ScSchool of Environment and Sustainability:
External Review Report
Prepared by:
Jean Andrey (University of Waterloo)
Sharon Collinge (University of Colorado, Boulder)
Charles Redman (Arizona State University)
December 4, 2015
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The external review team for the School of the Environment and Sustainability (SENS) at the
University of Saskatchewan visited the campus on November 4-6, 2015 to conduct an in-depth
review of the structure and programs of SENS. Based on our interviews and observations during the
visit, as well as review of the self-study report provided by SENS, we provide the following
recommendations, which are elaborated in the pages of this report:
1. The SENS community should reflect on, and possibly revise their mission and vision
statements given the range of interpretations of interdisciplinarity.
2. The SENS community should engage in a more active effort to debate, discuss, and embed
the concept of “sustainability” within the vision of the School.
3. SENS should continue to align its vision with the University’s signature areas, but be more
deliberate and explicit about its role(s) vis-à-vis those of other units.
4. The University’s senior administration needs to take a clear position on whether additional
new schools will be created in the areas of water and toxicology, or whether these research
strengths of the University will be supported through SENS and other existing
Colleges/Schools.
5. Ongoing discussion with the Department of Geography and Planning is needed to ensure that
SENS and this department evolve in complementary ways, given their shared interest in
human-environment interactions.
6. SENS should continue to strategically pursue joint appointments of faculty housed within
other entities on campus where partners are particularly eager to enjoy the benefits of jointly
appointed faculty to their units, to SENS, and to the University of Saskatchewan as a whole.
7. University should invest in supporting the recruitment of Associate or Full Professors with
demonstrated leadership capabilities that are eager to pursue joint appointments. Such
recruitment might be from appropriate units on campus or be new hires to the School and
University.
8. SENS should continue its recruitment activities in Saskatchewan, and work to attract students
from across Canada and the United States perhaps through entrance scholarships or
internship opportunities for highly qualified applicants to the professional programs.
9. SENS should continue to play its current roles in developing and delivering environmental
programming at the graduate level, and in coordinating undergraduate programming as well
as offering selected undergraduate courses that fit with its own mandate and are
complementary to existing offerings.
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10. We recommend that all faculty be encouraged to pursue interdisciplinary and collaborative
scholarship and that junior faculty members be mentored and supported in this endeavor.
11. With respect to balance across the three areas of substantive expertise, we recommend that
SENS carefully consider its options with respect to depth and breadth as it adds faculty
complement.
12. The review team recommends that SENS continue to be the academic home for a number of
water scientists, that two additional water governance scholars be added to ensure that SENS
retains critical mass—in both natural and social science—in water.
13. Discussion is needed to ensure that units with similar or overlapping missions and visions
evolve in ways that are complementary and mutually supportive through a combination of
focusing on distinctiveness and strategic alliance for mutual gain.
14. In cases where faculty lines are re-assigned, the Provost’s Office should support affected
Colleges with replacement hires, as much as possible, and with support for strategic
planning/realignment.
15. It is a priority that SENS’ partnerships with the Redberry Lake Biosphere Reserve be
protected.
16. The University should continue to invest in SENS with additional faculty hires.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 5
2. Mission and Vision ........................................................................................................................... 6
3. Organizational Structure and Governance ...................................................................................... 8
4. Academic and Educational Activities ............................................................................................... 11
5. Research Activities ........................................................................................................................... 13
6. Partnerships ..................................................................................................................................... 15
7. Additional Findings........................................................................................................................... 17
8. Overall Strengths and Weaknesses.................................................................................................. 18
9. Conclusion ........................................................................................................................................ 21
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1. INTRODUCTION
The University of Saskatchewan conducts periodic assessments of its academic, administrative and
operational units in order to ensure that programming and services are of high quality. Guidelines
and procedures for unit reviews are provided by the University’s Institutional Planning and
Assessment (IPA).
The review process has five phases:
1. Identification of the unit: This review pertains to the School of Environment &
Sustainability (SENS). SENS was formally established on July 1, 2007 as one of the major
initiatives of the University of Saskatchewan’s Integrated Plan (2003-2007). This is the first
period assessment of SENS.
