ÌìÃÀmvÌìÃÀ

Greetings from all of us at ÌìÃÀmvÌìÃÀ Geography. Through the continued craziness of the past year, we remain fortunate to work on the unceded territory of the xÊ·məθkÊ·É™yÌ“É™m (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), Sel̓ílÌ“witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) & kwikwəƛ̓əm (Kwikwetlem) nations and are grateful for it.

Switching between remote, in person and hybrid instruction and learning as the pandemic waves cycled through the education system has tested the metal of many of us this academic year, yet the hard work and commitment of all resulted in higher undergraduate enrolments than ever before (>5000) and 14 graduate theses were defended. It is the care and resiliency of staff, faculty and students that have allowed us to thrive, though we very much hope Fall 2022 will be back to normal and stay that way. We wish all our pandemic graduands the very best for your future successes.

The Department is also ever changing. We bid farewell to  who retired in January 2022, and we welcomed , Human Geography lecturer in July 2021 and , Geographies of Racialization Tier 2 CRC in April 2022. Geography’s long-standing technical staff shifted from Geography to the Dean’s office in a move toward a centralized service model for the Faculty of Environment. Geography Alumnus  now serves ÌìÃÀmvÌìÃÀ as Director, Indigenous Initiatives and Reconciliation. Renovations to our physical geography teaching labs are still ongoing (we hope these will be back in use in Fall), while those to some of our research labs are now under way, making for a temporary tight squeeze in our remaining space. The Dean’s office has also furnished us with new faster computers that will enhance GIScience instruction come the Fall.

Several of our students and faculty have been recognized for their achievements this past year. Some examples: Leanne Roderick received a  and Geoff Mann was awarded a . Tsatia Adzich, Adrienne Arbor and Joy Russell all received tri-council awards. Kendra Munn received the  and . Rachel Singleton-Polster received the Andre Gerolymatos Graduate Award, the Andrew Petter Graduate Scholarship in Public Policy, and the Mackenzie King Scholarship. Alexander Smith received the Canadian Pacific/Teck Resources Award and the Wayne Goeson Memorial Award. Morgan Wright received the Simons Foundation Award for Environment. Gabrielle Wong received the 2021 Warren Gill award.

Productivity and engagement also fared well. Here are some examples: Paul Kingsbury published a co-edited book, , Kirsten Zickfeld co-authored a chapter of the Working Group I Contribution to the Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (), and Jesse Hahm co-authored a  on woody plant use of water stored in bedrock. Media interviews and commentaries ranged from  (Geoff Mann) to the  (Paul Kingsbury) to  (Andy Longhurst) to  (Jeremy Venditti). Undergraduate students in several courses gave back to community by presenting their innovative city building ideas at CityStudio Vancouver’s  &  events, volunteering to tackle climate change communication on , and collaboratively publishing an article on  with students in a similar course at UBC.

I hope you remain safe and well, and that the coming year continues to bring lots of good news for us all. I invite you to follow us on  and/or , and I look forward to seeing some of you at our events over the coming year.



Tracy Brennand

Professor and Chair, Department of Geography