AGRICULTURAL & ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
Charles Vincent, MSc’80, PhD’83, has been selected as one of the Canadian Agricultural Hall of Fame’s 2024 inductees. A research scientist with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada and a long-serving adjunct professor in McGill’s Department of Natural Sciences, he has spent 40 years studying insects who have an economic impact on Canadian food production. His work, which included the development of the first viral insecticide registered for use in Canada, has been guided by a vision for developing sustainable agricultural systems that are commercially viable with the lowest environmental impact possible.
Yu-Shing Ni, BSc(AgEnvSci)’20, is part of the 50th cohort of Luce Scholars, a competitive development fellowship that provides emerging leaders with a yearlong opportunity to deepen their ties and understanding of Asia’s countries, cultures, and people. She is a farmer, educator and community organizer.
ARCHITECTURE
John Leroux, BSc(Arch)’93, BArch’94, has been named a 2024 recipient of the Order of New Brunswick “for his outstanding vision, dedication and commitment to the future of the province’s architecture and to the protection of historic buildings, and for his passion for building an improved quality of life for generations to come.” An architectural historian, curator, educator, and practitioner, he led the restoration of important provincial sites like the McAdam Railway Station, St. Anne’s Chapel of Ease in Fredericton, and St. Lawrence’s Anglican Church in Bouctouche.
Conrad Speckert, MArch’22, an intern architect at LGA Architectural Partners, is the recipient of the 2024 Prix de Rome in Architecture – Emerging Practitioners. He is leading a Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation-sponsored research project to develop alternative solutions to the building code requirement for two staircases in small multi-unit residential buildings and has proposed a corresponding change to the National Building Code of Canada. The prize is awarded to a recent graduate of a Canadian school of architecture who demonstrates exceptional potential in contemporary architectural design.
ARTS
John Terry Copp, MA’62, was named to the Order of Canada as a new member. The author or co-author of more than 20 books, he is one of Canada’s foremost military historians, particularly in relation to the country’s military role during the Second World War. He is the founder and director emeritus of the Laurier Centre for the Study of Canada, a research affiliate of Wilfrid Laurier University.
Martin Bowman, BA’67, MA’69, a teacher and translator, was recently awarded an honorary fellowship by the Association of Scottish Literature (ASL). He and Bill Findlay translated eight of Michel Tremblay’s plays from the playwright’s distinctive working-class Quebec French into Scots and all resulted in productions by major Scottish theatre companies between 1989 and 2003. He has been involved in other Quebec/Scottish projects including translating a stage version of Trainspotting into French for a Montreal production. ASL honorary fellowships are awarded to individuals who have made a substantial and distinctive contribution to the Scottish literary tradition as writers, scholars, teachers, publishers, and in other related fields.
Ian Smillie, BA’67, recently published a memoir, Under Development: A Journey Without Maps. A former UN Security Council investigator, he played a key role in the campaign to halt blood diamonds, and he was the first witness at the war crimes trial of Liberian warlord Charles Taylor. In his travels as a writer, consultant and teacher, he had encounters with Graham Greene, Wole Soyinka, James Baldwin, Queen Elizabeth II and former Chinese premier Li Peng, known as the “Butcher of Beijing” for overseeing the Tiananmen Square crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in 1989.
Nancy Neamtan, BA’72, was named a knight of the Order of Montreal in May. She has long been a leader in community-oriented economic development and is the co-founder and former president of the Chantier de l’économie sociale, an organization representing networks of social enterprises (cooperatives and non-profits), local development organizations and social movements.
Judy Lewis, BA’77, and Deborah Weinstein, BA’70, the co-founders of Strategic Objectives, a public relations agency in Toronto, were named among the 2024 inductees for Canada’s Marketing Hall of Legends. The agency’s campaigns have won more than 300 national and international awards, including the United Nations Grand Award for The Body Shop Canada’s STOP Violence Against Women Campaign. The agency was recently involved with the successful launch of the new Professional Women’s Hockey League.
Louise Legault, BA’78, recently published Ce qu’on cache aux enfants. The book explores life in Montreal at the beginning of the 20th century as seen through the eyes of her grandfather, a police captain in Montreal’s red-light district. Montreal was a dynamic, bustling centre of business, but also an “open city” rife with gambling, drugs, prostitution and corruption. You can find more information here.
Paula A. Cox, BA’80, received an honorary degree from Mount Saint Vincent University during its spring convocation ceremonies. She served as premier of Bermuda from October 2010 to December 2012. She previously held senior cabinet positions in the government, including minister of finance and attorney general. Today, she is chair of the African Diaspora Consortium, serves on the advisory board of the International Black Women’s Public Policy Institute, and is a member of the Council of Women World Leaders. She is also the governance and compliance director for Allianz Risk Transfer (Bermuda) Limited.
