Innovative Projects Realized

Seals and Sealing Network

The Seals and Sealing Network is a non-profit organization which brings together Canada’s sealing industry harvesters, processors, manufacturers, retailers, and Indigenous Peoples of Canada to promote and market high quality and sustainable Canadian seal products.
This work is conducted with the leadership from the Seals and Sealing Network (SSN) administered by the Fur Institute of Canada (FIC) through the Institute’s Sealing Committee. The Sealing Committee is made up of 17 individuals working in different spheres of the industry. The Sealing Committee is continuing to solicit participants to support the work of different Sub-Committees (Seal Oil, Seal Fur, Seal Meat, Branding, Animal Welfare and Indigenous sub-committees).
I will work as a marketing and communication intern in the organization to expand its business and online presence to the Chinese market.

OceansAdvance Business Co-op Student

The Newfoundland and Labrador Ocean Technology sector is comprised of companies, institutions, and organizations dedicated to ocean and marine-related technology, education, training, research and development, promotion, delivery and application. The technology is used to deliver solutions and generate efficiencies through safe and sustainable exploration, development, monitoring and use of ocean resources. Today, women comprise only 2 percent of this global sector. To enable and accelerate Canadian innovation, research and technology development, market and export leadership in the marine and ocean tech sector, it is critical to attract, develop and retain a robust, diverse and inclusive talent pipeline that includes women from every walk of life. The proposed Canadian Women in Ocean Industries Leadership initiative and emerging long-term action plan, will directly address this goal, increasing Canada’s leadership, competitiveness and contribution to ocean industries. It will foster an ocean talent pipeline with women from every walk of life, including equity seeking groups: 2SLGBTQ+ community; Indigenous communities; persons with disabilities; and racialized people, increasing the competitiveness of this industry. This project will help develop a strategy and carry out related actions to achieve this goal.

LIAM First – Accounting Assistant

We lost all of our paper documentation in the floods and are now setting up an electronic system to prevent future loss and to enable staff to work remotely and efficiently with new processes. We will need someone to look at how our processes were /are setup and find new ways for us to work given the new situation we are in with COVID-19. In particular, the way we are receiving invoices, approving and paying them. We need someone who can also audit and analyze our processes to make recommendations on where things can be improved or changed.

Streamline processes, Implement and audit new systems, Help convert the office into a paperless model, Aid with project accounting and looking at budget vs costs.
Challenges:
Finding skilled employees looking for work in Fort McMurray: This will allow us to spread our workforce out to Calgary where there is a bigger employment pool to choose from.
Inefficiency with processes: There will be clearly defined processes that are communicated to all employees to follow. With these processes, efficiencies will be created and communication will become better within the organization.

Alta Genetics Inc. (URUS) – Cybersecurity Framework Specialist

They key activities that woudl be performed in this role woudl include:
1 – Reviewing existing security frameworks and analyze applicability to our environment
2 – Project Lead on the implementation of a framework within URUS. This would involve working with both IT and business management to identify assets, existing protection strategies, and gaps in security and policy
3 – Development of internal documentation around systems and cyber security, including staff awareness and training protocols, and incident response plan

These activities would be directly applicable to our new remote worker paradigm. As staff have migrated out of offices where protection from certain cyber risk were in palce – to home offices that are outside the control and oversite of central IT, we need to adapt our processes and technologies to mitigate potential risks. There are two significant divisions within URUS that are based in Canada – Alta Genetics inc., and Saskatoon Colostrum Company Ltd. These two entities account for a significant portion of URUS’ revenue and profitiablity. Furthermore, we are an essential service witin the Agricultrual industry – as primariy suppliers to milk and beef producers within Canada and around the globe.

Consultant, Education Jurisdiction

The goals of the project will be to assist the Indigenous Community Learning Centres in Nanaimo, BC, which are co-administered by the Indigenous Partners, to obtain sustainable funding and an appropriate level of Indigenous independent governance in keeping with the UNDRIP, the BC UNDRIP Act, and the TRC’s Calls to Action. To achieve this, the project will focus on building a business case to keep the Learning Centres open, and a guide for a legislative amendment which would reclassify the Learning Centres into a class where they would receive and retain 100% public education funding. In addition, incorporating Indigenous values into the institutional framework of the Learning Centres would be a major part of the project, and ensuring the project is sensitive to existing community relationships while creating a sustainable educational system for Indigenous students off-reserve and in urban areas.

Maple Leaf Angels – Business Strategy Internship

This project will provide MLA with the operational support necessary to continue growing the brand. The project will help to attract the right entrepreneurs/start-ups and angel investors to join the organization. Through investments, MLA members will have the opportunity to mentor and guide entrepreneurs in Canada as they navigate the challenges and opportunities surrounding the development of their company. The project will also benefit Canada through the investment of human and financial capital in Canadian entrepreneurs and early stage companies. Successful investments will support the growth and business development of local emerging technology start-ups and inspire entrepreneurship in Canada.

