C/O MICHELLE CADIEUX
The Silhouette: Please introduce yourself.
Michelle Cadieux: My name is Michelle Cadieux. I am the course coordinator and one of the instructors for introductory psychology.
I've heard a lot about you guys doing costumes this Halloween. Could you tell us a little bit more about that?
Every year, we do the charity event where, if we raised enough money, your [professor] dresses up for Halloween. In reality, [Dr. Joe Kim] and I would dress up regardless of whether or not we raised enough money — we think it's a lot of fun. It's an initiative to raise money and we participate every year.
"Every year, we do the charity event where, if we raised enough money, your [professor] dresses up for Halloween. In reality, [Dr. Joe Kim] and I would dress up regardless of whether or not we raised enough money — we think it's a lot of fun. It's an initiative to raise money and we participate every year."
MICHELLE CADIEUX, COURSE COORDINATOR AND INSTRUCTOR FOR INTRODUCTORY PSYCHOLOGY
What do you guys have planned for this year?
That's kind of a surprise but Joe and I are going to have matching costumes. It turns out that, for some odd reason, I own two adult Mario costumes. I'm not actually sure why. But then, my son decided to go as Mario last year for Halloween. My husband wanted to go as matching Marios and I went through our costume closet — yes, I own an actual closet full of costumes — and all of a sudden I found a second one. So, Dr. Kim has gone as Mario a couple of times and borrowed the costume from me. It looks great on him. This year, I was just like: "Oh, we're totally going as matching Marios". I'm really into Nintendo games and I got my son really onto the Mario side of things. We went through all of Mario Odyssey together during the pandemic. Though, this year, he's going as a Pokemon. He's going as Eevee treating and my husband and I are both going as Eevee evolutions. So we're an Eevee family. He also has a Pikachu one for school.
Do you also have more costumes?
I have four different costumes for this year. I have the costume that I'm going to wear for lecture, Mario, and then I have the costume that I'm going to wear when I go trick or treating, Leafeon, and then I have the costume that I'm going to wear for my TAs during our tutorial preview. I haven't quite decided what that one's going to be yet but I have this medieval princess thing that I'm thinking of and I have a Sailor Mercury costume that I'm wearing for a Halloween party.
Do you have a favourite costume?
I have a whole bunch of really cool ones. One that students tend to pick for me is a 1950s diner waitress costume. I will wear the whole outfit including the roller skates and I will lecture while wearing roller skates. I haven't decided if students like the costume or just the higher risk that I'm going to fall on my face. Skating on carpet is actually really hard. Regardless of how good I am on skates, I might trip and my arms go up. Everyone in the room will gasp and I don't know if they're hoping that I'll fall or not. Either way, I think it's funny. [The costume] was actually made by my godmother. A lot of my costumes come from her — she used to make costumes for Halloween. She was really into it and luckily we're of similar size. So, when she was emptying out her costume closet, I inherited a bunch. The love of costumes may be genetic.
Could you tell us a little bit about the psychology of why we want to be so scared around Halloween?
Being scared is something that a lot of people find thrilling. I don't think it's necessarily connected to Halloween. It's just that Halloween can sort of be an excuse. Being scared ups your adrenaline and that feels good. There's an element of thrill that we enjoy. It's the same reason we like eating spicy chicken wings — even though it hurts — because the pain releases endorphins. We get this connection between being scared and getting that adrenaline rush in a situation when we're not actually in danger. It's why we do escape rooms, watch horror movies, play pranks where you jump out behind somebody and everyone laughs. A little bit of fear gets our blood pumping, gets our adrenaline up and that can be a really positive feeling as long as you're not in actual danger.
Professor Adrianne Xavier about research, Indigenous food security and increasing dialogue and awareness at McMaster
Featured Photo C/O: McMaster University
As an outspoken advocate for the voices of Indigenous people in her Six Nations community and on campus, Adrianne Xavier is serving as the acting director of the Indigenous studies and anthropology department. A part of McMaster University since 2019, Xavier recently defended her dissertation on Indigenous food security and food sovereignty at Six Nations, her home community.
