Academica Group

• Hosted by: Jason Hunter
• Presentation: Tom Brophy and Steven Smith

Building faculty-administrative collaborations has been a long-standing challenge and opportunity in the Canadian postsecondary environment. Both sectors share their own strengths and insights but rarely do these worlds come together to build on the research and lived experience of faculty with the daily and holistic interactions of postsecondary staff.

In this session, Tom and Steven will explore the academic and student services supports that have been put in place at Saint Mary's University and beyond, and how our team of researchers has conducted empirical research to demonstrate the effectiveness of these initiatives. We will cover student experience, first-year experience programming, and our regional and national benchmarking surveys. We will also discuss how our work has led to over $250,000 in SSHRC funding, publications, and presentations at domestic and international conferences by our faculty, staff, and students.