Principal Investigator: Lewis Molot

Funding: NSERC

Term: 2018-2022

The key driver of cyanobacteria bloom formation is the onset of anoxia (defined as complete loss of dissolved oxygen and nitrate) at the sediment/water boundary which results in release of ferrous iron into overlying water. The discovery of this formation has important management implications because blooms can be averted by preventing complete loss of dissolved oxygen at the sediment/water boundary. This allows managers to set phosphorus targets that protect oxygen levels. The project continues a survey of metabolically essential trace metals in lakes across Canada to fill in gaps, especially in eutrophic lakes. Preliminary evidence indicates that very low concentrations of certain trace metals (molybdenum, iron and possibly cobalt) can limit growth of cyanobacteria in eutrophic lakes in some regions when nitrogen is in short supply.

Principal Investigator: Patricia Ellie Perkins.

Funding: QES/Universities Canada.

Term: 2018-2021.

This Climate Justice Project aims to build a research network of 18 or more low and middle-income-country (LMIC) and Canadian emerging scholars (PhD researchers and post-doctoral fellows) working to address the injustices resulting from global climate change through participatory democratic governance. It will also introduce them to the ongoing Economics for the Anthropocene (E4A) program (see e4a-net.org), and also to the global Queen Elizabeth Scholars (QES) network. The QES training of emerging scholars includes applied-research and learning-by-doing through the E4A’s innovative pedagogical approach, which involves experiential education, research internships, retreats, field research preparation and joint research seminars with graduate students at York University, McGill University, and the University of Vermont. The QES program has opened up opportunities of the E4A program to LMIC researchers and has made it possible for Canadian E4A researchers to expand their academic and civil society networks in LMICs.

Principal Investigator: Ilan Kapoor. Funding: SSHRC.

Term: 2018-2023.

The research aims to investigate how, and to what extent, psychoanalysis intersects with international development; and to identify and analyze examples and case studies of psychoanalytic phenomena from both the Geography/Development Studies literature and the international programs of development organizations based on field work. Particular attention will be paid to illustrating psychoanalytic operations in development theory and practice, so as to make the point that trauma is not just an "inner" condition to development, but is externally materialized in institutional policies and programs. Based on field work, the research will focus on the activities of international development institutions (World Bank, UK Department for International Development, and development NGOs in India).

Principal Investigator: Linda Peake.

Funding: SSHRC Partnership Grant.

Term: 2017-2023.

Situated within the dynamic early 21^st century context of urbanization, this GenUrb project conducts research and engages in public education and policy enrichment in seven strategically chosen cities (Cairo, Cochabamba, Georgetown (Guyana), Ibadan, Mumbai, Ramallah, and Shanghai) in lower-middle-income countries to advance understanding of how the relationship between poverty and inequality is being transformed, focusing in particular on how this is reconstituting gender relations and women’s right to the city.

Principal Investigator: Jennifer Hyndman

Funding: SSHRC Insight Grant.

Term: 2017-2022.

The overall aim of the project is to produce and share new knowledge about private refugee sponsorship in Canada. Since March 2016, and at the September 2016 UN Summit in New York City on refugees and migrants, the federal government has committed to ‘exporting’ its expertise about Canada’s unique private resettlement program for refugees. At present, however, very little is known about what characteristics of place and people are correlated with and sustain ongoing sponsorship by private citizens, whether in cities and more rural areas. This project will fill a gap in the scholarly literature, but will also have several applications in policy and practice. In 2016, Canada is expected to resettle 44,800 refugees (Casasola, 2016), more than ever before in a single year; almost half of these will be privately-sponsored in whole or part.

Principal Investigator: Joseph Mensah

Funding: SSHRC.

Term: 2017-2022.

The study examines the return intentions of African immigrants in Canada, drawing on the experiences of Ghanaians and Somalis in Toronto and Vancouver.  More pointedly, the project seeks to understand the intersections of African immigrants’ integration, transnationalism, and return intentions, and to predict the background and spatio-temporal attributes of African immigrants who are more likely to return to their home countries.

Principal Investigator: Sarah Flicker.

Funding: SSHRC Insight Development Grant.

Term: 2018-2022.

The project focuses on what people can learn from the perspective of teachers about the implementation and enactment of a controversial updated health curriculum in Canada's largest province. The interdisciplinary team brings together researchers with backgrounds and expertise in environmental studies, education, public health, women's studies, youth studies, sociology, social work and nursing from across the province. An action research approach has been adopted that draws from the fields of curriculum studies, public health, policy studies, gender and sexuality studies, as well as equity studies. The team recently published their research report: Changing the Rules: Ontario Teacher Reflections on Implementing Shifting Health and Physical Education Curricula co-authored by Sarah Flicker, Marilou Gagnon, Jen Gilbert, Adrian Guta, Katie MacEntee, Vanessa Oliver, Chris Sanders, Alanna Goldstein, Hannah Maitland, Karine Malenfant, Martha Newbigging, Sarah Switzer, Daya Williams and John Antoniw. The project is funded by an Insight Development Grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. (SSHRC).

Co-Principal Investigator: Roger Keil

Funding: SSHRC

Term: 2017-2021

The StudentMoveTO is a research and partnership project based at Ryerson University focusing on an improved understanding of the travel behaviour of 600,000 post-secondary students in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA) in Ontario, Canada. The project explores transportation patterns of post-secondary students, and the potential social and environmental influences on their travel behaviour, and the effect of students’ travel on their social well-being and urban systems. Through partnerships between students, researchers, universities, policy makers, and communities, new pathways will be created for public policy development, institutional planning and enhanced student support services.

Principal Investigator: Valerie Preston. Collaborator: Lucia Lo.

Funding: SSHRC Partnership Grant.

Term: 2016-2022.

Established in 2016, Building Migrant Resilience in Cities (BMRC-IRMU) is a research partnership and a multi-sector collaboration. It draws on over 20 years of experience in bringing together a range of key actors working on issues of immigration and settlement through CERIS, a leading Ontario network of migration and settlement researchers, practitioners, and policymakers. This unique initiative explores the concept of social resilience to examine how institutions can facilitate migrant settlement in urban areas across Quebec and Ontario. The project is generating new knowledge for academic debate and discussion that will be made readily available to decision-makers and practitioners who strive to enhance migrant settlement.

Principal Investigator: Alice Hovorka.

Funding: SSHRC Insight Grant.

Term: 2016-2025.

How do we think about animals? Where do we put them and where do they belong? How do we interact with them and are these human-animal relations good, bad, otherwise? How might we understand the lives of animals in terms of their circumstances and experiences, welfare and rights to achieve sustainable and just interspecies relations? The Lives of Animals research group investigates animal governance and the networks of actors, knowledges, structures, practices, and outcomes that shape human management of animals. Case studies of various companion, domestic, and wild animals in Botswana and Canada serve to explore the positionality of animals as influential actors that reflect some theoretical and empirical interest in species relations of power.