News

As part of a newly formed UofG Engaged Learning Collective, CESI took part last week in the first in a series of Campus Community Partnership Conversations planned for the coming year. The event, which was hosted at 10C Shared Space, invited community groups, social innovators, small businesses, arts organizations, advocacy groups, social purpose initiatives, and those in science and technology to meet and chat with university staff from across campus who help to facilitate community-university partnerships.

The Research Shop is turning 10 years old! Founded in 2009 as part of the Community Engaged Scholarship Institute (CESI), the Research Shop works to meet the research priorities of local and regional community organizations. Over the past 10 years, the program has trained and employed 166 graduates students to work on various research activities and outputs that meet community needs first.

Learning with Impact, a photo exhibit sharing the experiences of students involved in community engaged learning, was showcased at 10C downtown Guelph over the month of February. This exhibit was put on by CESI to offer insight into the experiences of students and community organizations who worked together as part of various research projects.

The Guelph Lab is inviting proposals from experienced communications vendors who can create content and populate a website for the Lab. This work involves two primary tasks: creating new content about the Lab and its projects; and selecting and populating a simple, off-the-shelf website.

Vendors interested in this project should submit:

CESI is hiring! We are looking for fill​ student positions for the Summer and Fall 2019 semesters. Students will work within our Research Shop program on roles related to research and communications.

We are specifically recruiting for the following positions:

Guelph Lab Facilitator Sam Laban wrote a piece in the newest issue of Municipal World (March 2019). In ​Trusting Residents: How building trust and sharing power can generate value for a community​, Sam discusses what happens when municipalities entrust groups of residents with the management of public spaces or infrastructure. These experiments, he suggests, often dramatically improve or regenerate public spaces.

CESI and the John F. Wood Centre are inviting expressions of interest from community organizations looking to launch (or grow) an early-stage social enterprise in Guelph-Wellington to participate in the upcoming cycle of the Sandbox program. The Sandbox pairs interdisciplinary teams of students with community organizations in order to grow their enterprise, supported by seed funding, training and mentorship.

Are you interested in learning more about knowledge mobilization? The Institute, in collaboration with our colleagues at OpenEd, just made available a short video explaining what we mean when we talk about mobilizing knowledge and creating research impact.

Take a look at the knowledge mobilization video here!

What happens to all the ugly fruits and vegetables? The sad reality of the Canadian food industry is that we waste $31 billion in food annually, often times because products don’t live up to the cosmetic standards of grocery stores. This food waste has negative economic, ethical, and environmental outcomes and is a major source of greenhouse gas emissions in Canada. So, what can you do with malformed but still fresh food? There are many things you can make with ugly produce – tomato sauce, canned fruit, soup and dip mixes – the possibilities are endless!

Impact is at the core of the partnership between the Guelph Black Heritage Society (GBHS) and the Community Engaged Scholarship Institute (CESI). What started out as a targeted collaboration for an on-campus project spread like wildfire, initiating a web of activities and relationships that are sparking social change.