MEDIA

Alumna DiMarco is Out There again

Talk about typecasting. Melissa DiMarco (right) (BFA ’93) is an actor who sidelines as an entertainment reporter, wrote the Hamilton Spectator March 14. So it seems only natural that she would produce a TV series in which she plays an entertainment reporter named Melissa. And she does it successfully. “Out There with Melissa DiMarco” kicks off its fifth season tonight on Global’s CH TV where it will air nightly at 7:30pm.

"I enjoy the fact I found a spin for what I do for a living as an actor and an entertainment journalist," DiMarco said. "How cool is that? I get to merge two worlds that people normally see as two separate worlds. You are either on one side of the red carpet or the other and I get to jump rope back and forth. I had a reputation for interacting with celebrities and they trust my judgment knowing I came from the acting world," DiMarco said.

The Toronto native started acting after graduating from York’s Faculty of Fine Arts, and gained local prominence for her nightly entertainment show, “Nite Life”, that preceded “Late Show” with David Letterman on Omni TV.

Conrad Black and Edward Greenspan attended Osgoode together
When Conrad M. Black (left) pleaded not guilty to criminal fraud charges in December 2005, a federal court in Chicago granted his request that he be defended by Edward L. Greenspan (right) (LLB ’68), one of the most famous criminal defence lawyers in Canada, where he is known by the nickname Fast Eddie, began a story in The New York Times March 12. But the court made Black sign a waiver acknowledging that he understood that his lawyer, for all his renown in Canada, does not know American law. If he loses, Black, who faces more than 90 years in jail if convicted, cannot appeal on the grounds that it was his lawyer's fault. "I love that I've been certified as stupid by the Illinois judge," said Greenspan, who plans to frame a copy of the court document and hang it in his law office here. "So stupid," he added, "that no matter how incompetent I might be, Conrad can't rely on it." The Times noted later that Greenspan's place at the defence table is fitting for the latest chapter in Black's odyssey. The two men attended first year together at Osgoode Hall Law School in 1965, although Black dropped out but later completed the degree in Quebec. Greenspan, who grew up in Niagara Falls, Ontario, also went to high school with Black’s wife Barbara Amiel.

Paula Todd hosts new show covering Black trial
Paula Todd has a new TV gig as the host of Canada's first news series devoted to legal affairs and the criminal justice system, reported The StarPhoenix in Saskatoon March 13. Todd will host "The Verdict" on CTV Newsnet beginning March 14. For its debut, it will broadcast live from Chicago for the first several days of the Conrad Black trial.

Todd, who graduated from York with a BA in 1982 and an LLB from Osgoode Hall Law School in 1988, is a former reporter for the Toronto Star and the former host and co-producer of TVO's "Person 2 Person with Paula Todd" and TVO's Gemini Award-winning current-affairs program "Studio 2".

• Paula Todd (BA ’82, LLB ’88), former co-host of TVOntario's Studio 2, which was cancelled last year, begins hosting a new legal affairs show Wednesday night on CTVNewsnet, wrote CBC.ca News March 15. "The Verdict" kicks off with a huge legal story, the beginning of Conrad Black's trial for fraud, racketeering and obstruction of justice.

Todd will host the show live from Chicago for the first several days of the Black trial, which begins with jury selection on Wednesday. Trained as both a lawyer and a journalist, Todd aims to provide viewers with in-depth examination of legal issues and high-profile court cases.

Oscar win is an animated one for Timmins native
Like many movie fans, former York student Randall Finnerty (left) watched the 79th Academy Awards from an Oscar party, wrote the Timmins Daily Press March 15. But unlike most viewers, Finnerty walked away a winner.

Shortly into the annual awards ceremony, The Danish Poet, an animated film in which Finnerty was the digital imaging specialist, was named winner in the short film (animated) category. His responsibilities include adding colour and animation to drawings. "It's been a whirlwind in a way," said Finnerty, a former Timmins resident who now calls Montreal his home. "When you get nominated you don't want to get your hopes us, but I felt near the end that it had just as good a chance as the other films."

