2026-27 CGS, SSHRC, and OGS Funding Recipients

Reframing Canadian Higher Education Governance with Students in Mind

Niki Boytchuk-Hale

Supervisor: Amy Burns

Canadian universities have been governing themselves through a bicameral system (board and senate) since before Canada existed as a federation. While this model of shared governance is the hallmark of university autonomy and collegiality, research has consistently identified tensions among students, faculty, administrators, and boards over authority, representation, transparency, and decision-making. Even when students do have a formal seat in university governance, Canadian research suggests that representation alone does not necessarily ensure meaningful influence over institutional decision-making. I am interested in bold, transformative ideas to address structural barriers to student participation in university governance, navigating complex power dynamics, and examining how institutional culture shapes student voice and experience. Since most university decisions affect students, excluding or not optimizing their voices risks undermining good relations, academic quality, and trust. My study will examine how students are currently engaged in governance in order to inform the design of a new framework for internal democratic engagement that builds a participatory culture which is inclusive and durable to the chaos of a complex world, while advancing student leadership in institutional decisions.

(Co) Piloting AI-assisted IEP Goal Writing in Ontario 

Rebecca Cooke

Supervisor: Jordan Shurr

This research explores the use of artificial intelligence (AI), specifically Microsoft Copilot, to support Ontario educators in developing Individual Education Plan (IEP) goals. The study examines whether AI-assisted goal writing can improve the quality and efficiency of the IEP development process. It also explores educators’ experiences with AI-assisted goal writing, including their perceptions of its usefulness, challenges, and potential role in supporting special education practices.

Exploring Newcomer Belonging in Rural Schools in Southwestern Ontario

Emma Goetz

Supervisor: Michelle Searle

This research explores how rural schools can help newcomers feel a sense of belonging as they navigate their educational experiences and become part of their communities. It considers the relationships, practices, and supports that can create welcoming and inclusive school environments. By centering the experiences of newcomers and their communities, the research aims to better understand how schools can foster connection, participation, and belonging.

Bridging Foundational Numeracy Gaps: Piloting the Early Math Assessment at School (EMA@School) for Students with FASD in Grades 4 to 6 

Tanya Joseph 

Supervisor: Lindsay Morcom 

My research explores the use of early math screening to support students with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD), as foundational numeracy is essential to achieve adult independence. Addressing Ontario’s lack of mandated early math screening, this study pilots the Early Math Assessment at School (EMA@School), a validated digital screener developed by Carleton University, with Grades 4 to 6 students with FASD. Through error pattern analysis, this work aims to evaluate the tool's utility, identify foundational numeracy gaps, inform targeted classroom instruction, and enable early intervention before learning gaps widen exponentially. 

From Policy to Practice: Examining the Canada-Wide Early Learning and Child Care System in Ontario

Cheryl Lee-Yow

Supervisor: Kristy Timmons

The Canada-Wide Early Learning and Child Care (CWELCC) system was launched to support affordable, accessible, inclusive, and high-quality early learning and childcare programming and services. The existing scholarship has not sufficiently examined how the tensions are produced through the implementation of the CWELCC system in Ontario, nor how the early years workforce made sense of these tensions as they carry out the work of implementation. This research looks to bridge the policy and practice gap in early childhood education and care field, advancing our understanding of how large-scale policy reform translates into the experiences of those directly impacted. 

Assessing Teachers' Knowledge of Comprehension and Its Instruction: Development and Validation of a New Measure

Dennis Liao

Supervisor: Pamela Beach

My research examines teachers’ knowledge of reading, with a focus on the complex, multidimensional nature of reading comprehension. Building on my previous work on teachers’ knowledge of foundational literacy concepts, I am now developing and validating a measure of teachers’ knowledge of the higher-order processes involved in comprehension and its instruction. I hope this work can support teacher preparation for reading comprehension instruction and ultimately lead to better student reading outcomes.

Beyond the Year: Understanding the Long-Term Impacts of Ontario’s Demonstration School Program on Students with Reading-Related Learning Disabilities 

Marissa Little

Supervisor: Jordan Shurr

The Ontario Ministry of Education operates three demonstration schools mandated to provide a one-year, remedial residential program for students in Grades 5 to 10 with reading-related learning disabilities. These schools aim to develop students’ academic, social-emotional, and transitional skills through three core pillars: intensive literacy, assistive technology, and executive functioning. Given the transition-focused nature of these schools, understanding students’ experiences after program completion is important for determining how they transfer the skills developed through these pillars when they return to general education classrooms. My proposed research will examine the long-term impacts on students with reading-related learning disabilities who previously attended Ontario’s demonstration schools. Using a mixed-methods survey design administered during transition meetings, my research will capture students’ perceptions of their academic, social-emotional, and transitional experiences after returning to general education classrooms. Although demonstration schools were established nearly 60 years ago, only one evaluative study of the program has been published to date. This study quantitatively assessed changes in students’ reading scores before and after participation. As such, students’ experiences following program completion remain absent from the current literature. The results of my research will address this gap by providing insight into how students perceive the consolidation and application of learning developed through the program’s three core pillars across educational settings. These findings will help inform how demonstration schools can support students in transferring skills developed through intensive literacy, assistive technology, and executive functioning instruction as they transition back to general education classrooms.

