New web resources focus on Artificial Intelligence and academic integrity

Students involved in group work

A new webpage dedicated to helping instructors and teaching assistants navigate Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools such as ChatGPT and academic integrity is now available.

The AI Technology and Academic Integrity webpage provides information about the capabilities and limitations of generative AI technology, such as ChatGPT. The webpage offers strategies for leveraging AI technology as a learning tool and it includes strategies to help students avoid using AI to engage in academic misconduct.

For additional strategies and resources that help raise awareness of academic integrity and assessment design, visit the Academic Integrity webpage.

Experiential Education celebration for faculty offers network and learning opportunities

A person is using a computer

The 2023 EE Faculty Celebration will highlight diverse examples of classroom-focused, community-focused and work-focused experiential education (EE) and how faculty members have engaged employer and community partners in facilitating innovative EE opportunities.

This event is focused primarily for York University faculty and staff who are engaged with and interested in experiential education. The EE Faculty Celebration event will provide a chance for participants to network with other faculty members who have developed and facilitated experiential education opportunities for their students. The EE Faculty Celebration event takes place Feb. 9 from 1 to 3 p.m. and will be presented over Zoom.

Register online online to join this worthwhile opportunity to share and learn more about the variety of ways experiential education can be integrated into courses through stories of examples, lessons learned, and important campus resources available.

Jack Rozdilsky

Jack Rozdilsky
Jack Rozdilsky

Professor Jack Rozdilsky, an associate professor of disaster and emergency management, writes in The Conversation about what the Doomsday Clock’s new setting means

Welcome to the January 2023 issue of ‘Innovatus’

Header banner for INNOVATUS

Happy New Year! Welcome to the January 2023 issue of “Innovatus,” a special issue of YFile dedicated to teaching and learning innovation at York University.

This month, we offer an overview of the Academic Innovation Fund, a unique experiential learning initiative coming out of the Glendon campus, two unique forms of professional development and ChatGPT.

Will Gage
Will Gage

This issue offers a digest of sorts in that it does not have a specific Faculty in the spotlight. Instead, we opted to provide a wide array of interesting stories. The lead story focuses on the Academic Innovation Fund. The deadline for submissions is approaching and we thought you would find an overview of some of the past projects that received funding. It is interesting to see how the innovations arising out of the projects are now part of the fabric of the teaching and learning tapestry at York University.

There are also two interesting stories on professional development. One focuses on a reading group and the other on how a development tool known as Sandbox is inspiring new forms of professional development.

As well, Glendon, through its work with the Toronto French School, is deepening the experiential education for students who are studying French language with a view of a possible teaching career.

And finally, ChatGPT, a new artificial intelligence platform, has dominated the news of late. This story explores how York University is harnessing the power and potential of this new technology.

I hope the ideas presented in this issue are both informative and inspiring.

Sincerely,

Will Gage
Associate Vice-President, Teaching and Learning

Faculty, course directors and staff are invited to share their experiences in teaching, learning, internationalization and the student experience through the “Innovatus” story form, which is available at tl.apps01.yorku.ca/machform/view.php?id=16573.


In this issue:

AIF funds a wide range of teaching and learning projects
Over the years, York University’s Academic Innovation Fund (AIF) has promoted an inspired shift in teaching, learning, the student experience and internationalization of the curriculum.

Glendon’s partnership with Toronto French School is an EE success
The partnership offers a win-win for students at Glendon and the Toronto French School. The collaboration between the two institutions has led to a full-year experiential education opportunity in the form of a professional work placement course.

Reading for teaching offers new perspectives and connections
The new Reading for Teaching program offers an informal, collegial space to engage with colleagues from across York University and it is the result of an inspired collaboration between an educational developer and a teaching and learning librarian.

Coming soon: Innovative professional development online
Although she realizes that faculty members across Ontario may never binge-watch professional development videos focused on learning innovations, Michelle Sengara hopes the learning modules being created will still be a hit with dedicated teachers.

How will AI tools such as ChatGPT shape teaching and learning? 
ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence (AI) tool that has dominated the headlines of late, has been labelled as a transformational force in academia. How are York faculty harnessing this powerful tool?

