GSS holds research ‘speed-dating’ event
On Wednesday, June 19 the Graduate Student Society (GSS) held its first Research Speed-Dating event in the GSS Lounge. The event was meant to be a forum where SFU graduate students could interact and learn about their peers’ research, making connections that might lead to future collaborations or networking opportunities.
Nineteen graduate students attended, representing a multitude of departments, from linguistics to criminology, to art education to mathematics, to biomechanical engineering and more.
As with many first-time events, everything was a bit chaotic. Students began trickling in a little before 3:30 pm and it seemed that GSS organizers were still trying to decide on a system for registering participants.
However, this informal atmosphere gave the whole event a social gathering feel. Students mingled snacking on veggie sticks and chocolate chip cookies. Some, like Meghan Jeffrey (MA, linguistics), just came to meet new people, while others like Dominic Trevisan (MA, education) came looking for research contacts.
After a half-hour of visiting, Narek Nalbandyan, GSS Professional Development Coordinator, took the floor, introducing the event and outlining its goals. “This event is for being more aware, sharing our experience, sharing our knowledge and passion so that collaboration can happen and we can learn from each other, or at least we can become friends,” Nalbandyan concluded.
And then it was time for a little research “speed-dating.” Students were told to find a partner and were given five to six minutes to discuss their research, ask each other questions, and swap stories. After six minutes, Nalbandyan shouted above the din that it was time to find a new partner. One enthusiastic student shouted in mock-despair that she still had so many more questions; she was assured that there would be time afterward to continue conversing with anyone that had been of particular interest.
These mini-discussions went on for an hour until Nalbandyan announced the final “speed-date.” He then brought everyone together for a short discussion. The whole event lasted about an hour and a half.
“Frankly, we weren’t expecting 20 people and when we saw 20 people attending and really being interested and being engaged in these conversations, that felt like success,” said Nalbandyan, after all was said and done. “That motivated us to actively continue working on this program to make it better, make it bigger and possibly host in other campuses later on.”
GSS Relations Officer, Eleonora Joensuu chimed in, saying, “One success that I think was huge was that we had a really great range from across faculties, departments and programs. I think intellectual community is something that is lacking at SFU.
For me, personally, I think it’s so exciting to think of the amount of work, that we are here in a setting where research is happening and we don’t talk to each other. Even if a research collaboration didn’t come out of last night, we can feel connected to this institution.”
GSS plans to hold a Research Speed-Dating event monthly. “Next time, maybe we’ll have more food,” laughed Joensuu.
University Briefs
McGill researchers look into Maple Spring
One year after the protests, a research group at McGill University has been analyzing data from a survey filled out by Montreal university students. The questions centred on last year’s proposed tuition hikes in the province that spurned a huge movement of student unrest.
More than fifteen thousand students completed the survey, which showed two opposing results, since students who come from families with above average income were likely to support the tuition increase; however, the same students also responded they would attend protests more frequently.
Eva Falk Pedersen, a McGill Masters political science student, said of the results: “In a sense it also means these students were not necessarily protesting out of their self interest.”
With files from The Link
Western universities looking for American accreditation
Following Capilano University’s recent accreditation by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities (NWCCU), Thompson Rivers University has announced its plan to seek the same approval. The NWCCU is a major US agency based in Washington State that evaluates post-secondary educational quality.
The trend of Canadian universities looking for approval across the border has caused some controversy and resistance from faculty members at these institutions due to the NWCCU requiring definite learning outcomes.
SFU has also laid plans to receive NWCCU accreditation through the implementation of learning outcomes. TRU is planning to seek accreditation to ensure quality standards and to identify areas that need improvement.
With files from University Affairs
U of A receives large federal grant
The University of Alberta recently received $5.7 million in research funding from the federal government from the Canadian Foundation for Innovation (CFI), who has set aside $47.7 million for research grants in post-secondary institutions across Canada.
Renee Elio, associate vice-president of research at U of A, says that the fact that the university has received this significant amount of funding from the federal government greatly emphasizes the aptitude of the researchers at this university.