After graduating from high school, Finnerty took off with his friend Paul Bellini (BA ’92) to York University to study art. Bellini followed his dream to write comedy for the Canadian series "Kids in the Hall," while Finnerty focused on the fine arts. He finished his education at Sheridan College and the Ontario College of Art & Design.

Young publisher ready for big ventures
A Mississauga media mogul and York university student has made the top five in a contest to crown Ontario's Student Entrepreneur of the Year, wrote the Mississauga News March 14. Andrew Au, who started up Mogul Media and its main property, Campus Life Magazine, has been chosen by Advancing Canadian Entrepreneurship (ACE) to take part in its competition. The winner will be selected on March 16. Au is a student at York's Schulich School of Business.

Student programs robotic wheelchair to see and fetch
Alexander Andreopoulos, a PhD student in York’s Department of Computer Science & Engineering, is working on the PlayBot project, adding visual recognition abilities to a robotic wheelchair for people with mobility impairments, reported the Toronto Star March 13 in its Deep Thoughts column. Andreopoulos is working on the programming aspect of this project, which also involves a group of students at York. His work will make it possible for children using the PlayBot wheelchair to give commands to a computer, which in turn will direct the wheelchair to where it needs to go.

We judge how good a society is by how it takes care of its weakest segment, Andreopoulos says. Making a child more independent will help improve the quality of life. The robotic and computer technology industry is booming, he adds. Inventions such as this will also aid aging baby boomers who want to continue their independent lifestyles.

Classic game gets a naked twist
In his March 10 account of Digital Twist at an art opening at SPIN Gallery on Queen Street West, Toronto Star entertainment writer Peter Goddard said it felt like an episode of some new reality TV show where an art history class is held in the midst of a convention of swingers. The brainchild of well-regarded Toronto artist Johannes Zits (right, painting subject) (BFA 1983), Digital Twist features five nude performers, each painted from top-to-toe in a different, strong, strident colour. Everyone bumped bodies with Zits during a sweaty performance/game of Twister, the body-contact parlour game first marketed in the late '60s by the games conglomerate Milton Bradley. "Why is everyone naked?" said Zits, before heading out onto the mat. "Well, it's a classic form of the body. It's also touching on all other generations of performance art. The Twister game itself has a historical basis." Great, wrote Goddard. Finally, here's some art theory you want to get your hands on.

Festival adjudicator studied at York
The Corner Brook Rotary Music Festival Association welcomes five prestigious adjudicators to this year's stage for the 45th annual festival, wrote the Western Star (Corner Brook, Nfld.) March 16. Jehanbakhsh (John) Jasavala (BFA ’87) holds music degrees from York’s Faculty of Fine Arts and the University of Michigan, a diploma in jazz studies from Humber College and a bachelor of education from the University of Windsor. He has an active life as a performer, teacher and adjudicator. Jasavala has held the position of principal trombone with both the Windsor and Thunder Bay Symphony Orchestras. He has performed as a freelance musician with several orchestras in Ontario and Michigan. he is the founding member and leader of the Umbrella Brass Quintet.

Students band together to fight stigma of mental illness
Geoffrey Reaume was 21 when he headed for the Dominican Republic with a youth group and a secret, reported the Toronto Star March 10. It was the summer of 1983. For seven years, Reaume had been taking chlorpromazine, a drug prescribed to people diagnosed with schizophrenia. For seven years, he had also endured the drug's side effects. "I was zonked out, tired all the time," he recalls. Silenced by the stigma associated with any diagnosis of mental illness, Reaume, who now teaches at York University in the School of Health Policy & Management in the Faculty of Health, couldn't bring himself to tell anyone what he was going through. "I was scared but I wanted to try to wean myself off the drug," he recalls. Slowly but surely he succeeded. 

Reaume's agonizingly solitary ordeal is typical of most of his generation facing a psychiatric diagnosis, said the Star. But a new century has bred a group of young people openly supporting each other in a bid to consolidate their strengths. They are determined to erase the stigma faced by those branded as mentally ill. And in much the same way as the gay movement gained empowerment by embracing the queer epithet, they are building a growing community and identity.