AIF funds a wide range of teaching and learning projects

Hand holding light bulb with illustration on blurred background

By Elaine Smith

Over the years, York University’s Academic Innovation Fund (AIF) has promoted an inspired shift in teaching, learning, the student experience and internationalization of the curriculum. With the deadline approaching for applications to this year’s AIF, here is an overview of some of the examples of the past projects that received funding.

Will Gage
Will Gage

For Will Gage, York University’s associate vice-president, teaching & learning, the start of the winter term is a sign that it’s time to remind faculty members to submit their applications for Academic Innovation Fund (AIF) grants. And what better way to do so than to share some examples of projects that received grants in the past?

“For more than a decade, the AIF has provided faculty with funding to pilot, develop and test their innovative curricular and pedagogical ideas,” said Gage. “We are proud of the diverse, useful, practical output that has resulted, many of which have been incorporated into the classroom or the student experience.”

For example, an AIF grant is supporting a project related to a topic that is crucial to the University Academic Plan: the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The ‘SDGs-in-the-Classroom” Curricular Innovation Hub is a pan-University, interdisciplinary, scaffolded strategy that aims to infuse the SDGs into more York classrooms more quickly.

Nitima Bhatia and Tracy Bhoola, members of the SDGs-in-the-Classroom Community of Practice, are working under the oversight of Sandra (Skerratt) Peniston, an assistant professor of nursing, to bring this effort to life, thanks to an AIF grant. They led the team that created an SDGs toolkit to make it simple to integrate the SDGs into courses on any subject.

“SDGs do touch on every single discipline, but many people may not realize that, so we want to spread the word across campus,” said Bhoola.

Added Bhatia, “The toolkit has launched, but we are adding resources every day, so it’s a living, breathing resource.”

In time, the toolkit will be located on the hub, which will be home to resources about SDGs, collaboration opportunities and videos created by SDG Curricular Champions. Bhatia and Bhoola are also involved in five workshops being held in conjunction with the Teaching Commons to train faculty to incorporate SDGs into their curricula, and they will be making presentations to the faculty councils about the accessibility and relevance of the tools.

“We really want to get the SDGs into York’s DNA,” said Bhoola.

The 17 Sustainable Development Goals
The 17 Sustainable Development Goals

Robin Sutherland-Harris, an educational developer at the Teaching Commons, has used an AIF grant to develop a speakers’ program for the community of practice that is dedicated to equity, diversity, decolonization and inclusion in teaching and learning. Sutherland-Harris, the project lead, works with co-leads Ameera Ali, another educational developer, and Jessica Vorstermans, an assistant professor of critical disability studies, health policy and equity, to line up speakers for their monthly meetings and set the group’s agenda.

“We launched the community of practice in Fall 2021,” said Sutherland-Harris. “It’s for anyone who deals with teaching and learning at York and we’re always accepting members. We started with 40 people and now have more than 70.

“During our first year, our monthly sessions largely featured members of our community sharing topics of interest or expertise. However, we felt that especially those who are less established or not in the tenure stream were devoting a significant chunk of work to preparing presentations. We wanted to have funding to help support and recognize their labour, and that got us talking about applying for an AIF grant.”

The team plans to apply for a second year of AIF funding to support their monthly lectures and plan for their upcoming May conference.

A partnership between the Schulich School of Business and YSpace is preserving guidance and insights gleaned from York and Schulich alumni in a video database that any faculty member can access. Based on lectures given by these visiting experts, The Entrepreneurial Mindset/Skillset eLearning and Video Database Initiative, offers faculty short clips on myriad topics, such as venture capital and protecting intellectual property, said Chris Carder, executive director of Schulich’s Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

“Normally, when professors want to use video content for a class, they need to go out and find relevant stories,” said Carder. “Often, however, they are coming from American sources. At Schulich there are so many interviews done and appearances made by York and Schulich alumni and we’re saving it all.

“This program wouldn’t be possible without the AIF grant. I’m grateful that York has such a program that encourages us to push the envelope.”

Another current project, EE With, Not In, focuses on experiential education (EE). Led by Natalie Coulter, director of the Institute for Digital Literacies, and Byron Gray, manager of the TD Community Engagement Centre, this collaborative project supports students in their EE experiences in the Jane and Finch community. It uses a reciprocal approach that is respectful of community knowledge and expertise in the community, rather than being grounded in assumptions and stigmatizations.

