Post Cards from Congress – Day 1

Congress Day 1 was a Governor General Day. See our blog on this announcing His Excellency’s appearance at Congress. As mentioned in the Governor General’s media advisory, ResearchImpact-RéseauImpactRecherche (RIR) has been working with SSHRC and United Way Centraide Canada to develop the Community-Campus Collaboration’s Initiative.  In his Keynote Address to Congress titled “A True Democracy of Knowledge”, his Excellency said the CCC Initiative “is quite simply a superb initiative. It will help us ensure that social innovation is a key component of Canada’s innovation landscape. This initiative also provides us with a catalytic vehicle to apply knowledge and develop experiential learning.” He quoted from Boyer’s book, Scholarship Reconsidered which presents some directions towards a true democracy of knowledge. Two decades ago Boyer wrote about the scholarship of discovery, the scholarship of integration, the scholarship of application and the scholarship of teaching.
These different scholarships map well onto the Community-Campus Collaborations Initiative. Community based research is an important part of engaged discovery. Community service learning and experiential education are important parts of engaged teaching. Knowledge mobilization underpins engaged discovery and all three are critical for the scholarship of integration.
His Excellency also attended a panel offered by the Canada Foundation for Innovation that featured Yves Maufette, Vice-recteur à la recherche et à la creation, RIR-UQAM. The panel examined changing models of service to communities in Canada’s universities. Very engaged. Very knowledge mobilization.
Day 1 of Congress was a very engaged and engaging day.