Psych rights. Nutters with attitude. Welcome to the madness, they say. Embrace it. Learn from it. "I'm proud to identify myself as mad," says Jeremiah Bach, 25, a veteran member of the inter-university Mad Students Society and a community service worker with Sound Times, a Toronto-based group that helps people who use or have used the mental health system. "The queer identity is a good parallel," says Bach, who also is taking a post-graduate course in critical disabilities studies at York University. "We're reclaiming an identity. It's empowering for a fragile community."

Student entrepreneur learned from ‘The Apprentice’
At 20, he started a successful marketing business. At 21, he was an apprentice. Now, at age 26, he is conquering the world of philanthropy – and he's doing it in style, began a profile of 2002 York grad and entrepreneur Jay Klein in the Richmond Hill Liberal March 13. He did a double major in political science and communications studies and founded his company, Drivertise, when he was still a student. Drivertise helps clients advertise using signs and graphics affixed to a vehicle. Food and beverage companies, auto companies, grocery stores and furniture companies are among his customers. Five years ago, at the urging of friends and family, he put together a video audition to be on the first season of Donald Trump's hit TV show, The Apprentice". He came in just under the deadline for applications, with a very poor quality video, but the applications team watched it and called him right after viewing it, still laughing. "They said it was the worst quality video they'd ever seen, but they wanted to meet me," he said. While Klein was not chosen to appear on the show, he is grateful for the experience because he learned a lot from it. "It reinforced the way I like to carry myself and represent myself," he said.

Baroque violinist has York honorary degree
Canada's top Baroque violinist Jeanne Lamon (DLitt '94) has an honorary degree from York University, BC’s Goldstream News Gazette noted March 14 in a story about an appearance she was making with the Victoria Symphony Orchestra on March 18. Lamon is currently the music director of the internationally acclaimed Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra in Toronto and will both conduct and be the guest soloist Sunday at the University of Victoria's Farquhar Auditorium.

Catholic school teacher was a York alumna
More than 200 people filled the venue known as Hugh's Room in Toronto on Jan. 14 to celebrate the life of Christina Hapon Walters (BA ‘72) in a special way, wrote a relative in The Globe and Mail’s Lives Lived feature March 15. Walters died of cancer Oct. 26, 2006, at age 56. A trust fund started by her husband Vern was boosted by Chris's eclectic collection of hats. Twenty-four of them were sold at a silent auction and the $2,300 raised was added to the Christina Walters Endowment for the Arts. The endowment fund, which has now reached $15,700 through the generous donations of family and her many friends, will be used annually to subsidize and encourage the exposure of students to music, theatre and visual arts at Canadian Martyrs Catholic School, where Chris last taught.

More service means more riders
If you build it, they will come. By the tens of millions. That's the tale told by a chart showing the roller-coaster ups and downs of ridership on Toronto's streetcars, buses and subways. It marks the milestones in transit investments – and the perils of service cuts, reported the Toronto Star March 10. Slowly but surely, the federal government is coming around to the idea of writing cheques to support local transit. Prime Minister Stephen Harper stoked hopes this week when he pledged $697 million in one-time federal funding to extend Toronto's Spadina subway line north to York University and into Vaughan. Another $265 million was earmarked to improve transit around the Greater Toronto Area. That's a far cry from the paltry $7 million Ottawa chipped in as its offering in 1996 to build the $875 million Sheppard subway.

• For most of the people who actually use and rely on public transit in Toronto, this week's announcement of federal support for the Spadina subway extension is no good news, wrote John Barber in his March 10 Globe and Mail column. On the contrary, it is a virtual guarantee of further corrosion and thickening crowds on that part of the system real people actually use. In the annals of politically motivated subways to nowhere, a local specialty, this one's a peach. Except for York University, there isn't a single destination or actual neighbourhood on the entire line. Most of the six new stations will serve as nothing more than parking lots for years to come. The terminus is a Wal-Mart store reputed to become something called the Vaughan Corporate Centre.

