Poli sci grad on experience in Canada's North

Alison Smith (‘08) spent the past year participating in one of the most competitive and prestigious internship programs in Canada, the Parliamentary Internship Programme (PIP). As part of the 10-month internship on Parliament Hill, Alison had the opportunity to travel to the Arctic for a study tour with nine other participants, spending a week in Nunavut where they met with legislators, public servants, and civil-society organizations.

The PIP interns, including Alison, share their experience in The Globe and Mail.

Alison precedes three Mount Allison 2010 graduates who will begin PIP in September: Hanna Button (international relations), Fraser Harland (political science), and Stephen Middleton (biology).

Mount A welcomes sports stars

When a town of 5,000 gets more than 1,000 visitors, it's a noticeable difference.

Especially when those visitors are all tall, lean athletes decked out in colourful team uniforms from around the world.

The streets of Sackville are alive with athletes this week, thanks to Mount Allison's role as an athletes' village for the IAAF World Junior Championships.

The buzz is noticeable along the main drag.

At Bridge Street Café, a customer asks why the java joint is busier than usual.

It's the world junior championships of track and field. And the athletes' village at Mount A is housing 1,150 athletes from 143 different countries. That's about half the number of people who would fill the campus in September.

And over at Bridge Street Café, employee Randy Christopher says he's getting into the sporting spirit, too. He says the coffee shop has already served people from 50 to 100 different nations.

There will be many more such moments for Yarnell, the Bridge Street staff and all the residents of Sackville as the championships continue throughout this week.

Read the full article: Sackville stoked to welcome sports stars (Moncton Times & Transcript)

The Record Online

The Summer 2010 issue of the Record is now available online!

Do the next best thing to being here...

...take a virtual tour!

Over the past few months Mount Allison University has been developing a NEW virtual campus tour web site, designed to be personalized, interactive, and easily adaptable. The virtual tour can be viewed at Virtual Campus Tour.

Second Annual Mount A Homecoming Golf Classic

Alumni and friends are invited to the second annual Mount A Homecoming Golf Classic in support of Mount Allison University Athletics on Friday, September 10, 2010.

The tournament is being held at the Amherst Golf and Country Club again this year, beginning with a shotgun start at 1:30 p.m. A dinner and prize presentation will follow.

For more information, and to register, see Mount A Homecoming Golf Classic.

New this year: early bird prices until July 15th.

See photos from last year's tournament!

Top honours at chemistry conference

Recent Mount A grad Paul Themens '10 was awarded best undergraduate surface science oral presentation and best undergraduate macromolecular science and engineering poster presentation at the 35th Annual APICS-CIC Chemistry Conference (ChemCon) in Halifax, NS. Undergraduate and graduate students from across Atlantic Canada attended the three-day conference.

Themens’ research, the first study of its kind, involves investigating how nanoparticles affect the reactivity of free radicals, which are used in the synthesis of many types of plastics. Being able to change the properties of the free radicals, for instance how long they last and what they react to, has the potential to create new, environmentally-friendly materials that can be used in areas such as MRI instruments and drug delivery.

Originally from Dalhousie, NB, Themens will be furthering this award-winning research over the summer in chemistry and biochemistry professor Dr. Khashayar Ghandi’s lab at Mount A.

He and Ghandi have also received one week of experiment time at the world-class Rutherford Appleton Laboratory in the UK — a rare honour. Themens plans to pursue graduate studies in a related field in the fall.

Other ChemCon winners include recent graduates Jennifer Melanson (best undergraduate poster presentation in inorganic chemistry) and Sarah Tulk (best undergraduate poster presentation in biological/medicinal chemistry).

10 years of MASSIE

Four of Mount Allison’s senior managers recently traveled to Asia to make connections with universities, alumni, prospective students, and high-ranking officials in both China and Japan. Dr. Robert Campbell, President and Vice-Chancellor; Ron Byrne, Vice-President, International & Student Affairs; Dr. Stephen McClatchie, Vice-President and Provost, Academic & Research; and Adam Christie, Manager of International Affairs, made the week-long excursion, visiting various cities in both countries.

In the works for over a year, the trip began in Osaka, Japan to mark the 10th anniversary of the MASSIE Program (Mount Allison Semester Studies in English), to renew the MASSIE agreement with partnering Kwansei Gakuin University (KGU), and to begin working towards a double degree program in 2012 with KGU’s new School of International Studies.

All of these goals were reached, with the crowning moment being the 10th anniversary celebration. Since 2000 there have been 703 MASSIE graduates, and 140 of those grads attended the event.

Alumni dinners were held for alumni, prospective students, and parents.

See photos of the alumni dinner held in Beijing in February.