LFS Today Jan 11, 2022

 News  

In Memoriam: Archibald Young

With great sadness, the family of Dr. Archie Young announces his passing on Nov. 13, 2021, in Chilliwack.

Archie was born on a farm in Keir Village, Dumfriesshire, Scotland, in 1926, the sixth of eight children of John Young, a dairy farmer, and his wife Mary, a school teacher.

When he was three, the family, along with a herd of 24 Ayrshire dairy cows and one bull, emigrated to Vancouver, where John was to manage the farm on the new Point Grey campus of the University of British Columbia.

Read his full obituary here.

Accepting Summer 2022 Work Learn Proposals

With the winter session well underway, you may have begun to consider the possibility of hiring a student for the summer term to work in your lab, unit, or department. Working on campus is an excellent way for students to gain professional skills and experience, apply their knowledge in a practical setting and develop strong connections within the UBC community. Your commitment to hiring students helps them to achieve these outcomes while simultaneously allowing them to contribute to the work of your unit or department.

With this in mind, we would like to announce that proposals for the Summer 2022 Work Learn Program (May 1, 2022-August 31, 2022) are being accepted January 5-21, 2022. For those new to the Work Learn Program, if your proposal application is successful, your student’s position is subsidized at $9 per hour for a maximum of 300 work hours from May 1, 2022 to August 31, 2022. Most Work Learn students can work a maximum of 20 hours a week during the summer term.

When developing your proposal, please follow closely the recommendations found in the WL Submission Guide 2022. The more you follow the submission guide, the better your chances are for obtaining funding. Of equal importance is adhering to the Position Classification Guide Summer 2022, which outlines the student’s general job descriptions and appropriate hourly pay scale ranges. To submit a proposal, you have one of two choices:

1. Complete the LFS internal application form, where you will receive a confirmation receipt shortly after your submission. Mona Lee will then review your proposal and offer suggestions before submitting it to the Work Learn Program on your behalf. The LFS internal deadline for proposals is 12:00 pm noon on Wednesday, January 12, 2022. Should you miss this internal deadline, please refer to bullet #2 for instructions.
2. Go directly to the UBC CareersOnline (employer) portal, create an account, input your proposal details, and list Mona Lee as the administrator in your submission form. This way, Mona is notified if your submission is approved for funding. Here is a step-by-step guide on how to submit your proposal. You will not receive a web confirmation receipt upon submission. The external deadline for proposals is 4:00 pm on Friday, January 21, 2022.  Mona will not be able to view your submission or give you feedback.

Here are helpful resources about Work Learn’s timelines, student hiring practices, payroll, subsidy reimbursements and student eligibility for the Work Learn Program.
Need examples of good proposals to get you started? A few successful employers have agreed to share theirs with you!

• Project Worker (Project Worker – lab position)
• Research Assistant (Project Assistant – lab position)
• Finance Assistant (Office/Library Worker)
• LokoLab Research Assistant (Researcher/Professional – research position)
• International Event Assistant (Researcher/Professional – non-research position)

Tech Tip Tuesday: Outstanding Outlook

Keeping your email mailbox within a reasonable size ensures that Outlook remains zippy and responsive. It is important to archive your inbox regularly by moving messages out of Outlook, and there are ways to do this that keep your messages searchable and accessible.

One step to address this problem at its source is to avoid sending large attachments (5MBs and up) in an email. Instead, share your video or picture files in OneDrive and include a link to the file in your email.

For help with any of these best practices please contact The Learning Centre at it@landfood.ubc.ca . More information here:

• FASmail guide: https://it.ubc.ca/services/email-voice-internet/ubc-faculty-staff-email-fasmail/fasmail-usagetraining-guides
• FASmail Archive guide: https://ubc.service-now.com/kb_view_customer.do?sysparm_article=KB0014503

 Events  

Jan. 13 to Jan. 25 – Research and Teaching Seminars: Assistant Professor in Food and Resource Economics

We will be interviewing 3 candidates for the position of Assistant Professor in Food and Resource Economics (1 of 3 positions awarded from the President’s Academic Excellence Initiative), starting January 13.  All interviews will be done online.  We have included their information below, along with Zoom links to each of the seminars.  Registration is required, so please click on the links in advance to register, and you will receive a confirmation email with information about joining the meeting, and an option to add it to your calendars.  We hope that you will be able to attend and to provide feedback to the selection committee.

A copy of the advertisement can be found here.  If you would like to meet with any of the candidates, please contact Melanie Train (melanie.train@ubc.ca)

Colette Salemi, PhD candidate, Department of Applied Economics, University of Minnesota
Colette Salemi is an applied microeconomist conducting research at the intersection of environmental and resource economics and development economics. She will complete her PhD in Applied Economics at the University of Minnesota in Spring 2022. Colette uses geospatial data and household microdata to examine the impacts of conflict and forced displacement, especially in relation to food and natural resources. For example, Colette’s ongoing research on refugee camps in sub-Saharan Africa and Bangladesh evaluates how camp openings affect land use, forest cover, and the nutritional status of local communities. Colette is also interested in sustainability challenges related to refugee encampment, the climate-conflict nexus, and studies of environmental conservation and ecosystem services.