Xavier served as the recipient of the Indigenous In-Community Scholar Fellowship in 2020 and this year received the Petro-Canada McMaster University Young Innovators award for her work on community building and her efforts to mentor students to engage with the research process.
According to Xavier, community building has two components: building community with a research project and building community within any given group. She is a firm believer that community and health research go far beyond the formalities of methodology and the true spirit of research. Especially within Indigenous communities, lies in building a positive relationship with its inhabitants and leaders.
Photo Caption: Adrianne Xavier pictured beside colleague Dilyana Mincheva as a recipient of the Petro-Canada McMaster University Young Innovators award
Photo C/O: McMaster University
“I’m allowing the students to design what would theoretically be the pieces of a research project and what actions you must take to do real and whole Indigenous research. I want my students to know that there must be clear communication and understanding between them as researchers and the community they are engaging with,” explained Xavier.
Students under Xavier are working together to build relationships with each other and with fellow researchers regarding how to engage in the community of Indigenous spaces and Indigenous services. Xavier intends for this process to be a safe space for student researchers to learn how to ask questions — such as how to interact productively with Indigenous communities — and how to find sustainable solutions within the community itself.
Xavier emphasizes relationship building to her student researchers, given that as outsiders, many researchers are unable to assess the needs of Indigenous communities and in turn produce research and subsequent solutions that are not reflective of the community’s circumstances.
“As an individual, I know that the history of research with Indigenous communities has been very impersonal and the direction of research is often driven by researchers’ desires and interests’ and not the communities who should always be the central focus,”
Dr. Adrianne Xavier
Xavier’s research area of focus is Indigenous food security, food sovereignty and food as it relates to land repatriation. She promotes an understanding of food security and food sovereignty as the appropriate cultural access to healthy and sufficient food. Xavier is careful to draw the distinction between security and sovereignty; however, as food sovereignty does not always equate to food security, given that having enough food is different from being empowered enough to have the choice of choosing cultural foods. Similarly, food sovereignty cannot happen without food security, as if one has just technically had enough food does not equate to having the capability to decide one’s diet.
“Just having enough food to eat is not enough. Food must be personally fulfilling alongside being physically nourishing. Caloric intake is therefore not the only criteria for nourishment,” explained Xavier.
When she talks about Indigenous food sovereignty, Xavier is referring to the conversation of relationships: where do we get this food from, do we have agency to choose that relationship. A person who has enough money may not have food sovereignty if they are not able to make choices about their food.
During her time running a food sovereignty program with her mother, Xavier observed that despite teaching community members how to grow and preserve their own food, it was not always feasible for people to be able to do so.
Photo C/O: Megan Thomas, Unsplash
“I live in a community where there is no grocery store. I have to travel to other towns to get groceries. For me to have food sovereignty myself, I would have to choose the foods that I would like to have that are both culturally relevant, personally fulfilling and physically fulfilling within my community. I’m still unable to do that,” said Xavier.
True to her vision of Indigenizing solutions to community issues, Xavier is determined to center Indigenous perspectives on how to address Indigenous issues. Through her work with ISP, Xavier is actively working to expand Indigenous studies at McMaster by hiring new Indigenous faculty, with the goal of guiding her program towards becoming a department.
“As a university, I’m very fortunate McMaster is very supportive of me presenting my way of thinking in the classroom. I have felt welcome, I have felt supported and I will do the same for others,” said Xavier.
However, given the traditionally discriminatory policies of Canadian universities towards Indigenous peoples and the dismissive nature of academia to traditional knowledge, Xavier has found the settings of Western academia and it’s approaches to her teachings to not always be compatible. To combat this disparity, Xavier strongly advocates for the addition of Indigenous scholars in every department, as there are no facets of knowledge in the university where Indigenous ways of knowing are not present.
“We have our own understanding of the sciences, math, astronomy, religion, food, study, nature and the climate. Our way of knowing the world is crucial to building a more concrete understanding of these subjects,” explained Xavier.
While McMaster continues to open itself up to be mindful and welcoming of Indigenous knowledge, for new Indigenous students, faculty and staff, Xavier stresses that at Mac, there are opportunities to grow and have a strong community where Indigenous knowledge and lives are welcome.