Meanwhile, the Collective Inclusive Pathways to Access (CIPA) project is working to increase the success of students with disabilities in work placements. Currently, their access is heavily reliant on an accommodations model predicated on disclosure of a medical diagnosis. Led by nursing professor Iris Epstein, the project will develop a CIPA resource for professionals and those responsible for creating accessible EE. 

The AIF fund allows faculty to exercise their pedagogical creativity. Don’t miss out on this year’s call for applications – check your Faculty’s fast-approaching deadline for submission.

Glendon’s partnership with Toronto French School is an EE success

Glendon Campus in the winter
Glendon Campus

By Elaine Smith 

The partnership offers a win-win for students at Glendon and the Toronto French School. The collaboration between the two institutions has led to a full-year experiential education (EE) opportunity in the form of a professional work placement course.

When Mallory Nettleton heard about the opportunity to engage students at Toronto French School (TFS) with the outdoors, “It sounded exactly like what I want to do.”  

Julie Marguet
Julie Marguet

Nettleton, a 2022 Glendon graduate who is now earning her teaching credentials in French immersion and biology, is a strong believer in outdoor education and conservation and immediately contacted Julie Marguet, manager of partnerships and program development for Glendon’s professional development centre, about the Fall 2022 pilot program. 

As an attempt to broaden EE opportunities for Glendon students, Glendon approached TFS early in 2022 to see if there were possibilities of working together. TFS was looking at ways to get their students away from their devices and screens and out into nature, and Glendon had students preparing for education careers who were eager for some hands-on experience. The collaboration between the two has led to a full-year professional work placement course that matches Glendon students with TFS faculty to lead activities in what Marguet calls “the outdoor classroom.” 

“In the University Academic Plan, York University has highlighted its commitment to ‘attain the goal of providing every student with an experiential learning opportunity, regardless of program,’” Marguet said. “The strong Glendon-TFS alliance answers that call by providing meaningful, work-focused experiential education to all Glendon students through an equitable and accessible multidisciplinary approach.” 

It is also part of a larger experiential effort, Projet FranCOnnexion, to support and highlight local francophone EE along Toronto’s Bayview corridor, an initiative supported by Canadian Heritage in collaboration with the Ontario Ministry of Education for Official Language Minority Communities, as well as partners such as Oxford Learning and the Canadian Film Centre. 

For their professional work placement, upper-year Glendon students spend eight paid hours each week working with TFS students on outdoor activities that are appropriate for their grade levels. There are scavenger hunts conducted in French that require young students to find items such as one petal and two leaves as a way of teaching numeracy, games based on nature and walks through the nearby ravine system to discuss the local ecosystem. They also required to meet with their professor bi-weekly to hone skills such as leadership and communications that they can use at TFS and throughout their careers and to participate in career modules in collaboration with Glendon’s career centre. 

“Through skill awareness, skill acquisition and skill articulation, we want to set our students up for success,” said Marguet.  

The outdoor specialists’ pilot began in September 2022 with six students and its success has led to a second, three-credit version that began in January 2023 and is focused on STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) leadership.  

“TFS was thrilled to have potential teaching candidates filling these placements,” Marguet said. “We will continue to look for ways to expand and diversify this cherished partnership.” 

The project now involves 18 Glendon students although many more applied. Marguet required all applicants to work with the career centre to craft a resume, which she reviewed. She met with each of the applicants and chose a set of resumes to forward to TFS. Their staff selected students to interview, which required an additional student foray to the career centre for guidance about job interviews. 

“We want our students, even those who aren’t chosen for the program, to build their career toolbox,” Marguet said. 

When asked about the program, Nettleton said, “Honestly, it’s dream job stuff. I’m so inspired to get to work with students outdoors in a natural setting on an ongoing basis. I can’t tell you how much I enjoy being there and how much I’m taking in. 

“I’m interested in watching how the teachers I work with manage their classrooms and keep students engaged and it’s great to see the students connect what they’re learning to the bigger picture. It’s exciting to see these processes happen and to discover the different strategies that teachers use for different age groups. To watch the students get passionate about the subjects we’re talking about is absolutely incredible.” 

Reading for teaching offers new perspectives and connections  

glasses and pen resting on notebook

By Elaine Smith 

The new Reading for Teaching program offers an informal, collegial space to engage with colleagues from across York University and it is the result of an inspired collaboration between an educational developer and a teaching and learning librarian.