2. Self-study: The self-study, completed by SENS and IPA on September 29, 2015, is 42 pages
long and includes (1) School Description, (2) School Objectives and Curriculum, (3) Student
Profile and Outcomes, (4) Faculty Profile, (5) Research Activity, (6) Administration, (7)
Physical Resources, and (8) Financials. Additional background materials were provided
including program brochures, course descriptions, the SENS Final Proposal, University Council
materials from 2006 pertaining to the Task Force on changing structures as it pertains to the
creation of Schools, “Integrated Planning” documents from all three planning periods, SENS
materials for the University’s third planning cycle, guidelines for assignment of duties within
SENS, guidelines for promotion and tenure and for peer review of teaching, and the results of
surveys completed by faculty, staff, students and alumni of SENS.
Selection of reviewers: The review team comprised three external members – Jean Andrey
(University of Waterloo), Sharon Collinge (University of Colorado, Boulder) and Charles
Redman (Arizona State University) – and one internal resource member, Lawrence Martz.
3. Site visit and external review: The site visit occurred November 4-6, 2015 with all members
of the review team present for the duration. The review team’s report follows using the
template that was provided.
4. Responses to the review: The unit’s response will be submitted to the Provost within four
weeks of receiving this report.
5. Follow-up: An action plan will follow.
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2. MISSION AND VISION
The School of the Environment and Sustainability’s (SENS) mission and vision statements are
presented in the School’s “Plan for the Third Planning Cycle, 2012‐2016,” written in the context of
the University of Saskatchewan’s campus-wide integrated planning process. The stated mission is,
“We enable sustainable communities and environments through collaborative research and
teaching, graduate student engagement, and community involvement. We broaden understanding
and develop champions of environmental sustainability by creating, exchanging, and translating
knowledge using diverse perspectives,” and the stated vision is, “We will create and integrate
multiple understandings of natural and human environments and be internationally known for
innovative, provocative, and wide-ranging approaches to environmental sustainability.” These
statements are clear and compelling assertions of the guiding values and principles of the SENS
community and the explicit connection to engaging in work that is interdisciplinary and that is
relevant to society.
Interdisciplinarity
In our interviews with the SENS community during our visit and based on our review of the survey
data of faculty, staff, students and alumni presented to us, it was clear that interdisciplinarity is a
critical element of the SENS identity and of its differentiation from other units. Although there was
generally strong support from the faculty for the idea that SENS was achieving its mission and vision
(13 of 17 respondents “agreed” or “strongly agreed” that SENS is “doing a good job of realizing its
vision”), we observed a range of responses on how interdisciplinarity is viewed by the faculty and
students. For example, we sensed that the key element in the SENS vision and mission was to
investigate and understand human-environment interactions, broadly defined, but there was some
variation in the breadth of interpretation of interdisciplinarity. We recommend that the SENS
community reflect on their mission and vision statements, given this range of interpretations of
interdisciplinarity, and revisit whether they should be revised to reflect these realities. As reviewers
intimately familiar with the difficulty of this task, however, we appreciate that it will be unlikely that
a single definition will emerge.
Sustainability
By using the term “Sustainability” in the title of this School one has introduced something that is
distinctive from many other Schools/Faculties of the Environment. In our interviews with faculty and
students, virtually all individuals were supportive of using the term, but we were not able to discern
the extent to which sustainability was integral to the School’s identity and programming. We
acknowledge that the term is used in identifying two of the three components of the School
(Sustaining Ecosystems and Sustaining Communities) and is implied in the third (Water Security).
Yet, we believe that a more active effort to debate, discuss, and embed the concept within the vision
of the School could have a positive effect on internal cohesion and in distinguishing the unit from
others at the University. A focus on sustainability further underscores the School’s focus on
interdisciplinarity, and moreover, it adds the goals of transdisciplinarity, real world solutions,
enhancing human well being, and encouraging social justice to the environmental goal of
maintaining ecological integrity. These added objectives are important in themselves, and align with
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the signature objectives of the University as well as providing a clear rationale for faculty across the
University to contribute their efforts to SENS’ activities.
University Context
The University has identified six signature research areas including Aboriginal Peoples, Agriculture,
Energy and Mineral Resources, One Health, Synchrotron Sciences, and Water Security. SENS takes a
leadership role in Water Security, based on existing partnerships and joint appointments; and maps
onto four of the other five themes (all except Synchrotron Sciences). It is impressive to see the
extent to which SENS aligns its vision with the University’s signature areas. In order to achieve both
breadth and depth, however, it will be important for SENS to clarify its role(s), vis-à-vis other units,
particularly in Water Security, Agriculture and Aboriginal Peoples.
