An assembly of faculty, support staff, students, and administrators, Humber College Council (HCC) is Humber’s collective employee voice, making suggestions to Humber College’s President as it relates to long and short‐term priorities outlined in the institution’s Strategic Plan. To ensure the Humber community is informed of upcoming events, new initiatives, and important issues, HCC reports the highlights of its monthly meetings through this medium.

HCC held its sixth meeting of the 2021-2022 academic year on Thursday, April 14, 2022.

SYSTEMS LEADERSHIP GRADUATE CERTIFICATE

John Stilla - Senior Dean, Faculty of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Chris Irwin - Acting Associate Dean, Faculty of Liberal Arts and Sciences, and Regina Hartwick - Associate Dean, Indigenous Education and Engagement presented Humber’s new Leadership Graduate Certificate: Two-Eyed Systems Leadership for Sustainability.

Developed by Humber’s Faculty of Liberal Arts and Sciences and Indigenous Education and Engagement in partnership with VIA University College in Denmark and Otago Polytechnic in New Zealand, the program allows students to develop a set of skills to inspire, enable and support processes of systems change across sectors – skills that are increasingly recognized around the world as essential to achieving sustainable development.

Launching in Fall 2023, the program centres theory, guiding principles, and practice-based application of Etuaptmumk, or Two-Eyed Seeing in Mi’kmaq language, to encourage learners to intentionally and respectfully build new collaborative visions for the future, theories, practice-based applications and systems of relationality. It provides core theoretical and practice-based foundations that equip graduates with knowledges, experiences, and competencies necessary to lead systems-level change. Students who complete the program will have several options to work in the field of sustainability including working as consultants and advisors, researchers and analysts in resource management, sustainability, business and conservation fields within both the private and public sector.

The curriculum will be co-taught by Indigenous and non-Indigenous faculty who bring together the strengths, diversity, intersectionality, relationality, co-learning opportunities, and community-based interconnections inherent in Two-Eyed Seeing. Features include Land-Based Learning, Flexible Learning, Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) and Work Integrated Learning.  

The program’s learning outcomes set out to ensure graduates are able to:

1. Analyze complex real-world challenges in the context of disparate paradigms, conceptual frameworks and practice-based interventions to inform and support global frameworks for sustainability.
2. Employ reflective practice to elevate personal development and inclusive practices as a systems change leader.
3. Braid Two-Eyed Seeing conceptual and practice-based frameworks into project design, implementation and stakeholder communications to strengthen land-and-community-based relations
4. Design collaborative interventions that address social, cultural, political, ecological and economic challenges and opportunities for equitable sustainable systems change.
5. Advocate for land-based relationality and stewardship to promote global frameworks, ethical practices, and best practices for sustainability.
6. Develop and implement leadership skills to address systemic challenges and advance global frameworks for sustainability in collaboration with various levels of government, industry and diverse communities.

IDEA LAB UPDATE

Cynthia Mckeich - Director, Libraries, Alexandra Ross - Associate Director, Libraries, Ewan Gibson - Digital Fluency Librarian (Idea Lab), Christopher Rugo - eLearning Specialist, and Cheryl Mitchell - Director, Centre for Entrepreneurship, Faculty of Business presented on Humber’s Idea Lab that seeks to build Humber’s digital fluency. It provides studio spaces to enable students and staff in digital media projects (demo, interview, pitches, podcasts/audio recordings, videos, 3D printing, presentations, photography, etc.) and is designed based on three key philosophies: open to all, ease of access, and needs driven (responsive to students/employee needs). It offers workshops and online resources that support the Humber community to assist them in using the spaces and Humber’s Learning Management System (Blackboard Ultra). Currently situated at the North Campus Library, it will launch in Fall 2022 at Lakeshore’s Centre for Entrepreneurship (CfE). 

Based on feedback received from the Humber Community since its launch, the Idea Lab team conducted a consultation with HCC as to its name “Idea Lab” and whether to change it – and if so, to what. HCC is just one of many stakeholders being consulted.  

ROLE OF HUMBER’S BOARD OF GOVERNORS

Audrey Wubbenhorst - Faculty, Faculty of Media and Creative Arts presented on the role of a college’s Board of Governors (the Board) to address requests from the community about the Board’s role.

The role of the Board starts with the definition of a college. A college is a non-profit corporation, charity, and crown agent, established under the Ontario College of Applied Arts and Technology Act 2002, that is subject to regulatory oversight of the Ministry of Colleges and Universities (MCU) and its regulations.