When Teaching Commons educational developer Lisa Endersby and Scott McLaren, teaching and learning librarian, came up with the idea of a Reading for Teaching program, Endersby was looking for ways to continue collaborating with York University Libraries on teaching and learning, while McLaren, who had earned his PhD in the history of the book, was interested in reading communities and their practices and saw an opportunity to see how such a group functioned. The Reading for Teaching program met those goals and many more. 

Reading for Teaching is “an informal, collegial opportunity to engage with colleagues from across campus interested in reading and talking about teaching.” Endersby and McLaren brought it to life pre-pandemic and opened it up to York faculty and staff. Originally, the group met in person, but during the pandemic, the group met online. They hope to return to in-person gatherings soon. 

York librarian Scott McLaren
Scott McLaren

“We draw people from all over the University and every discipline,” McLaren said. “We have faculty from both teaching and research streams, graduate students, post-docs, CLAs and librarians and they all come from different backgrounds. You wouldn’t necessarily think that someone from biology could shed new light on teaching to someone from the humanities, but they do.” 

The group reads books about teaching and meets to discuss them, although the approach has changed over time. 

“We tried to organize around themes and tried to have participants vote on books from a curated shortlist, but we’ve found that reading a common text is the best way to foster engagement,” said McLaren.  

Added Endersby, “The group suggests a topic; Scott can curate suggestions and the two of us pick a book. As a group, we discuss how we want to explore the book together; since they are generally non-fiction, we might look at individual chapters.” 

Lisa Endersby
Lisa Endersby

The program meets four times each term; this winter, the group is discussing How Humans Learn: The Science and Stories Behind Effective College Teaching by Joshua R. Eyler, a hold-over from last term, given its popularity with the group and the amount of relevant material to discuss. The program’s group generally has 10 people or a few more each term, a size that both facilitators find is conducive to participation and good discussion. Members read the books in varied formats: print, online or as audiobooks. 

“People read as much as they can and come as often as possible,” Endersby said. “If they attend two of the four sessions, we consider that they’ve successfully completed the program.” 

What draws people to Reading for Teaching? There are a variety of reasons, said McLaren. 

“People join to improve their teaching and explore different teaching practices, to experience a sense of community around a common concern and to have a support system,” he said. “It’s a great way to share success and failures in a safe environment.” 

Endersby finds that Reading for Teaching offers people an opportunity to read for professional development with some accountability and to reflect on teaching and take part in reflective conversations.  

“We’re all so busy, we don’t often get to pause and think about what we’re doing,” she said. “I know that personally, I talk about reflection a lot in my work on pedagogy, but I don’t get to do it myself, so this is a learning opportunity for me. I also enjoy hearing various different perspectives; it’s really good learning.” 

McLaren agrees and notes another personal benefit. “I’ve discovered an incredibly rich literature around pedagogy, both fiction and non-fiction; it was quite surprising to me and it’s hard to narrow the selection down to shortlists,” he said.

Other books the group has read include The Slow Professor by Professors Maggie Berg (Queen’s University) and Barbara K. Seeber (Brock University) and the memoir From the Ashes: My Story of Being Homeless, Metis and Finding My Way by York University Assistant Professor Jesse Thistle.

Anyone who would like to join the Reading for Teaching program in exploring their current read is welcome to register. For questions or suggestions about books to read, Endersby and McLaren invite you to contact them. 

Coming soon: Innovative professional development online

Image is a featured image for YFile

By Elaine Smith

Although she realizes that faculty members across Ontario may never binge-watch professional development videos focused on learning innovations, Michelle Sengara hopes the learning modules being created will still be a hit with dedicated teachers.

Michelle Sengara
Michelle Sengara

Sengara, director of innovation for York University’s associate vice-president of teaching & learning, and her team are collaborating with Sandbox, Inc., a digital media agency with a specialty in e-learning, to turn evidence-based research about innovative teaching and learning methods into professional development modules. E-Campus Ontario is currently funding the development of these modules and it will be home to the finished products, making them available to teachers everywhere in the province.

“Our aim is to make these modules as catchy as the Explained series on Netflix, which explains large concepts in 20-minute episodes,” says Sengara. “We want to offer innovative content and innovative production values. We use animation and interviews to make professional development interesting and engaging.”