Recommendations – Mission and Vision
1. The SENS community should reflect on, and possibly revise their mission and vision statements
given the range of interpretations of interdisciplinarity.
2. The SENS community should engage in a more active effort to debate, discuss, and embed the
concept of “sustainability” within the vision of the School.
3. SENS should continue to align its vision with the University’s signature areas, but be more
deliberate and explicit about its role(s) vis-à-vis those of other units.
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3. ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE AND GOVERNANCE
The balance between senior leadership and self-determination of SENS
The evolution of the University since 2000 provides important context for the formation and current
composition of SENS, in that the School represents a new form of organizational structure as a nondepartmental college with an educational focus on graduate programs and an overall commitment
to interdisciplinarity. Since its formation in 2007, its governance structure has remained essentially
unchanged. Its head is an Executive Director with dean-like responsibilities and authority. The
Executive Director is supported by an Assistant Director, a Graduate Chair, and by a program
coordinator for each of its two non-thesis graduate programs. In theory, this structure provides
SENS with sufficient autonomy to chart its own course in the context of the Universities’ priorities. It
appears, however, that because of the relatively small size and young age of the school, some of the
forces at work are not entirely aligned. More specifically, it appears that SENS is evolving based in
part on the University’s vision for the new Schools (Environment and Sustainability, Public Policy,
and Public Health), in part on funding opportunities (e.g., major funding for water science), and in
part on self-reflection. This appears to be manifest as varied and somewhat inconsistent aspirations
for the School, which translates into a certain amount of fragility.
At present, it appears that SENS’ future is contingent on its partnerships with research institutes and
their leaders—in particular with the Global Institute for Water Security (GIWS) and to a lesser extent
with the Toxicology Centre and the Northern Ecosystems Toxicology Initiative (NETI). SENS requires
assurances of stability and critical size that go beyond temporary or informal partnerships with
research institutes/clusters. In our opinion, this can only be provided by senior administrators, who
will need to take a clear position on whether additional new Schools will be created in the areas of
water and toxicology, or alternatively that these research strengths will be supported through SENS
and other Colleges/Schools.
Should the University decide to form an additional School(s) that diverts some of SENS’ leadership
role in water and/or ecosystems, the review team believes that the University will need to be
supportive of other organizational mergers or alliances in order to ensure critical size and depth in
SENS. This might involve new forms of collaboration with other Schools (e.g., Public Policy) or
departments (e.g., Geography and Planning). Regardless, the review team notes that ongoing
discussion with Geography and Planning is needed to ensure that SENS and this department evolve
in complementary ways, given their shared interest in human-environment interactions. Indeed,
Geography exists within some Faculties/Schools of Environment at other Canadian universities (e.g.,
Trent’s newly announced School of Environment, Simon Fraser University’s Faculty of Environment,
University of Waterloo’s Faculty of Environment) and has formal collaborations at other institutions
(e.g., “environmental geography” is a directed environmental minor in the School of the
Environment at University of Toronto).
Joint appointments and faculty composition
SENS was initially founded with several faculty who had joint appointments between SENS and
another academic or research entity at the University. Indeed, we learned that the joint
appointment mechanism was part of the innovation in creating SENS and the other two
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interdisciplinary schools on campus. Initially there was a wide range of possible joint appointments,
but only a subset of these functioned well. We also learned of some discontent about the loss of
resources from some units as faculty moved their faculty lines into SENS, although several of those
we interviewed suggested that the community was “past that now.”
The faculty that we interviewed expressed unequivocally that their joint appointment with SENS
provided added value to their professional roles at U of S. They appreciated that SENS provided the
opportunity for faculty to teach courses and content that they wouldn’t be able to in a traditional,
disciplinary setting. The interdisciplinary environment also has facilitated great opportunities for
research collaboration, and promotes investigation of issues that are relevant to society without
formal constraints. In this realm, clearly SENS is highly successful.
