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Final exams are coming up, so from May 1st – 5th, we’ve scheduled some extra drop-in learning sessions, peer tutor tips tables and de-stressing activities, including visits from the St. John Ambulance dogs, the Student Life Ambassadors, the Pollinators and some plant pot painting. Hope you can join us! Get the full schedule here.
The Burnaby Festival of Learning is a multi-day festival of lifelong learning taking place in venues throughout Burnaby (including BCIT!)
From May 5th – 9th there are five full days of thought-provoking community-led events and programming.
There’s truly something for everyone and all events are free!
BCIT workshops include:
Just a few of the other great sessions being offerered by other Festival partners:
Check out all the events here: https://festivaloflearning.ca/events/
All events are free, but many require registration!
When: Wednesday, April 19, 2023
Time: 12:30pm – 1:30pm
Where: Summit Centre (BCIT main campus library, room 213)
The content of the session will concentrate on learning about our ourselves to be prepared for any uncertainties and challenges we face in the classroom that we can’t quite foresee. Utilizing SWOT will help us become agile and truly using EI to work on our approach to our interactions with others, specifically our students; it is important to deliver a quality instruction and to manage our own expectations and overall outlook about the courses we are involved with.
As a good quality professional, I always think that there is room for improvement.
The scholastic environment at BCIT has morphed due to factors such as Covid, and the ever changing demographics of our students, so let’s add another tool to our toolbox to deal with the changes.
The key learnings:
SWOT – Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats analysis, key points of each element to use in our journey toward improving ourselves and our classroom experience.
PDCA – (Plan, Do, Check Act) and EI (Emotional Intelligence) brief descriptions and how they relate to SWOT.
Bio:
Sandra Amador is an experienced quality professional with over 30 years in the field of Continuous Improvement and Quality Assurance. She has been an instructor since 2019 and as an avid learner, she strongly believes in providing as many easy opportunities for learning as possible, both at school and work; for her it is important to ensure students transform all the information they receive into real knowledge.
Sandra has worked in a variety of industries, from pharmaceutical to automotive and has been leading teams under different titles; her favourite title is change agent.
As a Certified Quality Auditor from ASQ, Sandra has taken audits to the level of collaboration and improvement catalyst that they are intended for, while ensuring fair compliance evaluation.
Sandra has been the Voice of the customer chair in the ASQ Vancouver leadership team in the past and a frequent speaker in annual ASQ Vancouver conferences. She has also participated instructing sessions at the BCIT’s Professional Development Day.
This talk is open to all members of the BCIT community.
A light lunch will be provided as we welcome ‘Food’ back to the in-person ‘Food for Thought’ series.
DATE: Wednesday, March 22, 2023
TIME: 11:30am – 12:30pm
LOCATION: Summit Centre (Bby Campus Library, room 213)
Journey Mapping is defined as:
General and analyis method that helps us understand the interactions that an individual has with a process, service or organization from the perspective of that individual.
Journey Mapping – Living Guide to Social Innovation Labs (gitbook.io)
From Oct-Dec, 2022, a journey mapping project was carried out with 9 EAL (English as an Additional Language) students and 4 EAL alumni from BCIT’s CIT and CST programs. Students and alumni were interviewed and then interview data was used to create individual journey maps. These were then analyzed to discover significant challenges and opportunities for interviewees in their goal of successfully transitioning from school to the workplace. Some of the key findings revolve around opportunities for experiential learning, guidance for self-study, and connecting to support services.
This workshop will present the journey mapping process, share examples from the actual journey maps, and elaborate on the key findings. Potentially, the proess could be replicated in other departments findings.
Since 1991, David has taught English as an Additional Language in Canada, Japan, and Qatar. In addition to his work with the Language Success Team at BCIT, David has also written curriculum for the International Student Entry Program, and has created two MOOC courses for BCIT’s Free Online Learning initiative. When not working, he can probably be found reading, writing, walking, obsessing about vinyl records, or having coffee with a good friend.
This talk is open to all members of the BCIT community. A light lunch is provided.
If you are interested in this event but cannot make it in-person, contact us – we are looking into offering hybrid in-person/virtual events. For more information about Food for Thought, please contact: Deirdre Grace Sylvia Gajdics
DATE: Wednesday, March 8, 2023
TIME: 11:30am – 12:30pm
LOCATION: Summit Centre (Bby Campus Library, room 213)
BCIT students do some great research and innovation projects as part of their programs, and there is funding available to support some of these projects. This presentation will look at some of the funding sources: Mitacs, BCIT Institute Research Funds, Student Innovation Challenge, the types of projects that get funded, and how faculty and students can access this funding.