The research fuelling the project is derived from York’s perpetual course model project, an effort that explores innovative course design. Its aim was “to experiment with new ways of thinking about what we teach (curriculum), how we teach (pedagogy) and how we define and measure success (assessment),” said Sengara, who led the initiative. “Rigorous research carried out on these course prototypes has yielded incredible insights on the effective design, development, and delivery of instructional experiences.”

Based on the research, she and her team identified six topics that deserve further exploration in order to revolutionize online teaching and these professional development modules are an attempt to mobilize those knowledge assets in a more innovative and meaningful way:

  1. How to Build Community in Online Learning Settings;
  2. Micro-credentials: Designing Flexible Courses to Upskill and/or Reskill Learners;
  3. Cultivating a Growth mindset as Instructors;
  4. Competency-Based Evaluation: Alternative Assessment Models for Skill Acquisition;
  5. The Who, What, Where, When and Why of the HyFlex Instructional Method; and
  6. How to Use Affective Communication to Teach with Compassion.

They’ve also designed a template for the modules for consistency. Each will discuss what the topic is about, why it’s important and how to do it, giving the series coherence. In addition, the team is building the modules with an eye to academic integrity and robustness. They can be used individually, as micro-credentials or as a resource that can be used in other professional development courses or communities of practice; the opportunities are myriad.

Image shows a flow chart titled Creating Cutting Edge Learning Experiences
The basic template developed by Sengara’s team

During the pandemic, Sengara’s team and Sandbox worked to create the first module, building the foundation for an efficient and effective collaborative process, and did beta testing with users on the resulting video content. However, most of the interviews at the time had to be done on Zoom, so they are being redone in person to ensure that the finished product has more staying power. Since the first module has already been tested by potential users, the team can incorporate their feedback into this new version.

“That’s the development process,” said Sengara. “We learn and iterate. We plan to make the first two modules the blueprint for the others with the same structure and same animation. By testing and gathering feedback along the way, we’re able to brainstorm and see what other ways we can push boundaries and make the modules more innovative.”

The first two modules will be live on eCampus Ontario this spring, with the others to follow later this year. Not only will they provide educators with innovative instructional ideas, but they’ll offer Sengara and her colleagues the opportunity to collect data across Ontario about professional development and academic innovation.

“York will take the lead on collecting this data, in collaboration with the development team at Sandbox,” she said. “We want to publish and give presentations on the next frontier of professional development when it comes to teaching and learning in this digital and disruptive age.”

They also hope to obtain funding for professional translation to make the modules more accessible to French and Indigenous language speakers.

In addition, Sengara and her team have created a strong partnership with Sandbox Inc., one that reflects the priorities of the University Academic Plan and should allow the partners to “continue to produce relevant, meaningful professional development content.”

“We need ways to quickly produce relevant content and get new ideas into the system,” Sengara said. “We want to create just-in-time content so we can spark new ideas that are part of an ongoing professional development conversation.”

How will AI tools such as ChatGPT shape teaching and learning? 

Image shows a computer, chart and international map

By Angela Ward  

ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence (AI) tool that has dominated the headlines of late, has been labelled as a transformational force in academia. How are York faculty harnessing this powerful tool?

Out of all the emerging AI tools, ChatGPT has been the focus lately. The chatbot, developed by OpenAI, interacts with users in a dialogue, answering their prompts with complex responses. Despite the uncertainty that comes with this new technology, it offers exciting possibilities for education.  

Angela Clark
Angela Clark

“We always knew this was on the horizon in the academic integrity world,” said Angela Clark, an academic integrity officer in the Office of the Vice-Provost Academic. “This is a new generation of AI tools that represents a big leap from the AI tools in existence prior to OpenAI releasing DALL-E and ChatGPT last November. We’re still in the beginning stages of learning about what these tools can do and their uses in education.”  

Robin Sutherland-Harris, educational developer in the Teaching Commons (TC) at York University, adds that the use of these tools is already a reality in the working world. “As educators, it makes sense to adapt to these AI tools because students will graduate into this world with AI as part of the landscape. We should think about how we can incorporate them into assessments, strategies and ways that we think about disciplinary writing within academia. AI tools are going to change all of these.  