Shared Values or Conflicting Priorities? Faculty and Leadership Perspectives on Equity and Integrity in Technology Adoption in Higher Education

Lydia Scholle-Cotton 

Supervisors: Chris DeLuca

As universities respond to generative AI (genAI) through emerging policies, guidelines, and supports, differences may exist between leaders’ expectations of genAI and how faculty are using it in practice. The purpose of my study is to explore how higher education leaders’ expectations of genAI align with or differ from the comfort, practices, and experiences of early-adopting faculty using genAI in undergraduate teaching. It examines leaders’ expectations, priorities, perceived risks, and institutional supports alongside faculty experiences and decision-making. By identifying areas of alignment and misalignment, the study seeks to better understand how genAI adoption and diffusion are shaped within higher education institutions and to contribute empirically grounded insights into the responsible and equitable integration of genAI in teaching and learning.

Beyond Outputs: Exploring and Aligning a Partner-Centred Model of Reciprocity and Value in Community-Engaged Higher Education

Jennifer Thompson

Supervisor: Michelle Searle

Her doctoral research investigates how reciprocity and value are understood, experienced, and documented in community–university partnerships in higher education. Although community engagement has become a strategic priority for Canadian universities and a recognized marker of institutional quality, dominant approaches to studying its impact tend to foreground institutional outputs and immediate student gains, telling us little about the relational, partner-defined value these partnerships are meant to produce. Through a phased, critical-interpretivist design starting with a national scan of institutional CE practices to arts-informed case studies of established partnerships, culminating in collaborative model development, this work aims to build a community-partner–centred approach to designing, developing and sustaining community-university partnerships. 

Investigating the Role of Mentorship in Overcoming the Academic Achievement Gap for Black Male Graduate Students in Canada

Mohamed Yusuf

Supervisor: Alana Butler

This study explores the educational experiences of Black Male Graduate Students (BMGSs) in Canada by examining their relationship with an academic mentoring figure throughout their academic journey. This includes exploring how these mentor-mentee relationships could bridge the academic achievement gap by advancing BMGSs’ ways of knowing and being, alongside their overall academic progression within the education system. 

Swimming with Mud, Clay and Limestone: A Framework for Place-Based Aquatics Education in Ka’tarohkwi/Kingston, Ontario

Kristen Fontaine

Supervisor: Heather McGregor

My research seeks to understand how critical place-based pedagogies may offer promising channels for strengthening relationships between swimmers, non-swimmers, and local bodies of water. The aim of my research is to offer perspectives that move beyond the standard settler-Canadian approach to swimming instruction and education. By understanding such perspectives, I hope to offer ideas for a place-based framework for an aquatics education program, specifically in Ka’tarohkwi/Kingston, Ontario, that is anchored in respect, reciprocity, and relationality. By expanding aquatics education to mean more than protecting against drowning, it is possible for aquatics education programs to experientially prepare swimmers, instructors, and lifeguards for engaging with aquatic environments (e.g., pools, lakes, rivers, etc.), while instilling responsibilities for taking care of local land and water.

The Internationalization of Higher Education and the Transnationalization of Caste: Understanding Dalit Students’ Experiences in Canadian Higher Education

Kavya Harshitha Jidugu

Supervisor: Thashika Pillay

My research explores how caste is transnationalized and reproduced through the internationalization of higher education policies, practices, and processes in Canadian higher education institutions. Drawing on the experiences of both domestic and international Dalit (caste-oppressed) students, including my own, this qualitative, community-engaged research uses story weaving and poetry to examine how caste shapes access to and experiences within Canadian higher education, including experiences of caste discrimination, marginalization, and exclusion. It also examines how Dalit students resist these structures through knowledge production, storytelling, anti-caste organizing, and transnational solidarities, envisioning anti-caste and decolonial futures for higher education.

Uneven Foundations: A Multi-Year Study of Gender and Self-Efficacy in Engineering Education

Nerissa Mulligan

Supervisor: Michelle Searle (Education) and Heidi Ploeg (Smith Engineering)

This multi-year, quantitative study examines how self-efficacy develops during the critical first year of undergraduate engineering and whether those trajectories differ by gender. Using a longitudinal, multiple time-point survey design, four successive cohorts of first-year engineering students (N > 1,700) are surveyed before entry and at two points across the academic year. The survey measures self-efficacy across six course domains—calculus, chemistry, physics, design, experimentation, and computer programming. The findings will inform evidence-based, inclusive teaching practices and contribute to the broader goal of equity in Canadian engineering education.