Elio stated that the University of Alberta has “the calibre of people who can put forward their vision for research with impact and then get the infrastructure support they need from the federal government.”
She explains how having this kind of financing from the federal government is critical if Canada is to attract and keep researchers in the country, since other nations are also on the hunt for innovators.
With files from The Gateway
Join the Club: The Simon Fraser University Anti-Acronym Society
JOIN THE CLUB is a feature that highlights SFU’s lesser known clubs and non-existent organizations.
The Simon Fraser University Anti-Acronym Society, or as it’s more commonly known, the SFU AAS, is an organization dedicated to the elimination of acronyms at SFU.
Although the group’s status as an officially sanctioned SFSS club remains TBD, the club is hoping to be approved ASAP and start the process of removing acronyms from SFU.
According to the AAS, A’s are needlessly confusing and don’t actually save much time because they almost always have to include the the long form version in brackets later anyways (A’s is short for Acronyms).
The AAS meets every Wednesday at 9:00 a.m. in the AQ and also holds a monthly closed meeting for the group’s VIP members which alternates between different rooms in the LDC, MBC, WMC and TASC 2. The AAS requires RSVPs from all VIPs for these CMs (Closed Meetings) and expects all VIPs to give their ETAs beforehand.
PS: The club’s official motto is “you only live once.”
Word on the Street: Summer Movies
“I can’t wait to be disappointed by The Lone Ranger! I’ve been waiting for EVER to be let down by it!”
Bill Jones, Eager to walk out of a theatre and do something else
“The Smurfs 2 . . . it’ll probably still be good but how do you follow up that original masterpiece?”
Suzie Simpson, Film buff
“I’m still holding out hope that Monsters University won’t disappoint and actually be the first movie to show the REAL college experience.”
Glen Jordan, Living the ‘G’ rated Greek life
“I was already disappointed by Man of Steel. That Superman guy is such a rip-off of my comic book character: Incredible Person.”
Andy Milton, Hack
“Blockbuster? Pfft . . . I only watch obscure independent films like Juno.”
Stephen O’Reilly, Also loves the underground movie Napoleon Dynamite
Research Roundup
SFU alumna developing app to diagnose skin cancer
Diagnosing skin cancer? There may soon be an app for that.
Maryam Sadeghi, an SFU Computing Science alumna, is working to develop an app to help in early diagnosis of malignant melanoma. The hardware and software Sadeghi is developing can be used on smartphones to photograph a mole, and analyze it for any visual symptoms pointing towards skin cancer. The app then recommends if further medical attention is required.
In order to better understand the visual indicators found with malignant melanoma, Sadeghi has spent the past 4 years working with UBC dermatologists, along with the BC Cancer Agency. The visual symptoms of melanoma discovered were then applied in combination with computer algorithms and visual imaging technologies in order to potentially diagnosis skin cancer. Skin cancer is 90 per cent curable with early diagnosis.
According to the BC Cancer Agency, melanoma is “the most aggressive and dangerous of all skin cancers.” The affordable app will allow consumers to photograph and evaluate their moles for symptoms of melanoma, and assist in early diagnosis of the disease. Risk factors for this disease include exposure to UV lights, and it is most common among fair-skinned people who have many freckles or moles.
Sadeghi and her friends have also already launched two smartphone apps hosted by the Save Your Skin Foundation. These apps give daily warnings regarding UV exposure across Canada and the US. “UV Canada” and “UV U.S.” have been downloaded 35,000 times since 2011.
Sadeghi explains that she was motivated to create an educational app for skin cancer prevention after she received the CIHR Skin Research Training Scholarship, which allowed her to work closely with dermatologists and receive feedback towards her research.
Sadeghi’s research and thesis landed her the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council’s Innovation Challenge Award in 2012, as well as a Doctoral Dissertation honorable mention from the Canadian Image Processing and Pattern Recognition Society (CIPPRS).
“We are now working on new products to empower patients with a professional tool for skin cancer self-screening,” said Sadeghi. The products are still under development, and are expected to launch by January 2014.