“I think the process of writing academically will probably shift with the integration of these AI tools into existing software, especially with predictive text completion.” 

Sutherland-Harris is interested in how tools like ChatGPT could help educators reflect on the nature of disciplinary writing and assessments. She said, “I’m excited by the possibilities for thinking about disciplinary writing, thinking about what kind of assessments are robust and how we’re asking students to do what AI is not able to do, such as taking multiple sources in combination and analyzing them for new conclusions.  

“My understanding is that ChatGPT is good at comparing one thing at a time but less adept at using deeper evidence to construct new arguments. How are we building assessments that addresses this, instead of getting bogged down in the mechanics of the writing?” 

ChatGPT can also encourage critical thinking when it comes to fact-checking content in classroom activities since it’s not always accurate with answers and citations. Sutherland-Harris said, “It’s helpful to start with an example text, which can be used to workshop ideas or interrogate what the AI is getting right in terms of a specific thinker, period of history or analysis and ask where the AI is falling short. It gives a useful starting point to push conversations into quite a deep level to really engage with content and discuss how writing should conform to the norms of the discipline, such as English or history.”  

Robin Sutherland-Harris
Robin Sutherland-Harris

Although there are exciting opportunities with AI tools, there are also challenges and concerns within this new terrain. ChatGPT can produce AI-generated essays, programming code and math solutions, which raises concerns about academic integrity.  

“When it comes to academic integrity, there will be some upheaval. It will be challenging as we all adapt to ChatGPT and come up with ways to integrate it into learning. In the short term, there may be more suspicion that students have engaged in academic misconduct. This may lead to more security measures being put in place such as having students write assessments by hand in the classroom or changing assessments from written work to oral. This may happen in order to be cognizant of professors’ time, so they don’t have to scramble to completely restructure how they assess,” said Clark.

In response to ChatGPT, some educators are already changing how they approach assessments and what they’re planning for the semester, said Sutherland-Harris. They are also searching for strategies around course-level policy that can protect academic integrity. Both Sutherland-Harris and Clark agree that this creates an opportunity for open discussion in classrooms, where educators might speak with students in-depth about the ideas they’re presenting or develop a charter with students on the use of academic integrity and AI tools.  

This open communication “engenders trust amongst the learning community,” Clark said. “Given that there are currently no citation guidelines for the content that these tools produce, instructors might even ask students how they think material should be cited.” 

When it comes to ensuring academic honesty, some educators will encourage transparency from students when they submit written work, Sutherland-Harris said. “Professors might ask students if they’ve used any AI or assistive writing technology. What was it and how did you use it? Students might use it to create an outline or draft an introduction before rewriting it. The use of AI for some educators is already being normalized as part of the writing process.”

Reflecting on citations, she notes that there is a gap when it comes to the norms around citing AI. “How do we cite and recognize the use of assistive technologies in the same way we cite other people’s ideas?” 

In terms of what tools like ChatGPT mean for the future, Clark said, “We now have ChatGPT 3.5, which has been shown to make mistakes at times. It can’t really synthesize information from different sources, show evidence of critical thinking and it makes errors when asked to generate programming code or solve math problems. As such, there are ways to detect when it has been used and in the short term, we can maintain our current practices. But GPT-4 will be released soon and who knows what that will bring? It also keeps improving as more people use it, prompting it to ‘learn’ and evolve.”  

“I think the ways that people think about, and structure assessment are already changing and will continue to change,” Sutherland-Harris added. “I wonder about the implications that AI which is good at writing will have on scholarly writing over time, which will affect how we educate students.” 

An upcoming workshop in February will be facilitated by both Sutherland-Harris and Clark to give professors the opportunity to connect on this topic. Instructors who are interested can register here. Different academic integrity resources for instructors and students are in development to help promote more clarity on these tools and their use.   

International students studying at the Lassonde School of Engineering reconnect far from home

Featured image for YFile shows Lassonde_Ugandan Students_Ngasha-Reuel copy

By Elaine Smith

It’s a happy coincidence that Andrea Ngasha Tayebwa and Adren Reuel Singh, who graduated together from high school in Kampala, Uganda, find themselves at York University this year. Both are studying at the Lassonde School of Engineering.

