Research in Focus SFU Faculty of Education

In this episode, Dr. Kris Magnusson, Professor and former Dean of the Faculty of Education at Simon Fraser University, reflects on the connections between career development and mental health. Dr. Magnusson's research interest lies in career development, and in particular, understanding models of career development and the application of research to career counselling practice. As a recipient of a SSHRC Partnership Development grant, Dr. Magnusson and his team are working towards understanding the relationship between the outcomes of effective career development practices and the determinants of adolescent mental health.

In this episode, Dr. Sean Chorney, an assistant professor in the Faculty of Education at Simon Fraser University, proposes that mathematising aspects of our social world can help us to not only identify hidden problems, but to also formulate alternative conceptions of their causes and possible solutions. Dr. Chorney discusses the concept of gerrymandering, as a demonstration of how mathematics can raise awareness and imagination.

In this episode, Dr. Joel Heng Hartse and Dr. Ismaeil Fazel speak about two projects related to academic literacy, remote learning experiences and learning to identify and understand predatory academic publishers. Remote learning has become the norm during this particular time in our history and both researchers are seeking to understand and learn more about how stakeholders are taking on the new realities of higher education. Also aligning with their research interest in academic literacy, Dr. Heng Hartse and Dr. Fazel advocate for educating students and scholars about predatory academic publishers.

In this episode with Dr. Carolyn Mamchur, professor in the Faculty of Education at Simon Fraser University, discusses the process of writing. To write well at the university level, Dr. Mamchur advises knowing what the question you’re responding to is really asking, finding yourself and your particular interest in that question, doing your research and finding the connections amongst the ideas. She shares that writing is telling a story that creates a meaningful relationship with the readers or other researchers.

This past spring, Dr. Heesoon Bai delivered a research seminar at UBC on Soil, Soul, Society: Regeneration from the Vital-Core. Many of the ideas covered in that seminar came out of the collective experience of a group of educators formed by Dr. Bai that met continuously over 12 years. In this episode, we interview Dr. Bai to discuss some of the concepts that were covered in her seminar, including a proposal that all teachers should take what is akin to a Hippocratic Oath and the importance of cultivating a contemplative practice. Dr. Bai shares why self-reflection, self-awareness, self-knowledge and self-cultivation is an important part of being a teacher.

In this episode, Dr. Huamei Han shares her research in 1) language, religion and immigrant settlement; 2) youth and multilingual study and 3) multilingualism in Africa-China trade migration. Dr. Han also provides an exciting overview of an issue of Language Ideology, Christianity, and Identity: Critical Empirical Examinations of Christian Institutions as Alternative Spaces which features five articles by scholars from around the world.