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Message from the Vice-Provost and Dean, YSGPS

This year at YSGPS, we continued to focus on our priority of enhancing the overall experience for our graduate and postdoctoral community at TMU. We did this by fostering more equitable opportunities and accommodations in admissions, funding and housing. We also concentrated on improving quality assurance processes through more centralized management of protocols and data collection. To support our graduate programs undergoing a Periodic Program Review, we introduced clearer manuals and templates, as well as direction on making implementation plans more meaningful.

In March, we showcased our graduate students’ incredible research at our annual TMU 3MT® Competition in a wonderful new venue, the 8th floor of the Student Learning Centre. For our postdocs, we successfully advocated for an overdue increase in the minimum salary. To help grad students and postdocs find balance and flourish, we hosted wellness series such as Graduate Thriving in Action, GRAD Breather and GRAD Art Break. Finally, we hosted graduate supervision workshops for new faculty and networking events for GPDs in order to build community among faculty leaders.

Internally at YSGPS, we welcomed Sarah Edmonds into the new role of Associate Director, Graduate Administration, Shreyas Sridhar as our new Graduate Business Systems Analyst and Stefanie Folgado as a Department Assistant to support our work on quality assurance. Working together with the rest of our team, these positions will help us better serve our graduate and postdoctoral community.

Working closely with University Relations, we refreshed our website to improve the online user experience, and we are continuing to enhance our graduate program pages to better serve prospective students. Looking ahead, I am excited about our first YSGPS graduate recruitment fair this November. We are also exploring opportunities to integrate Zone Learning and co-op education into graduate programs, and transnational education through articulation agreements and local and international partnerships. Above all, I look forward to continuing our commitment to uplifting our graduate and postdoctoral community and helping advance its collective success.