“One of the reasons why I felt so embraced by the university is because of how much Indigenous women are leading the way at McMaster, many of whom are women I know. The placements of Dr. [Allan] Downing, Dr. Tracey Bear are milestones. This is a huge testament to Mac’s ability to bring in Indigenous women,” said Xavier.
Dr. Paul Alexander influenced the American response to COVID-19, sometimes against scientific consensus
News broke on Sept. 9, 2020 that an appointee from the Trump administration was trying to dictate what information Dr. Anthony Fauci was able to share with the public in regards to the risks children face with COVID-19. That appointee was Paul Alexander, a part-time professor in the department of health research methods, evidence and impact at McMaster University.
Fauci is the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health and the United States government’s top expert on the COVID-19 pandemic.
This story is bonkers. @McMasterU prof Paul Alexander tried to prevent top U.S. infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci from speaking publicly about COVID-19 risks to children. #HamOnt (1/6) https://t.co/i0sIbZa0t2
— Sebastian Bron (@sbron_) September 10, 2020
Alexander was appointed to the Department of Health and Human Services in March 2020 by Michael Caputo, the assistant secretary of public affairs. Caputo was also new to the department and had no medical background or experience. However, he did work as a top advisor for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.
Alexander was appointed as a science adviser to help manage the COVID-19 pandemic in America. “The president called me at the end of March and told me I should bring expertise with me. Paul [Alexander] was the first call I made after I got off the phone with the president,” said Caputo in an article written by the Hamilton Spectator.
“The president called me at the end of March and told me I should bring expertise with me. Paul [Alexander] was the first call I made after I got off the phone with the president,” said Caputo in an article written by the Hamilton Spectator.
That expertise has now been the centre of a controversy within the Department of Health and Human Services and the overall response to the pandemic in America. POLITICO’s Sarah Owermohle broke the story from emails sent by Alexander to various officials. His medical advice and instructions for Fauci are written as scientific fact but contradict mainstream scientific consensus, particularly around masks and the risk of COVID-19 in children.
Prior to an interview of Fauci by MSNBC, Alexander wrote that he is opposed to mask-use in children and testing children for COVID-19. He wrote, “can you ensure Dr. Fauci indicates masks are for the teachers in schools. Not for children. There is no data, none, zero, across the entire world, that shows children, especially young children, spread this virus to other children, or to adults or to their teachers. None. And if it did occur, the risk is essentially zero.”
That email was sent on Sept. 8, 2020. In an article from Aug. 15, 2020, Nicole Chavez of CNN cited an American Academy of Pediatrics analysis that indicated a 90 per cent increase in COVID-19 cases among children in the United States. Chavez wrote, “several clusters of coronavirus cases emerged in Florida, Georgia and Mississippi schools within days of starting classes.”
This story has info on the latest school COVID-19 case in Hamilton and a follow up on the first case linked to the school system.
It also has a map of all the school cases between Burlington and Niagara. #HamOnt #COVID19 #BackToSchool https://t.co/i0O5roIwLd
— Bobby Hristova (@bobbyhristova) September 18, 2020
In Hamilton, there have been at least two cases of COVID-19 among children in schools. As of Sept. 18, there have been at least 25 COVID-19 cases among students across Ontario’s publicly-funded schools.
A previous email from Alexander, dated Aug. 27, wrote that “there is no reason to test people without coronavirus symptoms.” The Center for Disease Control published new guidelines on Aug. 24 with an unclear direction on tests for asymptomatic individuals.
Trump has repeatedly attributed high COVID-19 case counts to high testing numbers. As of Sept. 20, 2020 the United States has reached over 6.7 million total cases.
Fauci wrote in a statement to CNN, “I'm worried it will give people the incorrect assumption that asymptomatic spread is not of great concern. In fact, it is.”
“I'm worried it will give people the incorrect assumption that asymptomatic spread is not of great concern. In fact, it is.”
In an email from Dr. Hugh Auchincloss, deputy director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, he and Dr. Fauci declined an interview citing their full schedule.
