As part of its winter 2016 series of events, the Senate Committee on the Enhancement of Teaching is organizing a blog—with short articles about academic freedom as it relates to pedagogy and curriculum, and some short responses from committee members to get some conversation going! We invite everyone on the campus community to read and comment—on the original article or on other people’s contributions. Let’s get a conversation going about what this issue means and some of its implications for teaching and learning at UPEI. 

The blog is on the new SCENT website, at projects.upei.ca/scent – it’s on the homepage there. But feel free to peruse the rest of (still under construction) website too, where you’ll find more information about SCENT and the FDO. 

For more information, contact Ann Braithwaite, chair of SCENT, at abraithwaite@upei.ca or Gerald Wandio, Faculty Development Office, at fdo@upei.ca.

The presentation of a learning/career e-portfolio is a requirement for each student in the Bachelor of Education program at UPEI.

We would like to invite the campus community to attend one or more sessions during which a small group of pre-service teachers will each present his/her e-portfolio to demonstrate individual growth in becoming a professional educator through the various aspects of the B Ed program.

Each pre-service teacher will present for approximately 15 minutes after which the audience will be invited to discuss or ask questions.

Please see below for scheduled times and locations.

English B ED program:
Feb 3rd 5:00-7:00 Memorial Hall 301 (ELC)
Feb 4th 5:45-7:45 AVC 286A N or AVC 286B N (2 groups)
Feb 5th 4:00-6:00 Memorial Hall or 308 Memorial Hall 215 (2 groups)
Feb 8th 4:00-6:00 Main 113 or Main 116 or ELC (3 groups)
Feb 9th 4:00-6:00 AVC 287N or AVC 286A N (2 groups)
Feb 10th 4:00-6:00 Main 116 

French B Ed program:
Feb 4th 5:45-7:45 Kelley 211
Feb 10th 5:45-7:45 Kelley 210 

We hope to see many of you in attendance.

For further information, contact Carolyn Francis at crfrancis@upei.ca or Jill Ross at jbross@upei.ca or by telephone at 620-5155.

Have an opinion about tobacco use on campus? The Healthy Campus Committee wants to know!

The tobacco use survey is NOW OPEN. You can access the survey here after logging into your @upei account through the Shibboleth single-in service. The survey is also accessible from the Healthy Campus committee and Student Union homepages.

Thanks for participating and encouraging others to do the same. All participants are eligible for entry into a draw for one of two gift cards to the bookstore.

With 4 Atlantic University Sport men’s hockey games taking place in three provinces on Bell Let’s Talk Day, January 27, fans around the conference are invited to come out and show their support. At UPEI, the Men's Hockey Panthers will host the Université de Moncton Aigles Bleus at 7 pm at MacLauchlan Arena.

The first few hundred fans to arrive at the CARI Complex will receive a Bell Let’s Talk toque and thunder sticks. Stations will be set up at each venue where fans can participate by creating personalized speech bubbles, taking photos to share on social media and signing banners to show their support. Subway gift cards will be given out as prizes throughout the game.

Student and staff volunteers from UPEI Student Affairs, Residence Services, and Athletics and Recreation along with Bell Aliant representatives will be out in force, supporting the effort to help end the stigma around mental illness. Please come out and support your Panthers and #BellLetsTalk! 

To read more about Bell Aliant's partnership with AUS, link to the UPEI News story.

The UPEI Multicultural Choir meets on Wednesdays in the lower level of the Robertson library at 4:30 - 5:30. 
This is a non-audition choir open to all members of UPEI - students, staff, and faculty. 
The group is now in its 5th year and sings songs of the various cultures and languages represented on the UPEI campus, as an initiative of the AIRS Research project. 
All are welcome.

The Human Biology and Environmental Sciences seminar series continues on Friday, January 29, 2016 when Dr. Travis Saunders from Applied Human Sciences at UPEI will present:

“Is Sitting Killing You?”

Date: January 29
Time: 12:30 pm
Duffy Science 204

All are welcome

The PEI History of Medicine Society is pleased to host a talk by Dr. Susan Brown (History) on "Retiring from the Stage: Old Age and Disability among 18th Century Theatrical Performers" at 7:00, Wednesday, February 10, in the Main Building Faculty Lounge-- Main 204. All are welcome: coffee, tea, and snacks provided. For More information, contact Shannon Murray (smurray@upei.ca).

Payroll SIN Reminder to International Employees

Payroll would like to remind all international employees to please provide updates/changes to temporary Social Insurance Numbers to the Payroll/Human Resources department for T4 purposes.

Updates/changes should be made in person at the Human Resources department.

If you have moved in the last year, Payroll requires your current mailing address for T4 purposes. 

The UPEI system stores two addresses; current mailing and home. You can check the status of your current mailing address through the UPEI website by clicking on Acampus login@ - menu item AChange Current Address (+email)@. Changes to your home address must be done in person at the Registrar=s office or in Human Resources.