• With 1,650 buses a day, accounting for more than 40,000 daily trips, it's easy to understand why having an extended Spadina subway line serving York University makes sense, editorialized The Toronto Sun March 11. The fact you have to tunnel through five km of dead, industrial territory to make it to the campus, is the dud part of the plan. "The York University subway was one of our priorities," said TTC Chair Adam Giambrone. "If it's the only money that's coming, we would have put it elsewhere." The TTC's goal is to put transit where it's both needed now and there's the most potential for future expansion. Rob MacIsaac, chairman of the new Greater Toronto Transit Authority, said the transit system in the city resembles a wagon wheel, with everything emanating from the middle – either Union Station or Yonge and Bloor. It needs to become more like a spider web, with lines criss-crossing all across the city. He called the $2.1 billion expansion to York U and Vaughan "bare essentials and just the beginning."
  
• Callers discussed the long-anticipated subway extension to York University on the "Leslie Roberts Show" on CFRB-AM in Toronto March 9.

Transit justice coming to the suburbs
The extension of the York subway line is significant in at least two ways, write Roger Keil and Douglas Young, of the City Institute at York University, in an opinion piece published March 14 in the Toronto Star. First, it creates true transit citizens from more than 50,000 students and staff at Canada's third-largest university. No longer will they have to stand in line in the rain and sleet and be packed in usually crammed buses.

Their neighbours in the richly diverse communities around the university will finally be able to connect with downtown Toronto and other parts of the urban region as if they really lived in an emergent global city and not in the shadow of an underserved auto town from a bygone era, wrote Keil, director of the institute and a professor in the Faculty of Environmental Studies, and Young, contract faculty in the Division of Social Science, Faculty of Arts. It creates the opportunity for more transit justice in a region that not only continues to worship the car and the road but which favours most downtown neighbourhoods over the dynamically growing older suburbs, which have now evolved into intra-metropolitan hubs in their own right.

Second, it makes urban citizens out of the inhabitants of a largely forgotten section of the city between the glamour zones of the downtown and the traditional suburbs, wrote the two York faculty members. The new subway line will go straight to the heart of the "in-between city," the kind of novel urban form in which most Canadians now live, work and play daily. It is a city of variably dense human settlement. The roughly 80 square kilometres around York University, for example, are home to more than 120,000 residents and many thousands of workers. The subway is for them, and will integrate their neighbourhoods more tightly into the fabric of the city, which so often overlooks them.

Remnants of meteorite flame a trail to Earth
On Sunday night between 8pm and 8:30pm rapt observers from here to Milwaukee saw a ball of light, seething white, careening overhead, spitting out dazzling debris, reported the Toronto Star March 13. It probably landed as a rock no bigger than a fist, weighing about a kilogram. "Everything I have heard suggests that it was a bolide – a meteorite that was flaming through our atmosphere," explains Paul Delaney, a physics and astronomy professor at York University. "It probably came to ground somewhere. But where, nobody knows."

What's certain is that for three or four spine-tingling seconds, people from a massive swath of the continent shared the same slice of burning sky. And everyone imagined that whatever it was had landed in their own backyards. "That is not at all unusual for really bright bolide," Delaney observes. "They have huge distances over which they can travel and therefore be seen." A hurtling meteoroid glows white-hot as it rushes through the Earth's atmosphere. And, like a red-hot stick waved around at a campfire, it leaves a brief but extremely bright trail. "So it doesn't have to be very big to be seemingly really bright," Delaney says.

If anyone does manage to find this heavenly visitor, the earthly rewards could be substantial. Museums may pay as much as $3,000 for a meteoroid of that size, Delaney estimates. "These are wonderful laboratories," Delaney says. "It's a piece of space."

• In a March 13 story in the Richmond Hill Liberal, Paul Delaney said such objects travel at about 10 kilometres per second as they enter the atmosphere, which makes them glow. A greenish tinge to the flashes suggests chemicals trapped inside the rock are escaping as the object plummets. A rock that actually makes it to the ground is called a meteorite, while one that doesn't is a meteor, or shooting star.
  
• York University astronomy Professor Paul Delaney said a meteorite visible from north of Toronto through to Wisconsin last week, likely landed as a rock no bigger than a fist and weighed about a kilogram, wrote the Sarnia Observer March 14. And, just like a red-hot stick waved around at a campfire, a meteorite doesn't have to be big to leave a brief but extremely bright trail. If anyone finds it, Delaney doesn't think it will be recognized as a meteorite because it will look like any other rock.