The OCAAT Act and its Regulations sets out the college’s governance, such as board composition, size and terms, meeting quorum, requirements for chair and vice chair elections and for keeping accurate records and minutes of proceedings. It also requires that a college’s by-laws to be open for public inspection.

In terms of the composition, the Board composition requires an even number between 12 and 20 in accordance with the legislation (~1/3). The Board includes the President (as a voting member), one student, one academic member, one administrative staff member, and one support staff member (to be elected by students or relevant staff group) often referred to as “internal” or “elected” governors.

Quorum must be equal to the majority of the number of required Board members plus one (e.g., if 17 governors, a common quorum number would be 10). The Board must elect a chair and vice-chair annually or every two years, keep accurate records and minutes of its proceedings, and ensure that all meetings are open to the public (with stated exceptions), the public is given notice of such meetings (with some restrictions), and minutes are open to the public (e.g., matters of personal nature is to be closed to the public).

The Board’s role is largely to set the strategy and objectives for the organization, hire the President and CEO, and as much as possible, mitigate risk and plan for contingencies. A Governor’s duty, regardless of whether they are internal or external, is to the best interest of the college and not to any particular group.

SUSTAINABILITY UPDATE AND CLIMATE ACTION PLAN

Lindsay Walker - Associate Director, Office of Sustainability and Lisa Salem-Wiseman - Associate Dean and Special Advisor, Humber Institutional Learning Outcomes presented Humber’s sustainability update, including the Climate Action Plan and Humber’s Learning Outcomes.

Humber developed a Climate Action Plan in 2021/2022 - Humber’s road map to a net-zero future. It is a companion to Humber’s Integrated Energy Master Plan and outlines work done to date and where Humber plans to be by 2050. A key initiative underway is the district energy revitalization project that will revitalize Humber’s entire heating and cooling system.

The plan looks at the source of Humber’s emissions: Food (19%), Buildings (20%), and Commuting (53%). Initiatives to address these areas include providing more local food, meat free days, and improved vegetarian food offerings on campus; building retrofits, district energy, and net zero new buildings; hybrid and remote work, carpool and matching program, LRT, and electric vehicle charging stations.

The HLOs incorporates sustainability. Developed with extensive cross-college community consultation, the HLOs Framework includes key competencies that students and employers are looking for upon graduation: Key Mindsets (EDI, Sustainability, Systems Thinking), Meta-Skill (Critical Thinking), Skills in Action (Collaboration, Communication, Digital Fluency, Innovation, Leadership, Professionalism and Strategic Problem-Solving).

As the HLO framework continues to roll out, it will live in every aspect of the student experience, including the academic programming, experiential and work integrated learning, and non-academic/co-curricular programming. Currently, they already live in a variety of places across the college with plans to expand coming soon.

To measure the outcomes, the HLOS will be embedded into COSSID and a skills tacking software will be created. An HLO student self-reflection tool will guide students in articulating their skills development. SOTL research is currently underway as the team reviews the HLO pilots, and a mindset literacy assessment is in development.

In addition to the above, over the last year, the Office of Sustainability has led the installation of EV Charging stations, achieved the Bee City Campus designation, and will be rolling out or ramping up its office waste bin reduction program, OZZI program, carpoool matching app, sustainable building standards and GHG emissions inventory this year.

Specifically, the OZZI system and O2GO® Reusable Food Containers project aims to provide a cost-effective alternative to single-use, throwaway containers and avert waste from landfills and oceans. When program users order a meal, they pay a onetime $5 deposit for an O2Go Reusable Container and once emptied, they return it to a collection bin.  Upon returning the container, they receive a O2GO card which is traded in for another container when ordering their next meal.

In addition to completing Canada’s Greenest Employers 2022 application, plasn are underway for the next submission for a STARS designation. The Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System™ (STARS) is a transparent, self-reporting framework that enables colleges and universities to measure their sustainability performance. Designed to foster meaningful comparisons across time and higher education institutions using common measurements, STARS enables incentives for continual improvement, sustainability practices and performance sharing, and a stronger, more diverse campus sustainability community.

NEXT HCC MEETING

The next Humber College Council meeting will be on Thursday, May 12, 2022 through Microsoft Teams.

For questions or comments about HCC meeting highlights, contact regan.mancini@humber.ca. For supporting materials or opportunities to provide feedback, please visit the College Council website or contact shovani.samalia@humber.ca.