Study links food insecurity to death in HIV-treated drug users
A new study involving SFU, published in science journal PLOS One, looked at the relationship between food insecurity and survival among HIV-positive injection drug users who are receiving life-prolonging antiretroviral therapy (ART).
Food insecurity is defined as insufficient quantity and quality of food. The study found that drug users who were food insecure when first starting ART were twice as likely to die as their food secure counterparts.
“[This] study specifically aimed to explore whether food insecurity potentially influenced increased risk of mortality among injection drug users across BC,” said Aranka Anema, first author on the study and BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS (BC-CfE) epidemiologist.
The study followed 254 HIV-positive injection drug users receiving life-prolonging highly active ART across BC. After 13.3 years of follow-ups, they discovered that those individuals who reported being food insecure in the beginning of the study were nearly twice as likely to die than those who were food secure.
“We found that food insecurity, and not hunger, was significantly associated with all-cause mortality,” Anema explained, “suggesting that other aspects of food insecurity — such as poor dietary diversity and / or anxiety regarding food access — may be driving this association.”
Senior author of the study, Robert Hogg, an SFU health sciences professor and director of the HIV/AIDS Drug Treatment Program at the BC-CfE, says this is the first study to observe the impact of food insecurity on the survival of HIV-positive injection drug users.
Although life-prolonging antiretroviral therapy has helped to decrease HIV-related mortality, the findings of this study suggest food insecurity has a great impact on mortality and HIV-related illnesses.
“Our results suggest that addressing food insecurity, in addition to other known social and structural barriers to HIV-related health among illicit drug users, such as incarceration, homelessness, and gender-related factors, is [of] paramount public health importance,” Anema concluded.
Anema suggested that, although further research is necessary to understand the means through which food insecurity drives this association, “public health organizations should prospectively evaluate the possible role of food supplementation and socio-structural supports on survival among IDU within HIV treatment programs.”
Board Shorts
Student spaces
Can SFU students look forward to more student-friendly spaces? The Board will be discussing in the near future whether it should be the SFSS’ responsibility to invest in and fund student space or if instead they should motivate the university to invest in student spaces.
“[We need to] decide what kind of a board are we going to be,” said Jade K. Anderson, Faculty Representative (Sciences). The Board has tabled the discussion on student spaces for this week, but will be addressing the topic in the near future.
Welcome back party confirmed
After discussion last week, the Board has approved a budget for the welcome-back event this fall. The motion, which passed unanimously, increased the line item “Special / Large-scale Projects” by $63,000. The budget has been approved ahead of schedule, giving the board more time to organize the large event.
Now that a budget has been approved, decisions can be made such as who might perform during the afternoon concert — Board is hoping to have four different artists — and what might an after-party at the Highland Pub look like.
Peak Humour Quiz
Take this short personality quiz and find out whether you’re the kind of person who’s more likely to answer ‘A’, ‘B’ or ‘C’ when taking a multiple choice test.
1. When answering a question I am most likely to . . .
a. Choose the first answer
b. Choose the second answer
c. Choose whatever answer is left after not choosing the first two
2. In situations where I have three options that I can choose from I usually . . .
a. Pick the first one and be done with it
b. Read the first, consider it, but go with the second
c. Choose whatever answer is left after not choosing the first two
3. Your crush walks past you with a group of friends at the mall and hands you a multiple choice test. You don’t know the answer to the first question so you . . .
a. Answer ‘a’
b. Answer ‘b’
c. Answer ‘c’