After her appointment as SENS Executive Director, Professor Toddi Steelman regularized these
appointments into three categories: the “standard” (100%) appointment in SENS; the “primary-joint
appointed” (70% in SENS/30% elsewhere); and the “secondary-joint appointed faculty” (30%
SENS/70% elsewhere). At present, joint appointments represent faculty from 9 departments and 5
colleges. This structure contributes positively to the richness and diversity of faculty expertise and
experience to bring to the SENS research, education, and community engagement efforts. Several of
the people we interviewed praised Professor Steelman’s ability to forge and foster relationships with
units across the campus to make this interdisciplinary enterprise work so effectively. One person
noted that SENS is “a good concept with a great leader” and that has made it so successful in its first
few years. The opportunity to increase the volume and scope of graduate education for other units
on campus was noted as a key benefit. Given the opportunities presented by joint appointments, we
encourage SENS to continue to strategically pursue joint appointments of faculty housed within
other entities on campus where partners are particularly eager to enjoy the benefits of jointly
appointed faculty to their units, to SENS, and to the University of Saskatchewan as a whole.
Leadership succession
The issue of leadership succession in SENS is closely tied to the joint appointment situation. The
SENS self-study identified leadership succession planning as one of “the three biggest challenges
facing SENS into the future.” Currently, the SENS faculty composition primarily consists of pre-tenure
professors, making it difficult to accomplish the leadership and administrative roles typically filled by
post-tenure faculty. Given this situation, we recommend that the University invest in supporting the
recruitment of Associate or Full Professors with demonstrated leadership capabilities or interests
who are eager to pursue joint appointments with SENS from appropriate units on campus.
Recommendations – Organizational Structure and Governance
1. The University’s senior administration needs to take a clear position on whether additional new
schools will be created in the areas of water and toxicology, or whether these research strengths
of the University will be supported through SENS and other existing Colleges/Schools.
2. Ongoing discussion with the Department of Geography and Planning is needed to ensure that
SENS and this department evolve in complementary ways, given their shared interest in humanenvironment interactions.
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3. SENS should continue to strategically pursue joint appointments of faculty housed within other
entities on campus where partners are particularly eager to enjoy the benefits of jointly appointed
faculty to their units, to SENS, and to the University of Saskatchewan as a whole.
4. University should invest in supporting the recruitment of Associate or Full Professors with
demonstrated leadership capabilities that are eager to pursue joint appointments. Such
recruitment might be from appropriate units on campus or be new hires to the School and
University.
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4. ACADEMIC AND EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIES
Graduate and professional programs
From its creation, the main focus of the SENS academic and educational activities was intended to be
graduate education. The current offerings include two research-related graduate programs (MES,
PhD), a professional Master of Sustainable Environmental Management (MSEM), and a newly
approved professional Master of Water Security (MWS).
In our interviews with both professionally- and research-oriented graduate students, it was apparent
that students highly value the interdisciplinary emphasis of SENS and the engaging research and
coursework that they are able to pursue in this context. Both groups of students noted, however,
that the dispersed nature of the SENS space provides significant barriers to forming a strong sense of
community. There was some concern expressed that the high percentage of international students
sometimes makes it difficult to conduct group work because students from diverse backgrounds
have different expectations about preparation and submission of professional-quality reports. The
faculty appear to have responded to this need in part via the “Professional Integrity and Generous
Scholarship” course, but we encourage further consideration of how to integrate diverse
backgrounds and experiences into consistent high quality outcomes.
Thesis students indicated that financial support was good and generally there were not barriers to
completion for students, except in rare cases of shifts in faculty mentors. We encourage SENS to
continue to focus on creating a strong sense of cohesion among faculty and students in the three
theme areas of water security, sustaining communities, and sustaining ecosystems and to explore
ways to facilitate more interaction among the various research groups in the program.
Recruitment
The SENS self-study identified student recruitment as one of the “three biggest challenges” facing
the school into the future. SENS and U of S are clearly devoted to increasing the participation of
indigenous students into degree programs, and we encourage the development of specific, targeted
efforts to reach these communities, both within Saskatchewan and across western Canada. SENS
offers critical expertise and training in environment and sustainability themes, which could provide a
strong center of activity for the region. We applaud the efforts to reach out to the local business
community for professional student recruitment, such as via open houses, and encourage the
campus to provide support for co-marketing and co-recruiting efforts between SENS and other
related graduate programs at U of S. There appear to be opportunities to enhance recruitment
efforts of the best international graduate students by working closely with the College of Graduate
Studies and Research. Attracting students from other Canadian institutions and also the United
States will require a thoughtful strategy and may mean that SENS should consider offering entrance
scholarships or internship opportunities for highly qualified applicants to the professional programs.