When updating your current mailing address on-line, please follow these Canada Post addressing conventions:

Do not use the pound sign (#) anywhere in your address;
Do not use spaces or periods between PO or RR;
Apartment numbers before civic addresses on first line (no # symbol) e.g. 32-25 Brown=s Court;
PO on next line after civic, RR on third line if needed;
ACanada@ not required in country field.

Alternately, updates can be directed via e-mail to:

jhelps@upei.ca
hparry@upei.ca

or telephone (902) 566-0464.

Please remember to provide us with your full name and UPEI ID number.

Have you signed up to receive your electronic T4 slip? If you completed the consent form for the 2014 tax year, you will automatically receive your 2015 tax slip electronically. There is no need to complete the consent form again. New consents must be received no later than January 29, 2016.

Online tax slips will be available, through Campus Login, to current and former employees, who received taxable earnings or benefits in 2015. Online T4s are official tax slips accepted by the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA). 
However, CRA requires employees to give their consent in order to access their tax slips electronically. Your consent will be valid for all subsequent tax years. New employees can grant consent for online T4s after they have received their first pay cheque.

Employees who do not provide consent will have their 2015 T4s mailed to the address on file no later than February 29, 2016. Electronic T4s will be available sooner than the printed versions due to a lesser processing time. 

The consent form can be accessed through Campus Login:
https://secure.upei.ca/cls/login.html. The consent form must be completed by January 29, 2016, in order to receive your 2015 T4 slip electronically.

Check the web page to current with event times.  
http://www.upei.ca/studentlife/student-affairs/chaplaincy-centre

UPEI Clarinet Professor Karem J Simon will partner with the Atlantic String Machine in Strings Attached II, an intimate evening of chamber music, on Saturday, January 30 at 7:30 pm at the Dr. Steel Recital Hall. Works by Johannes Brahms and Carl Maria von Weber will be performed. Tickets -- $15 Adults, $10 Students – may be acquired at the music department office or at the admission’s desk prior to performance.

Have an opinion about tobacco use on campus? The Healthy Campus Committee wants to know!

The tobacco use survey is NOW OPEN. Using your @upei login, you can access the survey until Friday, January 29, 2016.

It is also accessible from the Healthy Campus committee and Student Union homepages.

Thanks for participating and encouraging others to do the same. All participants are eligible for entry into a draw for one of two gift cards to the bookstore.

http://www.upei.ca/studentlife/student-affairs/chaplaincy-centre

Library tours are ongoing until the end of January, so encourage students to take a Library tour soon in order to learn about the Library's resources and be entered to win weekly prizes!

Tours are available on weekdays, evenings, and weekends and last about 30 minutes.

Students can sign up in advance online at library.upei.ca/tours.

The Senate Committee on the Enhancement of Teaching (SCENT) announces its events for the winter 2016 semester! Our theme for the semester is “Academic Freedom, Pedagogy, and Curriculum: what do they mean for you?” Through a series of events taking place over the next few months, SCENT aims to engage the campus community in a series of conversations about academic freedom and its relation to pedagogy and curriculum—that is, to what we say and do in the classroom, and with students. While academic freedom is more commonly invoked when faculty talk about research and scholarship, it is also a central idea to the profession as a whole, and clearly impacts our work as teachers too. What do we do in the classroom, and with and for students? Are there limitations or boundaries around what we do or can do or even should do? If so, who or what sets those? What does academic freedom in our teaching mean to different Faculties and Schools, and in different subject areas? How does academic freedom affect students? And how would we (or do we) negotiate what are no doubt differences in how we all answer these questions?

In addressing these and other questions, with the goal of generating much discussion on campus about what we teach and how we teach, SCENT is pleased to organize three major events for this semester: 

• an ongoing blog and discussion forum, to which we will post short articles about this theme every few weeks over the semester, and invite colleagues to respond to them;
• a ‘faculty rants and raves’ event on Wednesday, March 9 (4:00-5:00pm), where faculty are invited to volunteer to rant and rave about academic freedom, in a variety of formats--rants, poems, skits, songs, raps, musings, etc. that can take a variety of tones--funny, angry, sad, thoughtful… (cash bar, nachos provided); 
• a guest speaker, Dr. Len Findlay, University of Saskatchewan, on Wednesday April 27, who will give a public talk and hold a workshop on this theme.

Check out our new SCENT website at projects.upei.ca/scent (still under construction)--where you’ll find information about SCENT and the blog mentioned above. And lots more information will be coming your way throughout the semester about all of these events! Book the key dates now—and stay tuned for much more from us as we get going on this provocative theme, around which we all surely have much to say!

For more information, contact: Ann Braithwaite, Chair of SCENT, abraithwaite@upei.ca or Gerald Wandio, Faculty Development Office, at fdo@upei.ca