PAUL ALEXANDER, the aide to Michael Caputo who personally tried to muzzle Fauci and change CDC reports, is leaving HHS, the department says in a statement. https://t.co/ep0xHyISFL
— Dan Diamond (@ddiamond) September 16, 2020
On Sept. 16, POLITICO reported that Michael Caputo will take a 60-day medical leave of absence, while Paul Alexander has left the department. It is unclear whether Alexander resigned or if he was let go. On Sept. 24, Alexander is set to appear before the Congressional Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis. This appearance is part of the subcommittee’s investigation of alleged political interference by the Department of Health and Human Services against the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s COVID-19 response.
When the Silhouette reached out for an interview in regards to this article, Paul Alexander declined.
By: Rida Pasha
Whether it’s the real world being brought into the classroom by a professor, or the ease in explanation provided by a teaching assistant, there is no doubt that a good learning experience is a product of the time and energy of professors and TAs.
However, these educators are often overlooked and underappreciated for their efforts to bring life to course content. It’s time we become more active in acknowledging our professors and TAs.
The 2019 Teaching Awards Ceremony, an event run by a subcommittee of McMaster Students Union Macademics, was held on March 15, presenting nominated professors and TAs with awards for their excellence in teaching.
As someone involved in organizing and attending the event, a common remark made by the winners was that the greatest compliment they could receive was hearing appreciation from their students.
Although we generally view professors and TAs to be confident people in positions of authority, it was interesting that many of them discussed how even though it’s their job to lecture or run tutorials, they still feel a sense of nervousness before the start of each class.
Though instructors are strongly educated and qualified, it’s reassuring for them to hear that they’re doing a good job from their students.
Let’s take the time to compliment instructors that incorporate memes into their presentations, relate class material to our generation, take feedback seriously and actually make course improvements based off of them.
It’s easy to take their efforts for granted, but if you really enjoyed a class, let your instructor know after class or send them an email with follow-up questions.
Trying to be actively engaged in class is a great way to show instructors that what they’re saying is interesting. Although three-hour lectures can start to drag on, it’s great to ask questions or give your professor a nod of understanding when they look in your direction.
With course evaluations now open, spare a few minutes to describe what you like about your classes so far, and provide suggestions if you have any.
Not only is this an opportunity to give your input, it’s also a great way for professors to cater their class to their students’ needs, something many professors genuinely want to do.
When it’s Teaching Award nomination season, make sure you nominate professors and TAs that are doing a great job. The process takes no more than five minutes and can make all the difference for the educators you’re nominating.
Besides the fact that appreciating your teachers is a kind gesture, it’s also important to remember that beyond the course they are teaching, professors and TAs have industry knowledge and professional experience that could benefit you.
Whether you’re interested in learning more about the field they’re in, getting advice about graduate school or acquiring volunteer opportunities, it’s not a bad idea to start building a relationship with your instructors by showing them how they’re making your learning experience better.
Of course, be genuine and mean what you say, but recognize that sharing your thoughts and opinions about a class can result in a really great professional relationship.
There are classes you will love and others you will hate. But amongst the many that are boring, annoying and difficult, we all have at least one class that we look forward to attending, even on a rough day.
As students, let’s take the time to show our appreciation for our beloved educators that make a positive difference in our lives.
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Watching a professor teach a large lecture hall full of students, one would hardly assume that they struggle to make ends meet. But for many sessional faculty members, the prestige of being a lecturer at McMaster University does not equal a steady income.
In July 2017, the local division of Canadian Union of Public Employees, CUPE 3906, began bargaining with McMaster University to improve working conditions for sessional faculty and hourly-rated sessional music faculty. Their main focus is on better wages and job security.
A sessional faculty member is a professor without tenure, who is expected to reapply for their positions once their short-term contract has ended. It is common for sessional faculty members to be hired on a semester-by-semester basis, meaning they must reapply for their job every few months.
"If you take 40 per cent of whatever the average assistant professor is making and how many classes they're teaching, usually two to four classes, it ends up being twice what our sessional are making, and it's the same work."
Graham Barker
President
Cupe 3906
“When you think as well about the idea of equal pay for equal work, which is a standard we hold onto as a local [union], you have to think about what other faculties on this campus are getting paid to do the same work sessionals are paid to do,” said Graham Baker, CUPE 3906 president.
Baker argued that once their income is broken down into segments, it is clear that contracted faculty are paid much more for the same work sessional faculty do.