Joe Boyd is the Research Liaison in BCIT’s Applied Research Liaison Office (ARLO). Joe has a background in Physics and Library studies, and while
at BCIT has sat on a number of funding committees. Joe is also responsible on reporting on BCIT’s research projects by faculty and students. ARLO helps
students and faculty with funding for their projects by identifying funding sources and liaising with external funding agencies. ARLO also runs the BCIT Student Innovation Challenge each year.
This talk is open to all members of the BCIT community. Light lunch provided.
If you are interested in this event but cannot make it in-person, contact us – we are looking into offering hybrid in-person/virtual events.
In celebration of Open Education Week!
DATE: Monday, March 6, 2023
TIME: 12:30pm – 1:30pm
LOCATION: Summit Centre (Bby Campus Library, room 213)
Have you ever wanted to create your own book, but don’t know how to get started? Join Julia Alards-Tomalin, a BCIT instructor in the Renewable Resources program as she shares her 4-year journey in creating a winter plant identification textbook with students across programs at BCIT. This new book fills a gap in the field of plant identification in our region and is available to all as a free, online Open Education Resource (OER) field guide. In this session, you will learn more about the steps to create an OER book and hopefully be inspired to create your own too!
Buds, Branches and Bark: A Guide to Winter ID in the Pacific Northwest. Second Edition. 2022. by Julia Alards-Tomalin and Tait, Alex
Julia Alards-Tomalin is an instructor in the Renewable Resources department at BCIT. She studied Forestry and Ecological Restoration at BCIT and recently completed a Master of Education at Simon Fraser University. Her background is diverse, including horticulture, arboriculture, invasive species management and ecological restoration, but is united by a common theme of plants. Julia began creating and using Open Educational Resources (OER) in 2019, including the co-creation of a Youtube Channel: Interviews with Plants. https://www.youtube.com/c/Interviewswithplants
This talk is open to all members of the BCIT community. A light lunch is provided.
If you are interested in this event but cannot make it in-person, contact us – we are looking into offering hybrid in-person/virtual events. For more information about Food for Thought, please contact: Elizabeth Padilla Deirdre Grace Sylvia Gajdics
Nominations for the Employee Excellence Awards 2023 are now open.
The recipient will be awarded $1,000. Nominations are OPEN until March 1, 2023.
Teaching Excellence in Open Education Award Criteria
The award recognizes teaching excellence in open education by meeting one or more of the following during the past year (April through March):
Julia Alards-Tomalin was the 2022 inaugural Teaching Excellence in Open Education recipient.
All BCIT libraries will be physically closed on Monday, February 20, 2023. The ehPod will remain open 24/7. Sorry for any inconveniences this may cause.
With the devastation in Turkey and Syria caused by earthquakes, you might find value in this video series from the BC Housing Mobilizing Building Adaptation and Resilience (MBAR) initiative.
Moving Towards Improved Earthquake Performance and Resilience for New Buildings / developed by BC Housing Mobilizing Building Adaptation and Resilience (MBAR) Initiative with structural engineer John Sherstobitoff.
Link to playlist on BC Housing YouTube:
When: Wednesday, February 15, 2023
Time: 11:30am – 12:30pm
Where: Summit Centre (BCIT main campus library, room 213)
Sanja Garic-Komnenic, will examine various sources that are used in film and theatre studies, share the experience of the challenges in retrieving archival material, and reflect on the shift in academia from strictly academic sources to all kinds of digital material, such as YouTube clips, blogs, and other previously considered non-academic sources.
Sanja Garic-Komnenic teaches in the Liberal studies program at BCIT. She holds a PhD in film and theatre semiotics. Sanja has taught courses in academic writing, film, theatre, and urban studies. Her research articles have been published in the American Journal of Semiotics and the Pacific Rim Review of Books. Sanja is a member of the NECS – the European Network for Cinema and Media Studies and has been presenting papers at NESC conferences. Sanja translated two books into English, Footprints: Poetry and Threads of Poetical Impression (2008 Trafford Publishing, Ed. George Payerle) and the novel Chernovs’ Toil and Peace (2010 Publish America. Baltimore, Ed. George Payerle). In addition to research in film and theatre, Sanja has written several feature-length screenplays. Her script for a children’s puppet play was produced for stage in 2004. She is currently working on a book on film and theatre adaptations, which will be published by Palgrave Macmillan later this year.
This talk is open to all members of the BCIT community.
A light lunch will be provided as we welcome ‘Food’ back to the in-person ‘Food for Thought’ series.