Paths to Professions in Disability Health ResearchGraduate Student Conference Preliminary Program

Paths to Professions in Disability Health ResearchGraduate Student Conference Preliminary Program

AN OPPORTUNITY FOR GRADUATE STUDENTS ACROSS THE DISCIPLINESDon’t miss this exciting and rare opportunity to dialogue with other graduate students interested in disability health research, enjoy great food, have fun and develop new connections!

THE PURPOSEThe purpose of the conference is to foster networks and provide resources to support BC graduate students’ success in the field of Disability Health Research. The conference will offer keynote speakers, facilitated networking opportunities and a creative PROJECT Show and Tell session.

SOME HIGHLIGHTS

Highlights include:

• Keynote speakers Dr. Bonita Sawatsky and Dr. Sharon Dale Stone speaking on the “Journey of a Disability Health Researcher”

• PROJECT SHOW and TELL – a creative learning opportunity for graduate students to share their research and gain some fun experience presenting a one-minute PowerPoint slide summarizing their current research. Promote your project! Have people drop by your station in the afternoon to chat with you about your work.

• Sessions include facilitated-networking sessions for graduate students interested in

disability health research to meet and share ideas across the disciplines as well as writing successful applications sessions.

• The performance of “My Leaky Body” by Toronto writer and artist Julie Delaney which will offer a creative expression and vehicle for discussion about the body, illness, pain and disability.

RED-CIRCLE THE DATE: THURSDAY, DECEMBER 6TH, 2007

DATE AND LOCATIONThe conference will take place at the Morris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University (downtown campus) in Vancouver BC on Thursday December 6, 2007. The Centre is located in downtown Vancouver at 580 West Hastings St. Please see the website: http://www.sfu.ca/dialog/ for further details. You can also refer to the maps below for street and room locations.

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Paths to Professions in Disability Health ResearchGraduate Student Conference Preliminary Program

Downtown Vancouver Location Map Room: Asia Pacific HallMorris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue (red star) Simon Fraser University Downtown

ACCOMMODATIONAccommodation is available at the Delta Suites Hotel at 550 West Hastings Street, Vancouver, British Columbia. The hotel is located in the same building as the conference centre. DHRN Conference special room rates are available but in order to secure this rate you must reserve your room by November 12th, 2007. To make your reservation please contact the Delta Suites Hotel directly quoting “DHRN Conference” for the group rate, by calling 604-689-8188 or toll-free at: 1-888-890-3222. Please see details below for available travel subsidies for DHRN members traveling from outside the Lower Mainland.

For more information about the hotel go to: http://www.deltahotels.com/hotels/hotels.php?hotelId=21

DHRN TRAVEL SUBSIDIESThe DHRN is pleased to offer a travel stipend of up to $500 to individual DHRN members traveling from outside of the Lower Mainland to assist with travel and accommodation. Membership with the DHRN is free. Please indicate on your registration form if you will be requesting a travel subsidy. For further eligibility details please contact Sylvie Zebroff, Provincial Coordinator at 250-807-8793 or email: dhrn.info@ubc.ca

WHAT IS THE DISABILITY HEALTH RESEARCH NETWORK (DHRN)? The Disability Health Research Network (DHRN) is an integrated, multidisciplinary and BC-based network that aims to foster high quality research and valuable community connections to better the lives of Canadians living with disability. It strives to promote research that solves real problems for person with disability, improves relevant clinical practices for the benefit and health of person with disability and leads to improved policies around disability health related issues.

Paths to Professions in Disability Health ResearchGraduate Student Conference Preliminary Program

REGISTRATION INFORMATION

Registration for the DHRN Graduate Student Conference is FREE. Registration capacity is limited however, so we ask that you REGISTER as soon as possible. PLEASE REGISTER BY NOVEMBER 23, 2007. A registration form is attached at the end of this programme – simply complete and fax or email to Sylvie Zebroff, DHRN Coordinator at sylvie.zebroff@ubc.ca or fax: 250.807.8001. You can also call at 250.807.8793.

DECEMBER 6th PRELIMINARY PROGRAM08:30 – 09:00 Registration/ Coffee & Muffins

09:00 – 09:30 Welcome and IntroductionsTAG Networking Begins

09:30 – 09:50 Keynote Speaker: Dr. Bonita SawatzkyTitle: A Disability Health Researcher: How Did I End Up Here?