Undergraduate program coordination
Recently, SENS has collaborated with the eight environment/sustainability related undergraduate
degree programs on campus to provide greater coordination and clarity for students pursuing and
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engaged in these programs. SENS has invested in a staff position that will serve as “Undergraduate
Environment Coordinator” that will communicate with and convene the units offering these degrees
to create an environmental “portal” that will be clearly visible to external and internal audiences. We
applaud this move and anticipate that this position will provide campus-wide benefits in terms of
coordination, clarity, and visibility for undergraduate environmental programs. We encourage the
administration to review the impact of this position in 2-3 years to assess future investment in this
position.
Undergraduate certificate
SENS launched an undergraduate certificate in sustainability in 2014, which provides a venue for
undergraduate students across campus to add value and sustainability content to their degree. The
program has already been quite successful in attracting students. This certificate allows students
enrolled in degree programs in other colleges to participate and thereby increases educational
resources for the entire campus. The foundational and capstone courses are taught through SENS,
which provides some consistency in course design and delivery. As the campus moves to the new
budget model, we encourage SENS to consider offering a new course to students across campus
(e.g., “Sustainability 101”) that would fill a demand for all interested students to receive some
exposure to the concepts and practices of environmental sustainability.
Recommendations – Academic and Educational Activities
1. SENS should continue its recruitment activities in Saskatchewan, and work to attract students
from across Canada and the United States perhaps through entrance scholarships or internship
opportunities for highly qualified applicants to the professional programs.
2. SENS should continue to play its current roles in developing and delivering environmental
programming at the graduate level, and in coordinating undergraduate programming as well as
offering selected undergraduate courses that fit with its own mandate and are complementary to
existing offerings.
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5. RESEARCH ACTIVITIES
Enhancing research intensity was one of the key reasons for the establishment of the School of
Environment and Sustainability, and we believe that the School has already been highly successful in
this regard with the potential for even greater contributions. As is reported in the excellent internal
self-study, virtually all SENS faculty have research grants, the average amount of research funding
per faculty member is well above University norms, and this research is tackling challenges of great
importance to Saskatchewan, Canada, and the World. This admirable level of productivity is also
reflected in their rate and visibility of publications resulting from research that once again is well
above University norms.
For a relatively young unit with many young faculty this is especially laudable, and the review
committee believes that members of the School can continue to expand their research activities and
that membership in the School should be seen as key to that advancement. One step in achieving
continued growth has already been taken, and that was to hire a full time research facilitator staff
member. We commend this and recommend that the facilitator strive to provide a number of
services: search for appropriate new funding opportunities, seek ways to lighten the burden on
faculty members when preparing proposals, seek out effective interdisciplinary collaborators, and
mentor especially the younger faculty in constructing successful research proposals. We believe the
new staff member is capable of all of these activities. At the same time we want to caution the
research facilitator and administrators that there could be danger in being too prescriptive in what a
researcher should undertake. Especially for younger faculty who are just forming their research
portfolio, they must not be encouraged to chase too many rainbows or to pursue projects that do
not sufficiently align with their interests and/or capabilities. At the same time we also know of
situations where young faculty are discouraged from joining interdisciplinary ventures until after
achieving tenure. Although there may be arguments to support this position, we believe the vision
of the School sees interdisciplinarity throughout one’s career. With its emphasis on interdisciplinary
collaboration in teaching and research SENS provides great opportunities to identify and pursue
collaborative research. Our recommendation is to reinforce and expand these opportunities and to
use successful senior collaborators to mentor and advise junior colleagues. We would also urge
researchers with established projects to seek ways to involve additional colleagues from
complementary approaches in their on-going research as demonstration of the potential of
interdisciplinary collaboration.
