Help Inquiry@Queen’s mark the 10th anniversary of the I@Q Undergraduate Research Conference.

All undergraduate students with research results to share are invited to submit an abstract for the 10th annual conference to be held March 10-11 in the Queen's Learning Commons, Stauffer Library.

Participation in the conference gives undergraduate students the opportunity to:

• share their research with the Queen’s community
• experience an academic conference
• enhance graduate and career skills including critical thinking, effective writing and presentation skills
• engage in scholarly communication with students and faculty from many disciplines.

The deadline for the submission of proposals has been extended to Feb. 5, 2016.

For more information on submitting a proposal, see our website: www.queensu.ca/iatq/iq-undergraduate-research-conference

For questions, contact iatq@queensu.ca

Throughout her career, Teri Shearer has immersed herself in business and accounting – numbers, yes, but also how those financial statements affect people and social structures.

“I’ve always been really interested in the interface between the numbers and people’s behaviour,” says Dr. Shearer, who took over from Laeeque Daneshmend as the university’s deputy provost this month. “My research has largely focused on management accounting – budgeting, incentive systems and cost-tracking – and the sociological and behavioural impacts of business practices.”

Dr. Shearer has stepped into the deputy provost role after 20 years at the Smith School of Business – a number that’s significant to her as she transitions to a senior administrative position.

“I’ve really enjoyed my time at Smith, but it seemed time to move to a more central position. Taking this position is a great opportunity to move beyond the walls of my faculty and get a view of the university as a whole,” says Dr. Shearer. “I want to experience the workings of the central university and expose myself to how other units approach operations.”

The deputy provost position is broad – in large part focused on the university’s finances and cost-containment, an area to which Dr. Shearer is well-suited, given her role in business education and the administration at Smith, where she was most recently associate dean. The position also oversees all academic appointments, as well as operations at the Agnes Etherington Art Centre. She will also play a key role in implementing the Employment Equity Strategic Framework.

“I am looking forward to this work on employment equity. It’s a very important area and one I am committed to pushing forward. The university – all universities – needs to be a model for students, and attracting more members of equity-seeking groups is a huge priority.”

Born in Iowa, Dr. Shearer started her career as a bookkeeper, and later as a certified accountant. She enjoyed the work, but craved more in-depth study of business practices, and so pursued a PhD at the University of Iowa. Soon after, she moved north to Canada, teaching at the University of Saskatchewan for three years before coming to Queen’s in 1996. Queen’s mid-sized status, along with its dual focus on research and the learning experience, have always appealed to her.

“This is a great place to be, as a student, faculty member, or administrator,” she says. “I am excited to see what I will learn in my new role.”

Learning is definitely part of the job, and she relishes the opportunity this career move provides. She also knows that, like everyone, she needs balance, something she says she finds in her garden, and with the animals she’s kept over the years on her hobby farm northwest of Kingston – everything from chickens and turkeys, to goats, sheep and llamas.

“The gardening and farming is something tangible I do to offset all the non-tangible work I do in the office,” she says.

For the past two Homecomings, Fraser Horn (Sci‘89) drove from Toronto to Kingston in his 100 per cent electric Tesla Model S. He was able to just make it to Kingston but had trouble finding adequate charging for his trip home. After last year’s Homecoming, Mr. Horn sent an email to Principal Daniel Woolf .

“I wrote to Principal Woolf suggesting that there ought to be an electric car charger on campus. I told him I thought universities should be at the forefront of sustainable projects,” says Mr. Horn.

Principal Woolf connected him with the Sustainability Office to explore the idea of installing an electric car charger on campus. Mr. Horn, an electrical engineer and stay-at-home father, made an initial $4,000 pledge. So began the Electric Vehicle Charging Station Sustainability Initiative.

As Sustainability Manager Aaron Ball explains, this initiative fits perfectly with Queen’s goal of creating a sustainable campus by increasing support for alternative modes of transportation. 

“We want to break down the barriers to alternate transportation. For example, more people will ride their bikes if there are lots of bike racks on campus. As electric cars become more popular as an alternate form of transportation, installing a charger on campus will break down another barrier,” says Mr. Ball.

In Kingston there is an electric car charging station near Hwy. 401 at Division Street, one on Princess Street at the Best Western and another at St. Lawrence College, but because of the hours it can take to charge, it’s really only practical to have a charger at your destination, which for Mr. Horn was downtown and the Queen’s University campus. It is logical and fitting that Queen’s, with its highly-respected engineering program that encourages discovery and invention of sustainable products and green initiatives, leads the way in this initiative. 

The two electric vehicle charging stations will be located at the corner of Union and Division streets, in front of the School of Kinesiology, where they will be “visible, accessible, and where we easily can connect to a building to get the power,” says Mr. Ball. They will be used by Queen’s employees and visitors to campus.

The cost of installing the two chargers on campus is $30,000. While Mr. Horn’s initial gift to the program is a good start, more donations are required to make this goal a reality. 

“I’m reaching out to my classmates and others who feel the same way I do, that Queen’s needs to encourage the adoption of sustainable practices,” says Mr. Horn. “I do a lot of driving with my three busy children, so I see the positive impact of using a sustainable and cleaner means to get around.”

He adds: “Things like this may feel small, especially if only one or two individuals are doing it, but collectively, I know, we can make a big difference. The lack of charging infrastructure is one of the biggest barriers to electric vehicle ownership but because electricity is everywhere it’s a relatively easy problem to solve.”

To contribute to the EV Charging Station project, visit givetoqueens.ca/sustainableengineering.