“When you look at what the workload looks like for a tenured professor, the usual breakdown is that they’re expected to devote 40 per cent of their time to teaching,” he said.
LIVING WAGES FROM UNIVERSITY EMPLOYERS ARE NEEDED #highered #cdnpse https://t.co/cHQyzRODMe
— CUPE Local 3906 (@cupe_3906) September 20, 2017
“So if you take 40 per cent of whatever the average assistant professor is making and how many classes they’re teaching, usually two to four classes, it ends up being twice what our sessionals are making, and it’s the same work,” he added.
McMaster’s current rate for sessional faculty members is $7,050 per three-unit course. In comparison, University of Toronto’s starting rate is $7,304.56 per three-unit course and York’s rate is $8,389.50 per course. It should be noted, however, that the latter schools are considerably larger than McMaster, with their student populations well above 50,000. McMaster’s student population currently sits around 30,000.
There are approximately 300 sessional faculty members represented by CUPE 3906 currently teaching at McMaster. Of those 300, the majority teach in the commerce and engineering faculty, particularly in the B.Tech program, where 70 of their sessional faculty lay.
McMaster's current rate for sessional faculty members is $7,050 per three-unit course. In comparison, University of Toronto's starting rate is $7,304.56 per three-unit course and York's rate is $8,389.50 per course.
“There’s a misconception that sessional work is like this “gig” that recent PhD graduates do until they can land that permanent position,” said Baker. “People who’ve been working here since the 1970s and 1980s have no more job security now than when they started. The sessional faculty member is the definition of a precarious worker.”
Currently, the union is not poised to strike, and both parties are taking the necessary steps to avoid it. According to CUPE 3906, at the last bargaining meeting with the university, they made progress on smaller issues and did not address the major concerns of better wages and increased job security. Their next meeting is slated for early Oct.
As the union continues working with the university, everyone involved hopes that there is no work stoppage, ensuring that undergraduate students are not affected by these negotiations.
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There is a certain relationship between students and professors that makes students wary of approaching the people at the front of lecture halls.
Osamah Al-Gayyali, now a third-year Biochemistry student, decided to do something about this. He got the idea while at the Biochemistry Society’s “Meet the Profs” event in his second year, where he could not shake the feeling of fear when approaching professors. Ironically, the event was held specifically with the goal of fostering student professor relations.
When he saw his first semester professor Karun Singh, Al-Gayyali pulled him aside and took a different approach. He asked Singh if he would take a selfie with him. To his surprise, Singh agreed.
“I take my phone out and all of a sudden I see three other biochem students trying to squeeze in … So, I went on for the next two to three weeks, taking selfies with every single professor I knew. Dr. Yang, Dr. Miller, Eric Brown...” recalled Al-Gayyali.
From a single selfie came a collection, and from that collection Professors of McMaster was born. Inspired by Brandon Stanton’s Humans of New York, Al-Gayyali decided to adapt the concept to showing students that professors are approachable.
Al-Gayyali decided that it was time to move past selfies, recruiting Annie Cheng to take pictures for the page instead. Cheng and Al-Gayyali were already well acquainted. In fact, all five team members behind the initiative were in the same biochemistry group.
“Except for Mohammad [Ali Khan]. He was the outsider,” they joked, clearly at ease with one another.
Already two years in the running, the Facebook page for Professors of McMaster is bound to feature at least one professor familiar to any given student. Each post involves a lengthy process.
“From the interviews, we try to get something out of them that they don’t present during lectures and stuff, so more of their personal side. But sometimes profs are uncomfortable with sharing that side of them,” said Cheng.
“So we ask them questions related to their education and history … their interests,” added Ali Khan.
When asked what is so intimidating about professors, the group joked around, saying “they were old and scary.” On a more sombre tone, it became apparent that the fact that professors hold your marks and sometimes even your future in their hands was a big factor. The other was the fear that professors were too wise and busy to glean any benefit from conversations with students – a myth that professors shot down immediately in interviews with Professors of McMaster.
“Because interviews are in their offices, I was worried it would be boring and look the same. But every prof has a different style, I find, which is interesting to me.”