Singh applied to York’s computer engineering program and planned to arrive for the fall 2021 semester, but York was still in pandemic lockdown and classes were online, so he did a semester remotely. When classes resumed in person during the winter of 2022, he encountered visa problems, so he didn’t arrive until fall 2022. Meanwhile, Tayebwa took a gap year after high school, applying to York for a President’s International Scholarship of Excellence. She received the scholarship and also arrived at the University in time for the fall 2022 semester.

Andrea Ngasha Tayebwa (left) with Adren Reuel Singh
Andrea Ngasha Tayebwa (left) with Adren Reuel Singh

“We had lost touch after graduation, so I expected Andrea to go to Montreal to study, since she has family there,” Singh said. “I texted her before I came to Canada and found out she was at York. She took me shopping and helped me settle in and we explored campus together. Now, we keep in touch and hang out when we have time.”

Tayebwa knew Singh was heading to York, but she hadn’t originally planned to come here, too.

“I read the Lassonde School of Engineering information and I was drawn to it,” she said. “I applied and got in. I came a week earlier than Reuel, and we helped each other settle in. It has been nice to have someone from close to home here.”

Both students were deliberate in their choice of Canada as the place to pursue a post-secondary education.

“I had come to Canada once and liked how different it was from back home,” Tayebwa said. “A lot of universities come to Kampala for university fairs and I was drawn to Canada. It is more diverse and more welcoming to international students than many countries, and it’s a safe place.

Singh said, “I found York on a list of the Top 10 universities in Canada. I was accepted at three of them and had to make a decision. I chose York because of Lassonde’s up-to-date curriculum. They are mindful of morals and ethics and I like that they feel the responsibility to train engineers the right way.”

Choosing computer engineering to pursue made sense to Singh, who has been programming since the age of 10 and is already a full stack developer who creates apps, websites and software. While in high school, he created an online voting system for school elections, PolliFy, which is still being used five years later. He has also created an app called Seizafe that analyzes YouTube videos to determine whether or not they might trigger an epileptic seizure and creates a warning for users. He was inspired to design the app, which is endorsed by the British Epilepsy Society, after a high school classmate suffered a fatal seizure during a debate team trip.

“I get emails thanking me, which is heartwarming,” Singh said. “I want people to benefit. I have a yearning to leave a mark in the world.”

For Tayebwa, the decision to become a civil engineer grew out of her interest in math and physics and her determination to do something for her country.

“Our infrastructure isn’t as developed as it is here,” she said. “It’s an area of study that I thought would be useful back home. Eventually, I want to return and help out.

“In the context of my course, I love how the engineering classes [at York] are up to date as current world issues are incorporated into the course and I love the emphasis on collaboration as well as experiential learning. I believe I’m picking up skills such as problem solving, leadership and creativity that will serve me well as I pursue civil engineering.” 

The students are taking classes together during the winter term, since all of the first-year engineering students take basic courses together. Singh took electives last semester in order to be in synch with the other engineers in his cohort.

“Lassonde is attracting talent from all over the world and currently has students from over 130 different countries,” said Jane Goodyer, dean of the Lassonde School of Engineering, after meeting the pair at the President’s International Student Reception, an event organized by York International. “But it’s a small world! We were talking and, when I discovered they were both from Uganda, I didn’t do the obvious and ask if they knew each other. Then, they told me they were from the same high school and the same graduating class, but didn’t realize they were both coming to York. What are the odds of coming all those thousands of kilometres and having someone from home there?”

The reception was also an opportunity for the university to celebrate international scholarship winners, like Tayebwa.

Woo Kim, director of international student and scholar services for York International, said, “Events like the President’s International Student Reception, gives York an opportunity to welcome international students and celebrate the richness and diversity they have to offer our University community.”

The scholarship is an honour that makes Tayebwa proud. “I knew I would hear in late March or early April,” she said. “Even though I felt qualified, I knew it was about luck to some extent, so I just prayed.”

The email informing her that she’d won a President’s International Scholarship arrived on April 1 and Tayebwa didn’t believe it.

“I thought it was probably some April Fool’s joke, but it said to check my online York account, and there was the letter, originally dated March 23. I called my mom and we celebrated.”

Now that they are in Toronto, Tayebwa and Singh are enjoying the campus, getting involved in extracurricular activities and making new friends. However, they plan to keep in close touch.

“Seeing Andrea feels like a piece of home,” Singh said.