Working as hard as Americans not worth the money, says tax prof
Neil Brooks (left) is a professor of tax law at York’s Osgoode Hall Law School and the author of a recent report published by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives comparing 19 industrialized nations on a variety of social and economic indicators, reports Maclean's in its March 19 issue. "Aiming for US per capita GDP [gross domestic product] appears to be totally misguided," he says. "On nearly every indicator we looked at, the Americans were at or near the bottom. They have the highest rates of poverty, the greatest degree of insecurity and inequality. Their health outcomes, on average, are the worst. So are their education outcomes. They may have more obscenely rich people than we do but that doesn't make the typical family any better off."

"I can't imagine why anyone would want to work as hard as the Americans," opines Brooks, an ardent supporter of taxation and public spending. "At the end of the day we should be concerned about whether we are enjoying life and leisure. Working harder to get an extra $12,000 a year isn't going to make anyone any happier or more satisfied with their life."

Tax-cut mantra is music to ears of the wealthy
Neil Brooks, a professor of tax law at York’s Osgoode Hall Law School, notes that the top one per cent of income earners have increased their share of national income substantially, from 7.5 per cent during the post-war decades to 13.6 per cent in the neo-conservative era – a level of inequality not seen in Canada for about a century, wrote the Toronto Star in an editorial March 16. Brooks suggests a higher marginal tax rate, clicking in at $450,000 and $900,000 a year, as well as a tax on inheritances above $3 million, in order to fund more public programs.

Such an approach, which would make Canada more egalitarian, like Europe, might appeal to many Canadians. But it's completely off the agenda, said the Star. Instead, the public debate remains confined within the narrow limits of neo-conservative theory. Even though the theory has been undercut by the facts, we're still encouraged to repeat it like a mantra. All together now: Tax cuts benefit us all. Tax cuts benefit us all. Tax cuts benefit us all....

Region pinpointed for sustainability education
Environmental education and research in the province will soon reach a new level, due to an important designation announced in Saskatoon recently by representatives of the United Nations University, reported the Saskatoon Sun March 11. At a ceremony held at the Meewasin Valley Authority, Charles Hopkins (right), UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Teacher Education at York University, and David Walden, secretary general of the Canadian Commission for UNESCO, designated the Saskatoon-Craik-Regina corridor as a Regional Centre of Expertise on Education for Sustainable Development.

Known as RCE Saskatchewan, the corridor is now recognized by the United Nations as a region within which different Saskatchewan organizations will work together to research, develop and deliver educational programs related to environment and sustainable development. "RCE Saskatchewan now joins more than 30 other RCEs around the world, forming one of the largest and indeed most crucial education, public awareness and training experiments ever undertaken," Hopkins said in a news release. "What we learn in these centres on how to successfully engage the public in this enormous learning undertaking may shape our very existence and will certainly have an impact on our quality of life for generations to come."

Repeal election night gag law
Now that the Supreme Court of Canada has declared constitutional Canada's election gag law, despite a lack of evidence of its efficacy, it's time for Prime Minister Stephen Harper to introduce legislation repealing the law, wrote The Vancouver Sun March 16 in an editorial.

In coming to this conclusion, the majority relied primarily on three sources – the testimony of an expert witness, the Royal Commission on Electoral Reform and Party Financing (the Lortie Commission) and a recent poll of Canadians' views on electoral fairness. The expert witness, York University political scientist Robert MacDermid (right), Faculty of Arts, testified that knowing election results before could cause people to change their votes or to stay home altogether.

Writing for the minority, Justice Rosalie Abella came to a very different conclusion, said the Sun. She noted that MacDermid's comments on voting behaviour only applied to situations where potential voters knew the outcome of the election prior to voting.

Interest reviving in Yiddish
In a March 10 story about a revival in Yiddish language, the Globe and Mail reported that on the academic front, there are Yiddish studies programs at the University of Toronto and York University. Yiddish is also part of the curriculum at Bialik Hebrew Day School, beginning in Grade 3. "Toronto is one of the few places in the world, except for New York maybe, which has such vibrant Yiddish secular life," U of T Yiddish Prof. Anna Shternshis says.

