Grants & Funding

$1,076,813
2020-2025

Margaret Macintyre Latta (PI), University of British Columbia
Co-Investigators: Karen Ragoonaden, University of British Columbia; Sabre Cherkowski, University of British Columbia; Dwayne Donald, University of Alberta; Jan Hare, University of British Columbia; Nicholas Ng-A-Fook, University of Ottawa; Sandra Styres, University of Toronto; Terry Beaudry, Central Okanagan Public Schools

Working together to negotiate the practices of co-curricular-making will foster creative and critical learning that is locally derived, and will enable self-understandings within the larger world. Locally, we will work alongside community organizations to share Syilx ways to care for tmx^wulax^w (our land) and to develop ways to learn and live better together that are guided by captikwł (stories). Nationally, we will create experiential curricular pathways, ways to reorient education toward reconciliation and to mobilize efforts accordingly. By the end of this five-year project, participating local educators and their students will have gained deeper understandings of Syilx culture with pedagogies responsive to the connections among land, culture, and understandings of self in the world. With our partners, we will have developed teacher education programs and professional development initiatives that can reconceptualize education towards individual and collective agency, growth, and well-being, attending to the strengths and particularities of their students and the resources of place. Through the articulation of such decolonizing co-curricular-making, education ministries, districts, and institutions will engage and mobilize reconciliation-in-action across Canada. Learn more.

PI: Virginie Magnat (UBC)
Co-directors: Bill Cohen (UBC), Manulani Meyer (University of Hawai’i of West O’ahu)
Co-applicants: Shawn Wilson (UBC), Tania Willard (UBC)
Collaborators: Emma Bigé  (Centre national de danse contemporaine), Evan Adams (Simon Fraser University), Karen Ragoonaden (UBC), Tina Fraser (University of Northern British Columbia), Tracey Bonneau (En’owkin Centre), Vicki Kelly (Simon Fraser University)
Partners: CIRDOC – Insitut occitan de cultura, En’owkin Centre, Pu’uhonua Society, The University of British Columbia, University of Hawai’i – West O’ahu

Description from virginiemagnat.space/about

“This project, funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), fosters language revitalization and cultural resurgence in the Okanagan (Turtle Island), Hawaii (Oceania), and Occitania (Southern Europe) by honouring and integrating the expertise of Elders and Traditional Knowledge Keepers, as well as native and fluent speakers of Nsyilxcǝn, ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi, and Occitan, three critically endangered languages, while forging transnational alliances between communities with diverse lived experiences and worldviews.”

2024-2029
$243,128

Dr. Sabre Cherkowski (PI) (UBC) and collaborator, Dr. Julia Mahfouz, University of Colorado at Denver

This study is one part of a new North American research program examining wellbeing in new waysthat wellbeing in schools is experienced through the relationships and organizational structures that support the central work of the school—student learning and development. The purpose of this study is to examine wellbeing as an outcome of the learning culture of schools that is built from an appreciative, community-responsive perspective. It provides a new model of research and practice for wellbeing in schools that is sustainable and accessible because it attends to the strengths, needs, and potentials that exist within all school communities.

2022-2027
$98,000

Dr. Catherine Broom (PI)

Canadian national identity and citizenship has been subject to contention and confusion since Canada was first stitched together as a collection of European colonies on lands that were, and continue to be, home to rich Indigenous cultures across diverse terrains.  This research will invite Canadians from diverse backgrounds across the nation to participate in a research study exploring how they understand Canadian citizenship and identity, their views, experiences and hopes for Citizenship Education and their beliefs about what kind of society they would like Canada to aim towards.  The findings, analysed by the PI and two research assistants, will serve as a starting point for theorizing a conception of the meaning of citizenship and identity in Canada that addresses issues with previous historical narratives and Citizenship Education programs.  This new conception aims towards promoting an inclusive and flourishing democracy founded in acknowledging complexity and healing past historical wrongs and rooted in hope and belonging for all Canadians.