09:55 – 10:15 PROJECT SHOW AND TELL – Part I10:15 – 10:30 TAG Mind Mapping Check-in10:30 – 10:45 Refreshment Break

10:45 – 11:15 Keynote Speaker: Dr. Sharon Dale StoneTitle: My Dialectical Journey Into Disability Studies

11:15 – 11:35 PROJECT SHOW AND TELL – Part II11:35 – 11:50 Tag Mind Mapping Check-In11:50 – 12:50 Lunch (provided on site)

12:50 – 13:20 PROJECT SHOW AND TELL – Poster and Station ‘Visits’

13:20 – 14:20 Writing Successful Grant Proposals – CIHR and SSHRC

14:20 – 14:35 Refreshment Break

14:35 – 15:40 Performance: My Leaky Body with Julie Delaney

15:40 – 15:50 TAG Wrap-Up - Reflections15:50 – 16:00 Closing and Thank You

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Paths to Professions in Disability Health ResearchGraduate Student Conference Preliminary Program

MORE DETAILS ABOUT THE CONFERENCE PROGRAM

PROJECT SHOW AND TELL (One-Minute Project Descriptions) These program sections will provide graduate students with an opportunity toshare their research ideas or preliminary findings with others and gain experiencein articulating this in a concise and simple fashion.

Let other researchers with similar interests know about your work! During this one-minute session, you will have one minute to inform attendees about your research project. Tell us about key aspects of your research in ONE PowerPoint slide and in a ONE MINUTE presentation. This is an opportunity to make linkages with researchers working in your area of interest. Please be as creative as you wish on this slide! You are given ONE minute of fame at this conference (and remember- it is ONE MINUTE!) in order to assist in networking – putting a face to a project!

We need to know about your intent to have One Minute at this conference! If you’d like to participate please submit your name and project details to the DHRN office, via email or fax, by November 26, 2007. Your One Minute slide must be submitted by November 30, 2007. If you have more questions about this session please contact Sylvie Zebroff at the DHRN office at 250.807.8793 or you can email Dr. Sawatzkydirectly (bsawatzky@cw.bc.ca).

This is an excellent opportunity for all graduate students interested in disability health research! Learning how to summarize, produce and present your research are important skills in grant writing, liaising with the media, informing other researchers and operating in an increasingly interdisciplinary world.

A copy of your slide or an academic poster pertaining to your slide will be displayed in the foyer for the SHOW AND TELL discussion session. The DHRN is also pleased to announce that we will provide a subsidy up to $100 towards the printing costs associated with producing an academic poster for this conference. If you are interested in submitting a poster, the poster must be no larger that 4’x6’. The deadline for the finalized posters is Friday November 30, 2007.

REMEMBER: You do not have to have finished (or even started) your research in order to participate in this Show and Tell session. Your slide could include: your research interests, what you are planning to do in your research, preliminary literature analysis and/or your theoretical and methodological approach. This is not a competition. It’s a fun way to exchange interests and ideas with one another!

For more information and tips on how to produce an academic poster, go to the following sites:

http://www.skidmore.edu/academics/sociology/resources/poster_files/posters_samples.html

http://www.ncsu.edu/project/posters/create.html

Paths to Professions in Disability Health ResearchGraduate Student Conference Preliminary Program

KEYNOTE SPEAKERS

Bonita Sawatsky, PhDDHRN Co-LeaderAssistant Professor, Department of Orthopaedics, University of British Columbia

A Disability Health Researcher: How Did I End Up Here?

Dr. Sawatzky is an assistant professor in both the Division of Orthopaedic Engineering and Paediatric Orthopaedics at the University of British Columbia. She completed her PhD in 1998 from SFU in Applied Science understanding the biomechanics of scoliosis surgery. In 2000 she began to shift her focus to studying the physiological and biomechanical effects of wheelchair set up on wheelchair propulsion in both adults and children, in hopes of improving function and decreasing long-term overuse injuries as a result of wheelchair propulsion with a particular emphasis on paediatrics.