4. What’s the capital of Norway?
a. Oslo
b. Oslo
c. Helsinki
5. You have a choice between three doors each of which contains a man-eating tiger, you . . .
a. Choose door 1
b. Choose door 2
c. Choose whatever door is left after not choosing the first two
6. You can’t read but are instructed to circle one of three multiple choice answers. Which one do you circle?
a. This one
b. This one
c. Helsinki
7. You realize how the personality test you’re taking works before you finish. Do you . . .
a. Just keep picking ‘A’
b. Keep picking ‘B’
c. Change your answers just to fuck with the results
RESULTS:
If you answered mostly A you’re most likely to answer ‘A’ on multiple choice tests
If you answered mostly B you’re most likely to answer ‘B’ on multiple choice tests
If you answered mostly C you’re most likely to answer ‘C’ on multiple choice tests
If you answered all C you’re most likely to answer ‘C’ on multiple choice tests and should also work on your Scandinavian geography
Out with the old, in with the ‘new’
Green recycling has been a relatively new concept in the 21st century; we are accustomed to the phrase “out with the old and in with the new.” However, SFU student Leah Bjornson has been challenging this mindset, promoting green recycling of clothing with her non-profit organization.
June 15 marked the third annual Wear to Care clothing swap, a non-profit organization aimed at promoting the green philosophy of recycling clothes while collecting donations for homeless youth aged 13 to 24 in the Downtown Eastside, in conjunction with the Covenant House Vancouver.
Held at North Vancouver’s Carson Graham Secondary School at 2145 Jones Avenue from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., the clothing swap took in gently worn clothes, especially those geared towards summer, and also accessories such as shoes, bags, and even sports equipment.
Anyone who donated three or more items was eligible to take home one free item of their choice. People who were looking to swap clothes also had the opportunity to take home great steals such as a BCBG Maxazria dress or even new items with the tags still on them. The clothing swap was not only geared towards the less fortunate or those who wanted to swap items, but it also stressed the importance of “going green” and reusing what is already available.
The idea was started by SFU student Leah Bjornson and friend Alyssa Salt, and it came about as a hobby of swapping unwanted clothes between their group of friends as a means to recycle and reuse those items that they no longer wish to own or wear.
“It became apparent that the clothes that were being swapped were not the particular styles that we would wear or had the right fit. We wanted to expand, to get the word out, and to enact change,” Bjornson explained.
Missing the extracurricular activities that they had once participated in during secondary school, this hobby of theirs quickly transpired into a worthy cause in partnering with Covenant House Vancouver in the Fall of 2011. With winter approaching, Bjornson and Salt wanted to help the homeless population stay warm by providing them with the necessary clothing.
Covenant House was chosen in particular because, unlike other charities such as the Salvation Army, they do not resell the items and are not profit-based. In the past two clothing swaps, geared towards winter and spring donations, upwards of 500 items were donated at each swap with approximately 50 or more people in attendance.
A large part of the donations were collected before the actual event, which Bjornson laments, “It’s crazy how difficult it is to get people to come and take ‘free’ things!” Nevertheless, Bjornson feels proud of what her and Salt have accomplished.
“It’s nice to have an initiative that you started yourself and that you feel you are making a difference even if it’s small. We’re aiming to show the younger generation that they do not have to go out and buy expensive things and that they can learn to recycle to make the earth a greener and more hospitable place to live in,” stated Bjornson.
Album Reviews: Boards of Canada, Deafhaven, and a throwback to My Bloody Valentine
Boards of Canada — Tomorrow’s Harvest
Named in part after The National Film Board of Canada, Boards of Canada is made up of brothers Mike Sandison and Marcus Eoin, who have used their unique blend of techno, downtempo and field recordings to evoke both the nostalgia of VHS tape hiss and the calming atmosphere of the natural world.
Each of their albums seems to occupy a particular space: 1998’s album Music Has the Right to Children reminds of mossy forests and windy beaches, whereas 2002’s Geogaddi is earthy and eerily mechanical.
Tomorrow’s Harvest, the duo’s first full-length since 2005’s disappointing The Campfire Headphase, is their darkest yet; the album calls to mind barren wastelands, endless deserts and post-apocalyptic nightmares that would give Godspeed You! Black Emperor chills.
Sandison and Eoin use obscured vocal samples and state-of-the-art recording equipment to create some of their most lush, sprawling ambient pieces. The 17 vignettes on Tomorrow’s Harvest — which average at about four minutes in length — conjure images of Cold War fever dreams and interstellar transmissions bathed in static electricity.