$5,000

Dr. Lynn Bosetti

This study contributes to our understanding of the impact of corporate managerial practices and neoliberal ideology on the mindset and practices of faculty deans in universities in Canada.  This research will document narrative accounts of their everyday experiences, struggles and vulnerabilities in attempting to lead in sometimes toxic cultures of incivility and precarity. It will investigate how these tensions influence how leaders execute their role mandates and affects their mind-set, academic identity, mental and emotional wellbeing. It draws upon research on the emotional labor of leadership, ethics of disrupting culture, and critical hope.

Dr. John-Tyler Binfet

Despite canine-assisted interventions (CAIs) being a popular means of helping university students optimize their mental health and well-being, researchers and program personnel do not yet know what motivates students to attend sessions that provide opportunities for them to interact with trained therapy dogs and their handlers and whether attending multiple sessions results in incremental benefits to well-being. Touted as low-cost and accessible, on-campus CAIs are not stigmatized as a formal mental health resource and thus can be especially appealing to university students who are known to be reluctant help-seekers. Well-being benefits arising from interacting with therapy dogs include reductions in stress, homesickness, and loneliness and a corresponding boost in happiness, life satisfaction, and campus integration. Human-animal interaction (HAI) researchers have asked and responded to the question “Does interacting with therapy dogs yield positive benefits for university student well-being?” The field must now move forward to ask: 1) “Why do students attend or not attend (other than phobias and allergies) on-campus CAIs?”; and 2) “Does attending multiple sessions yield increased well-being?” With increased budgetary constraints in post-secondary contexts, institutions that have or are considering CAI programming need to make evidence-based decisions on the design, promotion, and support for their on-campus student well-being programs.

To respond to these questions, two studies are proposed: Study #1) Focus groups with non-users, low-, medium-, and high-users of an on-campus CAI will be conducted to identify the motivations and barriers influencing student attendance at on-campus CAIs; and Study #2) A randomized controlled trial will be conducted to determine if attendance at multiple
sessions is differentially effective in optimizing student well-being (i.e., does greater attendance produce greater well-being
benefits for students?).

Dr. Stephen Berg

The purpose of this pilot study is to explore how accurately children between the ages of 5 and 8 perceive their own aquatic skill competence compared to their actual performance in the water. By examining the relationship between perceived and actual water competence, the project aims to contribute to improved water safety practices and drowning prevention strategies for young children. Because little Canadian research has investigated children’s water competence perceptions, the study will help fill an important gap in early childhood safety and physical activity research.

Participants (children) will be asked to complete a 17-item test where they will look at different water skills and choose which level of skill they believe they are closest to. This test is called the Pictorial Scale of Perceived Water Competence (PSPWC) and it should take approximately 30-45 minutes to complete. After completing the PSPWC, they will participate in the Actual Aquatic Skills Test (AAST), which looks at the same 17 items but they will do these skills in the water. This part should take about 30-45 minutes to complete