She has developed collaborations with the hospital’s Spinal Cord and Neuromuscular Clinics as well as collaborations with clinicians at GF Strong to gain knowledge about seating adults and access to adult wheelchair users. She is a member of ICORD (International Collaboration on Repair Discoveries), a new spinal cord research centre in Vancouver. It will eventually house a fully equipped research lab that centers on rehabilitation research including wheelchair function. She has been a co-leader of the Disability Health Research Network for almost 2 years. She supervises rehab, engineering, and human kinetics grad students as well as teaches in the undergraduate medical school program. Her most rewarding aspect of her work is mentoring students and watching them develop their own careers.

Sharon Dale Stone, PhDAssociate Professor and ChairSociology DepartmentLakehead University

My Dialectical Journey Into Disability StudiesSharon-Dale Stone is Associate Professor and Chair of Sociology at Lakehead University. She is also affiliated with the Women's Studies, Gerontology, and Masters of Public Health programs at Lakehead. Her research interests lie in the areas of disability studies, gender and sexuality, qualitative methods and critical gerontology, and her research has always focused on giving voice to groups of people whose experiences are marginalized in mainstream society. She has

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TAG Networking Team Member – Jennifer JasperSince 1999, I have worked as a facilitator and educational developer with the Centre for Teaching and Academic Growth at U.B.C. My interest in group dynamics began while I was studying a very tiny worm (C.elegans) for my Master’s work in animal behaviour. From worms to humans, I noticed that the process of interaction, integration and social friction were very similar, albeit slightly more complicated, in humans. My experience as a facilitator and educational developer has strengthened my belief in the group process. My goal is to help groups collaborate more efficiently and productively to create that change in the world that Margaret Mead spoke of when she said, “ Never doubt that that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed it’s the only thing that ever has.”

Paths to Professions in Disability Health ResearchGraduate Student Conference Preliminary Program

been writing about the experience of invisible disability since the 1980s, and this is now the focus of her research.

In recent years, Stone has collaborated with injured workers to write about their experiences of (mostly invisible) disability. She is currently a co-investigator on a major research project looking at the consequences of work injury: a project under the umbrella of the Research Action Alliance on the Consequences of Work Injury, funded by a Community-University Research Alliance grant through the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. As well, she has recently published A Change of Plans: Women's Stories of Hemorrhagic Stroke (Sumach Press, 2007) which is a collection of 11 stories, based on her larger research project about the experience of surviving hemorrhagic stroke before the age of 50. She is in the process of writing a second book on the subject, to reflect the breadth and depth of information gathered in interviews with 27 women.

TAG FACILITATED NETWORKING TEAM PROFILES

Jennifer Jasper&

Desirée Mou

TAG Networking Team Member - Desirée MouOn my grade one report card, under “works well in groups” you will see circled in thick, blue ink: “needs improvement”. I don’t think anyone would have predicted back then that I would later become fascinated by group work. Yet my Masters thesis had me back in my home town of Lillooet studying a land use planning process involving 40 people – from the community, from industry, and from various interest groups and businesses. What I learned from four years of observing this process and talking to those involved was that they care a lot about what they do, and they truly wanted to work together and produce something exceptional. This experience fired in me a passion to help groups work with their unique challenges. It has also been key to my work at the Centre for Teaching and Academic Growth (TAG), where I have been a facilitator since 2000. Group work energizes me and I am always exploring ways to make it interesting, powerful, and productive.

Paths to Professions in Disability Health ResearchGraduate Student Conference Preliminary Program

PERFORMANCE

Julie Devaney, MAWriter and Performer

Julie Devaney is a Toronto writer and performer of her leaky body. She has performed her work in New York, Washington and the UK and has upcoming engagements coast to coast in Canada. She currently brings her creative writing and performance out of conventional forums and into places like hospitals, classrooms and boardrooms. She has a Master's Degree in Critical Disability Studies from York University in Toronto where her thesis, "Clinical Encounters, the politics of my leaky body", was supervised by Dr. Margrit Shildrick. She was recently profiled in Chatelaine magazine where Heather Mallick described, "Devaney's writng talent turns emergency-room neglect into poetry... [She] is one of the few individuals brave enough to complain without blaming. Her courage is raw."

Julie can be found online at www.myleakybody.com

“My Leaky Body” is a performance piece by Julie Devaney based on her experiences spending five years in and out of hospitals, propped up on operating tables and in bed in pain for weeks and sometimes months at a time.

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