Keeping things in perspective was another important message that professors seemed to communicate. “You know, at the time, you feel like you’re under a lot of strain but, in the grand scheme of things, like one midterm or test isn’t going to define your future. I think that’s an important message to send out to students,” said Nafis Hossain.
While the interviews follow interesting narratives, Cheng says that the pictures tell a story on their own. “When I first went in though, because [interviews are] all in their offices, I was worried it would be boring and look the same. But every prof has a different style, I find, which is interesting to me.”
In the future, Professors of McMaster hopes to start a webpage, where they can post full transcripts and audio clips of the interviews.
Photo Credit: Jon White/ Photo Editor
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There are two university staff members that I see everyday who look like me. They are both women, and they are both very soft-spoken. We don’t ever exchange more than a “Hello” with one another, but between us there seems to be an unspoken agreement that we acknowledge and respect one another’s work. It’s not often that I see university staff faces with a similar bone structure to mine, the same skin colour as mine, or whispered hints of accents and languages that remind me of my family and my ancestors. But, I see these traits in these two women, and for that, they are the closest things to visual role models I have on campus.
Both of these people are custodial staff, and for the most part, they are the only staff members on campus that I have seen with faces like mine.
It is alarming to me that the only adult faces I see like mine on campus are the ones that are forced to work behind the scenes, not the ones actively being portrayed as representatives of our university. During my time as an undergraduate at McMaster, I only ever had one minority professor, and I was only ever taught by her for one of my four years. When it comes to minority women on campus, the message I get is quite clear: your role is best served in service, unless you’re willing to try and beat the odds.
I’m happy to have the role models that I do on campus, our service staff work hard for our campus and community. But I hate that I very rarely see these same role models at the heads of classrooms and hosting office hours — the same roles that I would like to see for myself and my sisters. Where’s my big family of Asian, Latin, Black, Brown, Middle Eastern and Indigenous female professors waiting to welcome me into their academic arms? Where’s my professors who look like me and who are happy to look like me and want me to learn from their visual example?
According to a 2010 study by the Canadian Association of University Teachers, only 17 percent of university faculty were minorities, without a report of how many of those were women. This may seem representative given that Canada has, according to the last census, a population consisting of 20 percent minority citizens, but how is this percentage of staff distributed through the university? Does one faculty have more exposure to minority role models than another? Another disappointing statistic comes in the form of unemployment research. The largest group of unemployed professors in Canada is that of female visible minorities, with eight percent unemployment — a sizeable feat compared to the roughly four percent unemployment running across their male and white counterparts.
It isn’t a matter of there simply not being enough racialized women with PhDs and credentials; we know they’re out there, they are just not being hired as much as other groups.
Even when I was hired for my job and then was hiring positions for this paper, I heard one of our former staff members say blatantly sexist and racist micro-aggressions about hiring multiple women of colour (FYI, they asked “are we hiring too many?”).
I hold a position of power among my student body, and I acknowledge that. I am a minority woman who is filling a job that, aside from a single digit number of exceptions in our 85-year history, has consistently been held by white people (and only 12 of those white people being women). With this being said, it is part of my intrinsic nature of holding this position to feel a need to represent my sisters of all colours and try to be the professional role model many of them have yet to encounter on campus.
In general, I see a variety of colours and cultures on campus, but very rarely do I see them outside of our student body and our service staff. At this point, I don’t even care if I see professors and staff who are the same genre of minority as me, I just want to see more than one person representing minority women from the side of faculty.
So McMaster, I get that you’re trying, and I know that we work hard to promote a diverse campus, but I’d like to propose a New Year’s resolution for you: let’s get a female university staff in a range of colours — I want to see women of colour on campus clearing off chalk boards for more than one reason.
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What began on the McMaster campus has developed into an international protocol for evidence-based medicine, an approach piloted by professor of clinical epidemiology and biostatistics Gordon Guyatt. Awarded a position in the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame for his work, Guyatt’s influence has spread throughout the western world.
“Throughout North America and Europe, bodies that accredit medical schools and training programs for physicians after they finish medical school have all adopted evidence-based medicine [into their curriculum],” said Guyatt, who sustains that evidence-based medicine bridges empirical data with clinical treatment.
