Graduate Student Awards
We would like to recognize all the amazing graduate students who participated in the 2021 OTESSA conference at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences. Graduate students are the key to a healthy and innovative future in both research and practice. This year, we awarded three $500 graduate awards. They were selected based on reviewer scores and also whether one had marked the conference submission as recommended for an award. In this post, we will introduce our first three graduate students to hold the 2021 OTESSA Graduate Awards and we look forward to more students joining OTESSA for the 2022 conference and continuing the practice. Stay tuned for our OTESSA 2022 Call for Presentations with a deadline of December 15!
OTESSA 2021 Graduate Awardees
Ryan Banow – @rbanow on Twitter
Ryan Banow is a PhD student and sessional lecturer in the Department of Curriculum Studies within the College of Education at the University of Saskatchewan (USask). He’s also an educational developer at the Gwenna Moss Centre for Teaching and Learning at USask. Before joining USask, he taught secondary math and science. Ryan is passionate about teaching and learning and has a variety of research interests around that passion. He collaborates on projects related to learning technologies, virtual reality in education, STEM education, course-based undergraduate research, supporting faculty in the scholarship of teaching and learning, and student metacognition.
Presentation: Using “Metacognitive Moments” to Improve Learning in Asynchronous Courses
Heather McTavish – @mctavish_h on Twitter
Heather McTavish (she/her/hers) is an incoming doctoral student at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education in the Curriculum and Pedagogy program. She is a recent graduate of Ontario Tech University, where she received an MA in Education. Her research focuses on the online learning roles of college and university librarians in Canada. She also holds a Master of Information Studies degree from the University of Toronto and has held many positions across academic, government and school libraries. She is interested in information literacy instruction, online learning in libraries, and academic librarians’ teaching roles.
Presentation: Canadian Academic Librarians Teaching Online
Kim Ashbourne – @KimAshbourne on Twitter
Kim Ashbourne is a graduate student in Educational Technology in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Victoria, and a graduate affiliate of the Technology Integration and Evaluation (TIE) Research Lab in the Faculty of Education. Her research investigates the intersections of digital accessibility and digital knowledge sharing in a post secondary context. Kim’s research, and her work as a Learning Experience Designer focused on accessibility at UVic, is informed by her own personal experience of disability, and by the paid and unpaid, centred and marginalized work of Disability Rights and Disability Justice activists and scholars.
Presentation: Reframing Web Accessibility in Higher Education: Examining the Role of the Educator in the Curation and Creation of Accessible Course Content