COVID-19 Screening MVP Launch of Animated Virutal Agent by CloudConstable

The COVID-19 Screening launch is CloudConstable’s latest innovation to implement Artificial Intelligence to protect members of an organization and the public through technological advancements of both hardware and software design. This includes the usage of temperature sensors, facial recognition, data security through cloud solutions, and present AI to direct and ask questions of the users. Implementing AI technology can have a both societal and organizational challenges. By being involved within their screening solutions at the Ontario Regiment RCAC museum in Oshawa, being potentially involved with one or more local customer, and giving meaningful testing and feedback will ensure safe launch of the AI Cloud tool. In addition, using relative knowledge of Human Resource and Business Functions will help understand the challenges of implementing A.I. as well as help the partner organization create and assist with business planning and commercialization. This in turn will be both a learning opportunity for both parties as well as making a larger impact for the future of Canada and its people.

Business Development intern

TrustD.space is a digital community hub for organizations where members connect to share skills, knowledge and events online. Their software is tailored to various community stakeholders from students to entrepreneurs and residents and aims to provide a safe, secure and innovative online platform to stay connected. TrustD provides the tools to increase member engagement by making it easy for members to share skills, crowd source knowledge and find engaging events. The project primarily comprises of Business development focusing on improving sales margins and bolstering their marketing plan. The role encompasses identifying ways to improve marketing efforts, developing and maintaining content and designing and presenting new social media campaign ideas. It also requires conducting due diligence through industry analysis and engaging with potential customers by running project demos and preparing promotional presentations.

Quinn Min_Titan Boats

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected Titan Boats on many different levels throughout the company. We have lost contracts from clients in the Tourism industry with multiple boats that were in the progress of being made now sitting half-built with no buyer. Aside from this immediate affect in sales, it has also forced us to unexpectedly invest in extra personal protective equipment for our staff. Being moved to remote working has challenged our ability to communicate and caused delays due to reorganization and creating new setups. An internship student would be a huge boost to our company during this time. We need help creating new HR policies and procedures to adjust to all the changes as well as help analyzing general workflow issues caused by COVID.

Drug Free Kids

Drug Free Kids Canada (DFKC) is a Canadian, independent, registered charity whose vision is to ensure that all young people will be able to live their lives free of problematic drug use. DFKC accomplishes this by educating and empowering parents and supportive adults to have non-judgemental dialogue with kids at every stage. The organization is a leading curator of information that is evidence-based, current and credible and provides information and resources to prevent problematic substance use among kids. Anna-Maria will aid in creating sustainability for the organization by providing valuable data to the funding efforts. This will be achieved by updating and quantifying the Social Return on Investment of DFK’s education/prevention activities to provide credibility to support ongoing funding efforts. Moreover, she will determine what services, information, education and/or support can be monetized. Importantly, the questions of how to best to market this engagement and to whom will need to be answered. Collectively, this information will be leveraged to create a business case to build a foundation for a revenue stream that is sustainable and impactful by engaging organizations to become stewards of the health for the next generation.

Qubit Systems Business Development Intern

Qubit Systems designs and builds instrumentation for research and teaching in the biological sciences. Founded 25 years ago, the company sells equipment to universities, research institutes and commercial entities worldwide. Products are used across the entire spectrum of the biological sciences including bioreactors to cultivate algae and bacteria; respirometers to monitor the metabolic activity of fish; insects and mammals; portable systems for monitoring photosynthesis in plants; analysers for measuring greenhouse gas emissions; and wearable systems for evaluating the cardiovascular fitness of human subjects. A current focus is the development of a low-cost line of products for monitoring personal fitness by direct measurement of metabolic rate. Such cardiopulmonary exercise (CPX) equipment measures the rate of O2 consumption (VO2) and/or CO2 production (VCO2) by a person wearing a face mask, and is the only scientifically proven method for fitness evaluation. To date such equipment has only been available at considerable cost, but Qubit aims to bring it into the realm of the recreational athlete and also make it available for individuals concerned about weight loss and diet.

A case study exploring the experiences of Black students in Canadian Higher Education studying English or Science

An exploration of undergraduate Black students’ experience of higher education at the Univerisity of Calgary. In order to explore the experiences of Black students who specifically study English or Science at the univeristy, we intend to recruit at least five undergraduate students from each subject, and conduct a group semi-structured interview with each group about their experiences of the universitiy. These interviews will be video recorded in order to distinguish the speakers. Discourse analysis will be used to analyse all of the data and it will be used to write a paper and findings will be shared in a conference.