Politicians, scholars, businesses use census data
What makes the census different from every other study, poll, and survey is that it is supposed to count every Canadian individually – no estimates, projections or margins of error, wrote The Globe and Mail March 14. While it doesn't quite meet that goal, the census does provide by far the most complete and accurate picture of Canada's population, and that makes it an invaluable tool for governments, business and academics. Ottawa sets transfer and equalization payments based on census data, companies use it to design marketing campaigns, and professors use it to study Canada's socioeconomic makeup.

"There's no other source that's anything like it," said Michael Ornstein (left), director of the Institute for Social Research at York. "It's truly wonderful. It's an amazing data source." Ornstein, who studies social and economic differences among ethnic and racial groups, says the detailed data on income, education, occupations, language and ethnic background is invaluable to his work. "You know an immense amount about people," he said. "There are questions you can answer [with census data] that you can't answer in any other way."

Road rage exaggerated, says York psychologist
Here's fresh proof Toronto gridlock can drive anyone crazy: A man left his car on the Don Valley Parkway during the evening commute, entered another vehicle and attempted to destroy that car's interior, wrote the National Post March 14. But David Wiesenthal (left), a psychology professor in York’s Faculty of Health, who has conducted research on road rage, said the phenomenon "is grossly over exaggerated – it rarely happens." He said there are hundreds of thousands of motorists who use the roads responsibly. "The real story is that there is so little of it."

Green or greenwash?
The compulsion to declare environmental purity these days is so pervasive that greenliness is being claimed by all manner of organizations and events, including some with climate ties that may appear peripheral at best, reported the National Post March 10. At the Oscar ceremony last month, officials at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences declared with considerable pride that this year's event was "carbon neutral." "You really have to give Al Gore credit," says Alan Middleton, a marketing professor at York University's Schulich business school. "Putting his status and celebrity behind An Inconvenient Truth has really captured an audience. People are paying attention to the environment." And with polls showing most Canadians are willing to take steps to stop global warming, it's no surprise that green marketing is now so pervasive, Middleton says. A number of big corporations – including oil producers, car manufacturers and appliance makers – have been accused of greenwashing. As firms tout ever-more tangential green credentials, it may hurt those making genuine strides, Middleton says. "The danger is that what they achieve gets devalued by the overall inflation of everybody saying they're green," he says.

Bittersweet boycott
Some well-meaning people are calling for a consumer boycott of Hershey products in sympathy with workers at the company’s Smith’s Falls plant, which is closing, wrote the Kingston Whig-Standard March 14. What would motivate lots of consumers to shun a product in this way? Ashwin Joshi, a professor of marketing at York’s Schulich School of Business, notes that people can be persuaded to avoid something if they think it carries a physical or health risk. They may also spurn a product for moral reasons. Think, for example, of the boycott campaign against Nike over its Asian labour practices, or against Shell for its involvement in Nigeria.

A third factor, the only one that could really be at work with Hershey, is what Joshi calls a "national" motive. Job are being bled out of the country; a big multinational is unfairly hurting Canada. If you could get enough people upset about that general principle and this particular instance of it, you might be able to drum up a strong boycott.

Osgoode alumnus wins local honours
Ray Stortini (LLB ‘60), who retired in 2004 after 33 years as a judge, will receive a Justice I.A. Vannini Award of Merit at an awards banquet on April 27, wrote the Sault Star March 15. The award of merit is presented each year by the Guglielmo Marconi Society and the Elettra Marconi Society to people of Italian descent in recognition of outstanding achievement. Stortini, 78, grew up in Sault Ste. Marie.

Stortini graduated from Osgoode Hall Law School and began operating a general law practice in the Sault. He was appointed a judge of York County in 1971 and was appointed to the Algoma District Court in 1976. He was appointed a Justice of the Superior Court of Justice in 1990.

Teacher accused of sex with student
Toronto police have charged Paola Queen, a 35-year-old teacher at Nelson A. Boylen Collegiate Institute, with one count of sexual exploitation after they received a Crime Stoppers tip earlier this month about an alleged inappropriate relationship between a high school teacher and a student, reported the Toronto Star and Canadian Press March 10. Queen became a teacher in June 2005. She has two undergraduate degrees – a 1995 BA in sociology and 2000 bachelor of social work – from York University.