The internal report identifies three priorities, Water Security, Sustaining Ecosystems, and Sustaining
Communities, roughly paralleling the three faculty research strengths in the School, hydrology,
toxicology and ecosystem science, and social science. Recent hires and current recruiting is focused
on adding talented junior faculty colleagues to the School, particularly in the social sciences. We
applaud these actions and believe it will add to the research strength and teaching depth of the
School. However, in our interviews we did not get a clear vision of the ultimate objective of the
social science focus. Specific needs for additional strengths in social science, such as working with
indigenous communities have been identified that will strengthen the program, but we recommend
a longer-term strategy be developed. We see several possible trajectories for the SENS leadership
and faculty to consider. One option would be to add breadth in diverse areas that are deemed
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crucial for teaching or research missions; this appears to be the approach taken to date. A second
option would be to identify a specific research strength for SENS to pursue to be more equivalent
with strengths in toxicology and in water security. This could be sustainable communities as
identified in the self-study, but the review committee views this as too nebulous and recommends
greater elaboration or specificity. A third option would be to acknowledge the potential of already
existing research strengths in the biophysical science arms of the school and build the social science
strength to complement and extend those strengths. We encourage further discussion with the
School in order to be explicit about the associated tradeoffs.
Recommendations – Research Activities
1. We recommend that all faculty be encouraged to pursue interdisciplinary and collaborative
scholarship and that junior faculty members be mentored and supported in this endeavor.
2. With respect to balance across the three areas of substantive expertise, we recommend that
SENS carefully consider its options with respect to depth and breadth as it adds faculty
complement.
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6. PARTNERSHIPS
The importance of partnerships to SENS cannot be overstated. Half of its faculty personnel are joint
appointments, all of its graduate programs are founded on a model whereby SENS students have the
option to be supervised or take courses in other units, and its research achievements are made in
teams that frequently extend into other on-campus units. As well, SENS embraces the University’s
priority of ‘place-based’ research, and this manifests itself as community partnerships in various
ways. Indeed, it is acknowledged in the SENS Plan for the Third Planning Cycle that it is “through
attention to strategic growth and partnerships [that] SENS will become a leader in Canadian
environmental education”. The review team agrees with this statement.
Partnerships related to water
Two partnerships are particularly noteworthy and protection/enhancement of these is a priority.
They include the GIWS and, to a lesser extent, the National Hydrology Research Centre of
Environment Canada, which themselves are strongly integrated. We recommend that water
security should remain a core area of concentration. Toward this end, the review team recommends
that SENS continue to be the academic home for a number of water scientists, that two additional
water governance scholars be added to ensure that SENS retains critical mass—in both natural and
social science—in water. The latter’s focus on soft skills including teamwork and collaboration as
fostered by experiential and interdisciplinary programming for the water scientists provides
something that is unique and should be enhanced. The opportunity to add strength in water
governance is also important to pursue.
Connections with other units
As noted previously, the review team believes that special attention should be given to units that
have missions/visions that are similar to or overlapping with SENS. The Department of Geography
and Planning in the College of Arts and Science is one such unit. Other units that may also have
overlapping research, education, and community engagement missions as SENS include the other
two integrated graduate colleges (School of Public Health and the Johnson-Shoyama Graduate
School of Public Policy) as well as Community Planning and Native Studies, and the recently created
Global Institute for Food Security (GIFS). Discussion is needed to ensure that these entities evolve in
ways that are complementary and mutually supportive through a combination of focusing on
distinctiveness and strategic alliance for mutual gain. In cases where such coordination re-assigns
resources, the Provost’s Office should support affected Colleges with replacement hires, as much as
possible, and with support for strategic planning/realignment.
Community Partners
SENS’ partnership with the Redberry Lake Biosphere Reserve is worthy of applause and should be
protected. It represents deep engagement with community partners in ways that provide value to
all parties involved, and it provides an opportunity for innovative programming for field skills
training.
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Recommendations – Partnerships
1. The review team recommends that SENS continue to be the academic home for a number of
water scientists, that two additional water governance scholars be added to ensure that SENS
retains critical mass—in both natural and social science—in water.
2. Discussion is needed to ensure that units with similar or overlapping missions and visions
evolve in ways that are complementary and mutually supportive through a combination of
focusing on distinctiveness and strategic alliance for mutual gain.
3. In cases where faculty lines are re-assigned, the Provost’s Office should support affected
Colleges with replacement hires, as much as possible, and with support for strategic
planning/realignment.