A Mixed Methods Study of FSL Teacher Preparation, Support, and Advocacy in Ontario

This dissertation investigates the ways that Ontario's pre-service French as a Second Language (FSL) teacher education programs shape early-career educators' sense of preparedness to teach in FSL contexts, and how professional organizations can better support that preparation. Using a mixed-methods design, the research pairs a province-wide survey of educators within their first five years of teaching with follow-up focus groups, alongside a data party  with key professional intermediaries. Findings will support the development of practical guidance for faculties of education, school boards, and FSL professional intermediaries, helping strengthen the pipeline of confident, well-prepared French teachers in Ontario.

Filling the Gap: Success Factors and Barriers for Indigenous Students Transitioning from First Nation Communities to Urban Northern Ontario Secondary Schools

Brooke Collins

Supervisor: Lindsay Morcom

In Northern Ontario, many Indigenous students from remote First Nation communities must relocate to urban centres to attend secondary school. This significant life adjustment frequently occurs during key developmental years and requires students to separate from their families, communities, and cultural environments to pursue their education at a young age. Such displacement can have consequential and lasting impacts on students’ identity, academic success, and emotional well-being. This study seeks to examine the barriers and success factors that influence students' experiences and explore how these students can be better supported moving forward.

Recognizing ADHD in Girls: Insights from Canadian Individuals Diagnosed in Adulthood

Grace Howard

Supervisor: Ian Matheson

My research explores how Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is recognized or overlooked among girls in Canadian K-12 schools. Centring the retrospective insights of individuals diagnosed with ADHD in adulthood who were socially perceived and treated as girls during their schooling, the study examines how gendered expectations, understandings of ADHD, and educational practices may contribute to delayed recognition. Using an exploratory sequential mixed-methods design, the study begins with semi-structured interviews that explore participants’ K-12 schooling experiences and recommendations for improving recognition practices. Findings will inform the development of an online survey to further explore these insights across a broader Canadian sample. Overall, this research aims to inform practices that support earlier and more equitable ADHD recognition in schools. 

Calculated Visibility: Strategic Identity Disclosure Among Transgender Teacher Candidates in Teacher Education and Practicum

Lauren Jack

Supervisor: Lee Airton

Education has become a focal point as the political climate shifts for transgender rights, with schools and teachers facing heightened scrutiny. My research will examine the experiences of transgender and gender diverse teacher candidates, specifically in how they decide whether or not to disclose their trans identity while on practicum. This decision can bring personal and professional risks, including concerns about safety, reputation, and potential employment. Through interviews with trans and gender-diverse teacher candidates enrolled in or recently graduated from teacher education programs, this research will examine the factors that shape a teacher candidate's decision to disclose their identity.

Learning open surgery skills: A randomized controlled trial comparing surgeon feedback vs proctorless feedback from the open surgery tutor 

Rebecca LeClair

Supervisor: Boris Zevin

Description:  This project aims to evaluate the effectiveness of the Open Surgery Tutor (OST), a novel AI-driven simulation platform for open inguinal hernia repair that provides proctorless assessment and automated feedback. The study will compare AI-generated feedback from the OST with traditional faculty feedback to determine whether AI-enabled feedback can effectively support surgical skill acquisition. This research seeks to address the persistent challenges of reduced operative exposure and faculty assessment burden by providing a cost-effective educational tool for novice trainees to learn open inguinal hernia repairs. By enabling independent practice outside the operating room, the platform may shorten learning curves, improve readiness for intraoperative participation, and maximize the educational yield of limited operative opportunities. 

Professionalism or ableism? Investigating access barriers faced by disabled candidates in teacher education

Corey Martin

Supervisor: Lee Airton

My research explores how discourses of professionalism and ideas about what the 'ideal' educator looks like perpetuate ableism in teacher education. Teacher education program attendance policies in particular tend to be punitive and ableist, presupposing that absences stem from a lack of responsibility, effort, and ‘professionalism’ on the part of an absent teacher candidate. Policies, syllabi, lectures, and informal comments which position attendance as professionalism may deter teacher candidates, disabled or otherwise, from prioritizing their health and advocating for themselves out of fear of jeopardizing their program completion. I will conduct a policy analysis of the regulations and policies governing the teacher education program here at Queen's and consider disabled and chronically ill teacher candidates’ experiences of these policies, of their accommodations, and of normative discourses of professionalism.