Students awarded Vanier scholarships

Three Queen’s PhD candidates are among this year’s group of more than 150 Canadian graduate students to be awarded a $50,000 Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship.

The scholarships are awarded annually by the federal government.

Dianna Lanteigne, PhD ’15, will use the scholarship to continue her research on adolescent emotional development.

Krystle Maki, PhD ’14, will continue her research on the relationship between surveillance and Ontario Works, a social assistance program.

Andreas Reichelt, who came from Vienna, Austria to work on her project, will continue investigating the intricacies of human interactions and social cues through Queen’s Cognition and Action Laboratory. The winners were selected based on leadership skills and scholastic achievement.

—Darienne Lancaster

Professor becomes fellow

Geography professor Audrey Kobayashi was given the title of fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (RSC).

The RSC endorses Canadian culture, counsels governments and organizations and supports research in the natural and social sciences. Kobayashi studies racism, gender and spatial theory to look at how these correlate with changes in homes, streets and workplaces.

Also elected to the RSC were Queen’s alumni Ian Dowbiggin, MA ’77 and James Rutka, Med ’81.

-—Meaghan Wray

Queen’s ranked in top 150 universities

Queen’s placed 144th out of 150 in the 2011 QS World University ranking system.

The annual ranking surveys employers and academics. Out of 200 universities worldwide, Queen’s is the sixth-ranked Canadian post-secondary institution Queen’s scored high for reputation, international faculty, social sciences and management offerings and citations per faculty.

—Meaghan Wray

New funding for cancer research

The Ontario Institute for Cancer Research recently announced a new $12.6 million High Impact Clinical Trials (HICT) program at Queen’s aimed at improving cancer treatments.

“The HICT program has been designed to evaluate innovative technologies that will lead to more personalized, targeted medicines that are more effective and less toxic,” Dr. Janet Dancey, HICT program director, said.

The program will primarily be investigating rare tumour treatments with its Rare Tumour Clinical Trials Initiative, a partnership between the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research, pharmaceutical company Pfizer Canada and the Queen’s-based National Cancer Institute of Canada’s Clinical Trials Group.

—Darienne Lancaster