4. It is a priority that SENS’ partnerships with the Redberry Lake Biosphere Reserve be protected.
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7. ADDITIONAL FINDINGS
Size
SENS had a faculty complement of 4.9 FTEs in 2008/09, growing to one of 18.2 by 2014/15. Even
with four additional hires expected in the next year, SENS does not have sufficient faculty resources
to provide deep expertise in each of its three substantive areas of focus: water security, sustaining
ecosystems and sustaining communities. The three largest “competitor” Faculties in Canada include
University of Waterloo Faculty of Environment (faculty complement = 84), Simon Fraser University’s
Faculty of Environment (faculty complement= 52) and York University’s Faculty of Environmental
Studies (faculty complement = 40). If University of Saskatchewan’s School of Environment and
Sustainability is going to gain national stature in more than one area, it will be important that the
University continue to invest in SENS with additional faculty hires.
Recommendations – Additional Findings
1. The University should continue to invest in SENS with additional faculty hires.
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8. OVERALL STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES
Strengths
Leadership
The review team noted that the SENS Executive Director, Professor Toddi Steelman, provides strong
leadership to this diverse and multidimensional school, and she has been highly effective in forging
partnerships within SENS and across the campus. Executive Director Steelman has worked with
faculty and students to develop a clear vision for SENS and we are confident that SENS will continue
to grow and thrive under her outstanding leadership.
Academic strength in multiple areas
Under Steelman’s leadership, the SENS faculty convened and identified their research strengths into
three broad categories: sustaining ecosystems, sustaining communities, and water security. In each
of these areas there are highly engaged, productive researchers who have enhanced the academic
reputation of SENS and of U of S. These three themes also extend the collaborative reach of SENS
into many different units across the campus, including those in engineering, public policy, arts &
science, and agriculture and biosciences.
Promising young cohort
In the past few years, SENS has recruited excellent young faculty who are highly engaged in the
research, education, and outreach missions of SENS. These exceptional scholars and teachers
provide a solid foundation for the future success of SENS, as they will recruit high-quality students
and postdoctoral scholars and contribute positively to the productivity and visibility of SENS.
Very close alignment with campus signature research areas (especially water)
From the perspective of the U of S campus, SENS clearly aligns very closely with the major research
areas identified as critical to its future, including Aboriginal Peoples, Agriculture, Energy and Mineral
Resources, One Health, and Water Security. Given the close connection of SENS with the GWIS, there
is clearly great strength in scholarship, education and outreach related to water security.
Commitment to self-reflection, willingness and ability to adapt to changing circumstances
The review team was impressed with the extent to which the SENS leadership, faculty, staff and
students engage in discussion and deliberation about a variety of issues related to programs within
SENS, and their ability to adapt as needs arise. For example, the recent revision of the graduate
program demonstrates the ability to respond to student feedback and to creatively improve the
content and structure of the educational experience.
Close connection/relationship with two strong and recognized research centers (GIWS, Toxicology)
As noted elsewhere in this document, these two research centers are especially distinguished and
contribute great strength as well as exceptional collaborative opportunities for SENS faculty and
students.
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Team teaching (flexibility in curriculum development)
The commitment to authentic team teaching, as opposed to “tag-team” teaching, appears to work
especially well at SENS. This is a difficult practice to implement, and yet at SENS it appears to be fully
integrated into the culture of the faculty and students to great effect.
Excellent staff
The review team was particularly impressed with the SENS staff and their commitment to excellence
in supporting and collaborating with other staff, students and faculty in furthering the mission and
vision of SENS.
Weaknesses
Long-term Stability
We see the single largest weakness to the future success of SENS is the uncertainty of the
relationship among the semi-autonomous units to the remainder of SENS faculty and programming.
