UBC Reports | Vol. 48 | No. 13 | Nov. 7, 2002

Kudos

Ag Sci Wins International Award

The Faculty of Agricultural Sciences’ Global Resource Systems (GRS) Program has won the Scotiabank-Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada (AUCC) Award for Excellence in Internationalization for 2002.

The program, headed by Prof. George Kennedy, won in the category of Broadening the Student Experience. Members of the selection jury were impressed with the undergraduate program’s unique integration of science, language and regional studies.

Launched in 1996, the program gives students a sense of how science operates in the real world through a combination of language training, cultural studies and international experience. There were 50 students in the GRS program in 2000-01.

Kennedy accepted the award at a special ceremony held in Ottawa in late October.

Film Awards

Faculty and students of UBC’s film program are celebrating several awards this month. UBC Film Prof. Sharon McGowan’s film Society’s Child has been nominated for a Gemini Award for Best TV Movie or Dramatic Mini-series. The movie chronicles the life and death of Nikki, a nine-year-old girl with Rett Syndrome, a genetically triggered disability that only affects females.

McGowan and three other partners produced the CBC film, which was broadcast in February.

The awards, presented by the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television, recognize outstanding achievements in the Canadian film and television industries and will be aired on CBC Television on Nov. 4 from Toronto. This is McGowan’s first Gemini nomination in this category.

A film produced by a team of UBC students won the Telefilm Canada Award for Best Emerging Western Canadian Director for a Short or Mid-Length Film at the recent 2002 Vancouver International Film Festival closing ceremony. Big Shoes to Fill was directed by Michelle Porter and produced and edited by Sidney Chiu. The cinematographer was Shannon Kohli. The award comes with a $4,000 prize.

Woollard Receives McWhinney Award

Robert Woollard, Royal Canadian Legion Professor and Head of the Dept. of Family Practice, has received the Ian McWhinney Family Medicine Education Award for 2002.

Awarded by the College of Family Physicians of Canada (CFPC), the honour recognizes individuals who have made an outstanding contribution to family medicine education in Canada.

Woollard, a full-time faculty member since 1989, is recognized for his influence on the development of the discipline of family medicine at the undergraduate and postgraduate level and also in the area of continuing medical education and role modeling. He chaired the Implementation Task Force for UBC’s new medical school curriculum.