undergraduate), staff and faculty, members of the community, as well as high school students who are considering University career choices will be invited to view the posters and listen to the oral presentations. There is no cost associated with community participation in this event.
This conference is unique because it is a student-organized, student-focused, conference for communicating student research to the community. It provides an affordable option for local students to improve their curriculum vitae and a chance for everyone to keep on top of the world-class research being done here at the University of Regina and neighbouring Universities. The conference planners hope that resounding support and attendance from the University of Regina and the community will help to make the conference a National destination for student research over the next few years.
Key Note Speaker: Jay Ingram
Saturday, April 4th, 2009
Education Auditorium
One of Canada's best-known science popularizers, Jay Ingram is co-host and producer of Daily Planet, television's first daily science show. His Jay’s Journal is a well-known regular feature of that program.
Ingram hosted CBC Radio's science program Quirks And Quarks from 1979 to 1992, earning him two ACTRA Awards, including one for Best Host. During the '80s, he was also Contributing Editor to Owl Magazine. He also hosted two radio documentary series, The Talk Show, about language, and Cranial Pursuits, about the brain. The Talk Show won a Science in Society Journalism Award. Following that, Ingram presented items on the brain for the CBC TV's The Health Show and contributed regular weekly science features for CBC Newsworld's Canada Live (1993-94).
He holds four honorary doctorate degrees: from Carleton University, McGill University, McMaster and King’s College in Halifax. Ingram has written ten books, three of which have won Canadian Science Writers’ Awards. His latest is The Daily Planet Book of Cool Ideas -Global Warming and What People are Doing About It. He is an engaging, provocative speaker who can address complex, scientific issues in non-technical terms, making them interesting, relevant and accessible to a wide range of audiences.
Special Appearance by: Jorge Cham
Friday, April 3rd, 2009
"THE POWER OF PROCRASTINATION"
Jorge Cham is the creator and artist of Piled Higher and Deeper (PhD), the comic strip about life (or the lack thereof) in grad school. Often called the Dilbert of academia, PHD has appeared in the Stanford, MIT, Caltech and Carnegie Mellon newspapers among others, and it is published online where it receives over 7 million page views a month from over 1000 universities and colleges worldwide.
Jorge Cham was born and raised in the Republic of Panama. He obtained his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Georgia Tech and his M.S. and Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University (specializing in Robotics), where he started drawing PHD. He was subsequently an Instructor and Research Associate at Caltech from 2003-2005, where his work focused on developing “Smart” Neural Implants. He has published and presented nationally and abroad on his Robotics and Neural Prosthetics research. He also travels and presents all over the world to thousands of graduate students, faculty and administrators on the graduate student experience.
Three PHD book collections have been published. In all, Jorge Cham’s books have sold over 48,000 copies to date.