The Global Institute for Water Security and the Toxicology Center are groups of world-class
researchers that provide much of the sponsored research and publication activity within SENS. We
see their long term stabilization within SENS as a high priority and that this integration is clearly at
risk from what we learned in our interviews. We believe that by working with SENS social scientists,
existing research clusters in the natural and engineering sciences provide an amazing opportunity for
a unified approach to sustainability locally and globally that involves water quantity, water quality,
public health threats, impacts to native peoples, and overall sustainability governance. SENS and
University administrators have to work to implement a framework that maintains strong intellectual
integration, external research support, and integrative graduate training while allowing sufficient
autonomy of the self-identified clusters for them to be satisfied. A related challenge for SENS is to
be clearer on its future vision and the implications for balance and new faculty hiring. We appreciate
the elegance of the three articulated priorities; but we believe that two of the three themes—
Sustaining Ecosystems and Sustaining Communities—are broad concepts and unrealistic for a
modest sized faculty to deal with comprehensively. In particular since SENS is intended to be
research-intensive and interdisciplinary and does not have the undergraduate obligation for broad,
uniform coverage, it has the chance to be more specialized and attune itself to an integrated
approach to one or more major sustainability challenge.
Space
Given the emphasis on collaboration in interdisciplinary thinking, it is counterproductive to locate
SENS faculty in three very different locations. The rented space for the Global Institute for Water
Security is quite reasonable and is in close association with a relevant government research facility,
but a substantial walk from the SENS core facility in Kirk Hall. The toxicology facility is also separate,
but not as far and apparently bursting at its seams. Unfortunately the Kirk Hall space itself is not laid
out in an effective manner, being an only moderately renovated residence hall. Our own view is that
a joint facility serving all three units of the School would be the single most important step to
building future integration. This space should address the need for co-location of faculty (with 100%
or 70% appointments), staff and post-docs to all be located together, expanded wet-lab space, and
proximity to important research and educational partners. While we recognize that it is well beyond
the mandate of the review team to recommend a specific location for an integrated SENS School, it
did appear to us that there would be advantages to being located in close proximity to the space
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currently occupied by the Global Institute for Water Security, and we wondered about the possibility
of a new building at the southeast corner of Innovation Blvd and Resources Row. If a new space is
not possible we recommend at least a serious renovation of an existing building with more space
devoted to meeting rooms and communal settings to make it easy for people to get together on a
regular basis. We believe one of the pillars of fostering collaboration, interdisciplinary research, and
integrative graduate education is face-to-face time to build understanding and trust. Moreover, we
expect that a unified space would also build a further sense of community and diminish the
centripetal forces currently at play.
On-campus Relationships
Although we have the highest admiration for the abilities of the current School director to build
bridges to other units, we do believe that there are lingering bad feelings manifest in some of the
units that gave up faculty or portions of faculty lines in the early years of SENS. Professor Steelman
has done a lot to diminish what at one time may have been open hostility; yet, we believe that for
SENS to grow to a more effective size and to add key expertise other colleges must see the growth of
SENS through transfer of faculty lines as a win-win for themselves.
External Relations
On another note, we do not have detailed information, but from what we learned during our visit we
find that SENS faculty research is not sufficiently engaged with local, regional, and national business
interests. They have been very successful in competing for national and regional research funding
from government sources, but to satisfy their mandate of research engaged in real world outcomes,
more collaboration with business interests is essential.
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9. CONCLUSION
The findings and recommendations of the external review team have been elaborated carefully on
the previous pages of this report, and these can be summarized into this list of our main conclusions:
•
SENS is an excellent example of a non-departmentalized school focused on environment and
sustainability themes, and while still evolving, has the potential to be a signature
accomplishment of the University of Saskatchewan
•
Long term stability of the semi-autonomous units associated with SENS would promote the
identity of the program, the richness of its interdisciplinarity, and intensity of its research
•
There is great opportunity to further cultivate positive relationships with other Deans and
college faculty; an increase in the size of SENS could be beneficial for effectiveness of
research training and visibility—possibly by adding faculty (or units) from, for example, Food
Security, Community Health, and Geography.
•
We believe that the current vision of the School is adequate for expected incremental
change, but encourage more specific long range planning that would enable more
transformatory change if the opportunity emerges.
•
SENS has the potential to be engaged with the economy and communities of Saskatchewan,
but needs to reach further, especially in private sector engagement
•
Unified space would enhance programmatic and intellectual fusion
•
If university advances its effort towards activity based budgeting SENS will need special
consideration or should explore the establishment of an undergraduate program or at least
an introductory sustainability course.
•
Student recruitment efforts will need to target various markets in deliberate and thoughtful
ways.
•
We applaud SENS innovations in graduate and professional education, including the new
professional Master’s degree in Water Security
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