“Evidence-based medicine has to do with being aware of the best available evidence… and being able to put that best evidence in the context of people’s values, preferences and circumstances relevant to choices that patients have to make,” he explained.
Currently more than 90 organizations worldwide abide by the policies and values of the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation, a system developed by Guyatt in what was a collaborative effort. GRADE became the epicenter of a cultural shift that has taken place over the last 20 years towards a formal clinical process in patient treatment. GRADE encourages physicians to adhere to guidelines that implement ideals that mesh well with evidence-based medicine. It has allowed for a system where evidence is appropriated before it can be applied.
Guyatt attributes the genesis of the evidence-based method to the community at McMaster.
“This could only have happened within a unique cultural environment that exists [at McMaster]. McMaster is known worldwide as the place where evidence-based medicine got started,” said Guyatt.
Guyatt was the director of Residency Program in Internal Medicine at McMaster in 1990. It was here that he first implemented the term evidence-based medicine. Caught up in the environment of the then new medical school at McMaster, and under the mentorship of clinical epidemiologist Dave Saket, he was inspired to explore an unconventional approach to health care.
“When McMaster Medical School started it was a revolutionary idea of a medical school. There were no tests, no examinations. Everything was based on problem-based learning. There was a great innovative spirit where challenging existing norms and values was highly valued,” Guyatt said.
The British Medical Journal ranked evidence-based learning as seventh among the most important changes in medicine in the last 50 years. Other developments on the list included computers, public health and anesthesiology.
Guyatt’s induction into the Canadian Medical Hall of fame is another notch in a long history of recognition.
“For me personally it’s nice, but more importantly than for me personally, it’s a recognition of the importance of the way that evidence-based medicine has impacted the medical practice.”
When asked about the future of evidence-based medicine, Guyatt likened it to the metaphor of turning an ocean liner around.
“It takes time,” Guyatt acknowledged. “It’s been 24 years since the term was coined, and we have been pushing and pushing and pushing. Eventually, if you’re in the right time, place and cultural environment, things will change. The ocean liner is just halfway turned around, now we just need to keep pushing until it turns all the way.”
Photo Credit: Jeff Comber
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On April 25, Keyna Bracken, associate professor in the Department of Family Medicine at McMaster University, was mere hours away from watching the town of Patan shrink into a dot from her airplane window when a 7.8 magnitude earthquake rocked Nepal.
Keyna recalls the airport lounge moments before the ground started to move. “I heard a penetrating silence. You know that there is something wrong because it’s just too still.”
The quiet of the airport waiting room was broken up by what Keyna likens to the sound of a train. Having travelled to Haiti post-earthquake with St. Joseph’s relief group and experiencing a number of aftershocks, Keyna recognized the sound for what it was–the oncoming earthquake.
“The ground began to move, and not a gentle rocking either, but a really nasty movement–it’s more of a high impact wave. You can’t really go anywhere… because you get tossed around.”
Keyna took shelter under a table and waited it out before she was able to run past a now deserted security gate. She had made it onto the runway with the others, but there was no direction amongst the crowd and she was unable to speak Nepalese, forcing her to do nothing but wait.
“You could see the dust in the air from Kapmandu, and knowing what those buildings were like, I figured that most of them had probably collapsed. When you walk along [the Nepalese streets], only for a couple of hours, you realize why–many of the buildings are not concrete and don’t have foundations.”
With the help of an expatriate Canadian who spoke both English and Nepalese, Keyna made it to the guesthouse in which he had been staying. “That night was probably the most terrifying night that I had ever been through. I felt very alone even though there were [many] stranded people [in] this guesthouse that a Nepalese gentleman had opened up for everybody. Several times there were pretty significant aftershocks… You’re on a perpetual adrenaline hit for 36 hours.”
When light finally broke in the sky and airplane engines roared to life, Keyna knew that she had to get on a plane and get out that day. The airport was a different kind of terror; she had to push her way through the frantic crowd all coveting a seat on a plane out of the rumbling country.
“I was just so fortunate. I could have been in one of those temples. It could have been the day before when I was visiting tourist sites. I was the one that had a flight, and [others had] no way of getting a ticket unless you had outside help.”