Based loosely on Deadly Harvest, a 1977 B-movie about a dystopian future caused by crop failures, the album’s best tracks seem to gel with this overarching theme of hopelessness and decay.
The wispy beats and whining keyboards on “Cold Earth” seem to project a futuristic vision akin to Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. The percussive racket of “Split Your Infinities” seems to exist on the verge of total societal collapse, while the reluctant drum machine and pessimistic keyboard riff of early single “Rich for the Dead,” could soundtrack the depletion of the ozone layer.
Other Boards of Canada albums might offer more enjoyable listening experiences, but the bleak, colourless aural vista of Tomorrow’s Harvest might stand as the duo’s most rewarding. Like most of the band’s best work, the album urges repeat listens, and only time will tell whether this album will reveal deeper layers.
Deafhaven — Sunbather
Sunbather is a record fueled by intensity. At no point during this album’s seven-track span is any emotion expressed lightly. Even during slower, lighter fare like “Irresistible,” there’s a palpable sense of urgency that runs throughout the LP, like a racing heartbeat.
Though this isn’t uncommon in the world of black metal — a genre characterized by its melodrama and extremity — San Francisco foursome Deafheaven’s sophomore release sidesteps the overwrought brutality of their contemporaries in favour of a more complex, densely layered aesthetic.
The album is made up of four lengthy, sprawling mood pieces, each separated by a shorter, softer track. Although this track sequencing isn’t the most original, it gives listeners breathing space while also highlighting the potency of pummeling tracks like “Dream House” and “Vertigo.”
Guitarist Kerry McCoy’s melodic, post-rock inspired style grounds the album’s busiest, most muscular songs, without subtracting from the break-neck energy of Daniel Tracy’s schizophrenic drum beat or vocalist George Clarke’s impassioned wails.
In fact, Sunbather’s unorthodox combination of genres — part black metal, part post-rock, part shoegaze, part emo, part ambient — might be its biggest strength. The broken beauty of McCoy’s guitar riffs seem to argue with Clarke’s emaciated shriek, until you learn that the two are the album’s principal songwriters.
Tracks like the off-kilter genre experiment “Please Remember” or the ambient “Windows” seem to further highlight the contradictions in the band’s approach, but the quartet’s impeccable musicianship and conviction serve as the glue that combines Sunbather’s most disparate qualities.
As much as I like to think of myself as musically open-minded, I tend to be picky when it comes to metal: so many of the genre’s biggest names always strike me as artificial or simply exhausting. But by avoiding the pitfalls of so many of their peers, Deafheaven have made one of the most original and rewarding LPs in the genre’s recent history.
My Bloody Valentine — Loveless
Everything that can be written about Loveless probably already has been: how the album’s recording almost bankrupted Creation Records, how countless engineers were hired and fired during the album’s genesis, how Kevin Shields and company took 22 years to record a follow-up. The LP, which stands as one of the best and most unique of the 90s, has been poked and prodded like a frog in a high school chemistry classroom.
But even the most verbose and well-researched article can’t fully communicate what makes Loveless so fundamental and absorbing, even now, two decades after its release. The album can’t be judged on terms of its song structures or melodies — neither of which are particularly groundbreaking — but rather the tactile experience of its sound, which has been often imitated but never matched. You don’t just listen to Loveless, you feel it, and that’s a tough sensation to describe.
From the album’s more accessible tracks like the dance-beat of “Soon,” and the bubblegum-pop refrain of “When You Sleep,” to its more atmospheric sound experiments, Loveless exists in its own sonic sphere, giving the album a timeless and almost ethereal quality. It isn’t a 90s record, and it seems separate from the shoegaze genre it supposedly defines: Loveless just is.
Since the album is better off listened to than written about, allow me to make a recommendation: settle into a comfortable spot, pour yourself a cup of herbal tea, turn off the lights in your room, and slip on your headphones. Keep the volume high — Loveless is best heard loud — and close your eyes.
No words I could write here can match the soaring highs of this Ireland foursome’s magnum opus. Just listen.