Research Seminar: Hungry hosts? Refugee camps and host community nutritional outcomes in sub-Saharan Africa
January 13, 3:30-5:00pm
Register here:
https://ubc.zoom.us/meeting/register/u5wtd-Ghpz0iGdVIl7xcXL_Wiu3sqGybfayb

Teaching Seminar:  Beyond Maps: Introduction to Geocomputation
January 14, 2:00-3:00pm
Register here:
https://ubc.zoom.us/meeting/register/u5UvduyurzsrEtJu7AZtOiBkqOqnDjy9PKLh

LFS Grad Student Roundtable 
January 13, 2:00-2:45pm
Join Zoom Meeting
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/69655595286?pwd=UkE3aWtaU08wbUc1UXpLR0RuRVNzZz09
Meeting ID: 696 5559 5286
Passcode: 803255

Dora Zsuzsanna Simon, Assistant Professor, University of Stavanger, Business School
Dora Simon started as an Assistant Professor in September 2021 at the University of Stavanger Business School in Norway. Her main fields are International Trade and Environmental Economics, focusing on the agricultural sector. She finished her Ph.D. in 2021 at the University of Zurich.

Research Seminar:  To Beef or Not To Beef: Trade, Meat, and the Environment
January 17, 12:00-1:30pm
Register here:
https://ubc.zoom.us/meeting/register/u5clc-2trj0iGNHK_KJXC6IkJ-XpT8lzYVKM

Teaching Seminar:  Emerging tools for Data Analysis in Economics
January 18, 9:00-10:00am
Register here:
https://ubc.zoom.us/meeting/register/u5Aode2hrTgqE9cOhGrJizbHhmqhGHS81Uil

LFS Grad Student Roundtable 
January 17, 9:30-9:45am
Join Zoom Meeting
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/63234929123?pwd=SjdUdzZBTHVZbk81RVJOaUVZVlpUdz09
Meeting ID: 632 3492 9123
Passcode: 331169

Jonathan Proctor, Postdoctoral Fellow, Harvard University, Center for the Environment and Data Science Initiative 
Jonathan Proctor is an environmental economist with a background in agronomy, climate science, remote sensing and machine learning. He is currently a postdoctoral fellow jointly at the Harvard Data Science Initiative and the Center for the Environment. He received his PhD in Agriculture and Resource Economics from UC Berkeley in 2019. He develops and applies new methods to empirically estimate anthropogenic impacts on climate and, in turn, on global socio-environmental systems. He is particularly fascinated by how light, water and temperature jointly determine crop growth, and how high resolution satellite imagery can be used to measure socio-environmental conditions.

Research Seminar:  Accurate specification of water availability shows its importance for global crop production
January 24, 3:30-5:00pm
Register here:
https://ubc.zoom.us/meeting/register/u5Yqfu6qpjIjHdEeoTgnkkdRBlcLhNdIw6oT

Teaching Seminar:  Emerging tools for Data Analysis in Economics: Satellite Remote Sensing
January 25, 2:00-3:00pm
Register here:
https://ubc.zoom.us/meeting/register/u5IldOCrpj0iE9a0W2S1BF5nLUn_EGblTig8

LFS Grad Student Roundtable 
January 24, 1:00-1:45pm
Join Zoom Meeting
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/69661550759?pwd=QUdGdjdYdzlKSFo4d2puRW4rNmg4UT09
Meeting ID: 696 6155 0759
Passcode: 198029

Jan. 31 to Apr. 3 – Walk for Joy

Registration is now open so you can either join individually or put a team together made up of your colleagues, come up with a team name and then sign up before January 30, 2022. Registration can be done individually or as a team. If your team captain has filled out the form on behalf of your team, then there is no need to fill out the form again.

Walk for Joy has waived the registration fee. Instead, they are asking that participants make a donation to this year’s charitable beneficiary, the Indian Residential School Survivors Society. Donations can be made at www.irsss.ca/donate and recorded here.
There will be a virtual kickoff event on January 26th at 12 pm. In-person and virtual options presented soon. The link will be sent out upon registration for Walk for Joy 2022. There will also be a virtual Award Celebration on April 13th at 12pm. The link to join the Zoom meeting will be sent in the Walk for Joy newsletter.

Please visit their website at https://walkforjoy.educ.ubc.ca/ to register and find out more details.

 Deadlines  

Jan. 17 – PICS Internship Program

PICS internships support the hiring of university students at the workplaces of British Columbia governments, NGOs, industry and communities that are pursuing climate change mitigation and adaptation research, planning or implementation.

PICS internships provide $12,000 to BC provincial, regional, and local governments, and BC-based non-governmental agencies, indigenous communities, private companies and Crown corporations to hire a student intern for a minimum of 13 weeks, or an alternative arrangement that distributes an equivalent number of total hours. Successful applicants may top up this contribution to provide an appropriate wage for the student’s level of education and experience.

Eligible students must be enrolled – or accepted for enrolment – in a full-time undergraduate or graduate program at one of the four PICS partner institutions: UVic, UBC, SFU or UNBC.

The deadline to submit the application is January 17, 2022. Notification of decisions is anticipated by mid-February 2022.

For complete information about this annual call please read the Internship Program Guide and submit an Internship Application Form, or visit the PICS website. Inquiries can be made by emailing picsintern@uvic.ca.