Dr. John-Tyler Binfet and collaborators, Central Okanagan Public Schools

Despite the important role friends play in providing companionship, offering emotional support and challenging and expanding one’s thinking and horizons, making friends in adolescence can be a daunting task. This is especially the case for students who are neurodiverse who can face formidable challenges around establishing and maintaining social connections. One innovative source of support to build social connections is through interactions with therapy dogs as they are known to be “social catalysts” and can unite individuals and serve as a focal point for discussion and interaction. This project has two aims: 1) To create and implement a program to provide neurotypical and neurodiverse middle school students opportunities to build their social skills, leadership, and social connections through interactions with trained therapy dogs and their handlers; and 2) To explore the perceptions of students who participate in this program around whether the program was meaningful and impactful. The field of human-animal interactions and in particular, canine-assisted interventions (CAIs), is burgeoning (Binfet & Tardif-Williams, 2025; Erbacher & Bordlein, 2025). Whereas therapy dogs were historically found almost uniquely in care facilities to provide support to health-impaired patients, they are now found in a variety of contexts supporting the well-being of a variety of clients (e.g., in airports to reduce stress in travelers, on college campuses to reduce student stress, in schools to foster students’ social and emotional skills, in classrooms to assist young readers, and in funeral homes to support mourners). Building from an on-campus program (currently in delivery) that sees therapy dogs from the University of British Columbia Okanagan’s long-running therapy dog “B.A.R.K.” program support university students with autism, the Central Okanagan Public Schools approached the applicant to ask if a similar program could be introduced to support middle school students’ social skill and leadership development. Collaborating with teachers and the District Principal of Learning, a 5-week program will be co-created and implemented at a local middle school with the perceptions of student participants explored post-program through semi-structured case study interviews (administered either orally or via text chat to reduce stimuli demand for neurodiverse students). Transcribed interviews will be content analyzed both within and across neurotypical and neurodiverse students with salient themes identified. The applicant has a record of prior SSHRC PEG funding in the community with demonstrated sustainability including: 1) a PEG awarded in 2017 to introduce therapy dogs for constable stress reduction at the local RCMP detachment that continues to run today and is funded by the RCMP; and 2) a PEG awarded in 2021 to the Central Okanagan Public Schools district to develop a social and emotional learning program for teacher professional development that is well subscribed and continues to run today. The proposed study extends a long-running and productive partnership between the applicant and the Central Okanagan Public Schools and holds potential to serve as a model for varied educational contexts seeking creative ways to support neurodiverse students. With a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology and Special Education and Counselling, and as a former classroom teacher, school counsellor and administrator and as the Director of UBC’s B.A.R.K. program, the applicant is experienced in conducting applied research of the nature proposed in this application.

$15,000

Dr. Bill Cohen

The YEEHAH pilot project seeks to develop, design, and evaluate a Syilx Okanagan led equine-assisted therapy framework for youth informed by community, Syilx storyways, Syilx horsemanship and connection to  tmixw- – all things alive. The pilot will inform the development of new Indigenous tools, methodologies, protocols, theoretical models or frameworks for other Indigenous Equine Facilitated Wellness programs.

This project ultimately seeks to develop a novel Syilx intervention to improve the wellbeing and life-outcomes of youth; a population experiencing exponentially high rates of mental health challenges, trauma, marginalization and associated poor health outcomes (Government of Canada 2021). Secondly, it responds to the relative absence of research on Equine Assisted Interventions based on Indigenous concepts of therapeutic human-horse relationships and activities; developed and studied in communities in which horses are traditionally central to cultural identity, such as the Syilx Okanagan; and activates local connections with land and environment as an element of wellbeing. Lastly, it contributes to the academic knowledge based around decolonizing approaches to developing and documenting community driven Indigenous wellness interventions and acknowledges that human health is deeply connected to the tmixʷ including all that is living: water, land, plant, animal, human and non-human. tmixʷ is a concept of life-force involving “many strands which are continuously being bound with each other to form one strong thread coiling year after year always creating a living future.” (Armstrong, 2009, p. 3).

Ongoing
$249,999

PI’s: Kathleen Martin Ginis and Mary Jung
CO-PI: Stephen Berg, Susan Holtzman, Charlotte Jones, Donna Kurtz, Jonathan Little, Lesley Lutes, Nelly Oelke, Ross Hickey, Kathy Rush

This interdisciplinary team from the Faculty of Health and Social Development, Irving K. Barber School of Arts and Sciences, Faculty of Education and Faculty of Medicine will design, implement and evaluate interventions that address three community-identified health priorities: mental health and aging, obesity and diabetes, and aboriginal and rural health.  Using systematic, evidence-based, and community-engaged processes, the research ream will help guide current and future UBC Okanagan researchers in undertaking meaningful community health research and knowledge translation activities.