After three hours, Keyna was able to break through the crowd and make it onto an airplane heading to Bangkok.
“When the plane finally started to lift off you couldn’t actually see any of the collapse because of the dust. Usually Kapmandu is dusty because it gets trapped in the valley, but the dust after was just incredible. You couldn’t see anything.”
Keyna, who is planning her imminent sabbatical year, had been in Kapmandu to scope out possibilities for collaboration with the Patan Academy of Health Sciences. The Academy is a Medical School and Hospital in the old part of Patan. It is partially founded by the Nick Simon Institute, an organization aimed at training all-encompassing physicians for remote areas. Her next destination was Banda Aceh, an area hit by the 2004 tsunami that ravaged the Indonesian landscape.
“I carried on with my plans… I think that was a good thing, because the resiliency of the Indonesian people after such a horrible event highlights what you can hope to aspire. It was interesting going from an area that had a fresh tragedy to an area that had a ten year old tragedy.”
Keyna has now been reunited with her family in Canada, but her time in Nepal remains fresh. She still wakes up at night thinking that the ground is shaking. During the day, she counts her luck in sturdy buildings, in foundation, in roads and in a still ground.
Kacper Niburski
Assistant News Editor
After five years of serving as McMaster’s Provost, Dr. Ilene Busch-Vishniac has decided to leave McMaster and become the ninth president of University of Saskatchewan starting Jul. 1, 2012.
“To leave this office the last time, to leave McMaster, to leave the students; it will be all so hard.”
Her decision may have come as a slight surprise to some. In November Busch-Vishniac decided that she would not complete a second term as Provost at McMaster. She did, however, state that she would spend her leave traversing the halls of JHE, “to help me return to my research and to my teaching.”
Unfortunately for McMaster, this is not the case. Announced early January, Busch-Vishniac confirmed that she would be succeeding the current University of Saskatchewan President, Peter MacKinnon, who has served for 13 years.
She leaves behind a list of notable achievements, including the revitalization of the information systems, reform of the budget model, and fostering student development.
“We’ve been working hard on all fronts. The first of which was to improve information systems, and we are well underway of renewal of them. We have also worked to change the allocation of resources, which is addressed in our new budget model. We have made a lot of progress on that, to the point that we think if there is enough consensus on the model we will be able to start implementation in a year.”
She added that, “We have also generally worked towards the improvement of students’ experience and we are equally responsive to the needs of the student. Most of all, I am proud that we are intentionally responding to the needs of the students.”
But after a successful five-year term with only marginal hiccups, Busch-Vishniac did not wish to add to her list of accolades.
“We have accomplished a lot in the five year term,” she said, “and it might be time for someone with a new perspective to come in to work closely with the President Deane on the objectives he set out in Forward with Integrity.”
She further added that, “I am also in a position now which I wasn’t in earlier November to say it felt like the right time to move up. I didn’t want to put the University into a position where I signed on to a second term I had no intention of serving.”
And move up she did. “As of November, I had yet been offered the position of presidency at the University of Saskatchewan. It looked like I would finish my term at McMaster and join the faculty of Engineering, spending my leave here. I did have other opportunities pending, but I was not in a position to say anything about them at that time.”
Come late November, Busch-Vishniac had yet to even visit Saskatchewan. However at an invitation of the University of Saskatchewan’s search committee, after which she spent touring the University and the city of Saskatoon, discussions materialized and the possibility became much more concrete.
Now without a shred of doubt, Busch-Vishniac has committed to serving the Saskatchewan community. The decision, while being anything but simple, will be eased by the University of Saskatchewan’s strong leadership as well as their widespread community engagement.
In life, things change. People come and go. Institutions rise and fall. Even a paragon moves on. No matter the work they have tirelessly invested in. No matter who they leave behind. No matter the accomplishments that pad their shelves. All doors close one day.
But it is only a matter of time before they are reopened. This case is no different. In response to Busch-Vishniac’s decision to not continue a second term and the subsequent expeditious transfer, a search committee has been appointed by the Senate in late October to begin the process of suggesting a new Provost for McMaster.
At this time, however, Busch-Vishniac’s replacement has not been announced by the University.