Michele Young, BA’81, was named one of USA Today’s 2024 Women of the Year. She is a lawyer in Ohio who survived stage 4 breast cancer. Her cancer went undetected for years because routine mammograms weren’t equipped to properly scan the type of dense breast tissue that she and a large percentage of other women have. She helped drive the passage of a bill in her state which requires insurance companies to expand access to advanced breast cancer screenings for women with dense breasts and other risk factors.
Gary Stein, BA’82, was appointed to the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal as a full-time member in February 2024 for a five-year term. In 1995, he joined South Ottawa Community Legal Services as a staff lawyer, representing low-income and vulnerable clients in housing law, federal and provincial income support appeals, and many disability-related issues. In 2005, he became the organization’s executive director. In 2017, after leading the amalgamation of Ottawa’s community legal clinics, he became the executive director of Community Legal Services of Ottawa.
Marguerite Mendell, PhD’83, was named an officer of the Order of Montreal in May. She is a distinguished professor emeritus at Concordia University’s School of Community and Public Affairs, where she has been teaching since 1986. She is the co-founder of the Karl Polanyi Institute of Political Economy, and her research has focused on impact investing, social innovation, community economic development and economic democracy.
Bradley Stoner, MA’84, is the new director of the Division of STD Prevention (DSTDP) at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and Tuberculosis Prevention. During his time at the CDC, he will be taking a leave of absence from his duties as a professor of medicine at Queen’s University and as the head of the Department of Public Health Sciences at Queen’s Health Sciences. His research has focused on the clinical epidemiology of sexually transmitted diseases and sociocultural factors that influence infectious disease risk in human populations.
E. Ria Tzimas, BA’88, was appointed regional senior judge of the Superior Court of Justice of Ontario for the Central West Region. She had previously been a judge of the Superior Court of Justice of Ontario in Brampton, and before that, a Crown attorney with the Ministry of the Attorney General of Ontario.
Carissima Mathen, BA’89, was appointed a judge of the Superior Court of Justice of Ontario in Toronto. She had been a professor of law at the University of Ottawa. She has published over 50 articles and numerous books, among them the award-winning Courts Without Cases: The Law and Politics of Advisory Opinions. She is the co-editor of the recently published Decoding the Court: Legal Data Insights from the Supreme Court of Canada.
Catherine Stewart, BA’90, Canada’s ambassador for climate change, is this year’s recipient of Carleton University’s Bissett Alumni Award for Distinctive Contributions to the Public Sector. She took on her current role in in 2022, having served since 2014 in various senior positions at Environment and Climate Change Canada, including assistant deputy minister of international affairs and chief negotiator for climate change. The annual prize recognizes an alumnus of Carleton’s School of Public Policy and Administration who has made significant contributions to public service.
Lene Madsen, BA’92, formerly a judge of the Superior Court of Justice of Ontario, Family Court, in Hamilton, was appointed a judge of the Court of Appeal for Ontario in Toronto. Before becoming a judge, she was a principal mediator with Bluewater Mediation in London.
Monica Flores, BA’93, became the new vice-president of governmental affairs and communications at Telefilm Canada in April. She had been the president of Monica Flores Consulting, where she advised clients in communications, branding, public affairs and stakeholder relations. Prior to launching that firm, she held senior management positions for companies in the pharmaceutical and healthcare sectors, including Novartis and Bristol-Myers Squibb.
Alexander Boldizar, BA’94, recently published The Man Who Saw Seconds (Clash Books). The thriller follows Preble Jefferson, an otherwise ordinary man who can see five seconds into the future. When a confrontation with a cop on a New York City subway goes tragically wrong, government agencies become aware of Preble’s gift and a manhunt ensues.
Apple C. Newton-Smith, BA’94, formerly a judge of the Ontario Court of Justice in Toronto, was appointed as a judge of the Superior Court of Justice of Ontario in Toronto. Prior to becoming a judge, she was a partner at Berkes Newton-Smith and practiced as a criminal defence lawyer. She was an adjunct professor at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law where her teaching focused on evidence and trial advocacy.
Joanne Blanchard, BA’95, was appointed in June as the new chairperson of the Parole Board of Canada for a term of five years. She has been involved with the Parole Board since 2022, initially serving as a board member, an appeal division board member and then as a regional vice chair. In these roles, she conducted hearings, rendered conditional release decisions, and was responsible for the professional conduct and training of board members.
Simone Pilon, MA’95, became the executive director of Berklee Valencia, the Berklee College of Music’s campus in Valencia, Spain, in April. She had been Berklee Valencia’s interim executive director since March 2023. Before joining Berklee Valencia as dean of academic affairs in 2020, she was chair of Berklee’s Liberal Arts Department in Boston.
Nicola Ciccone, BA’96, recently released J’t’ai trouvée, j’te garde, his 15th album. The record marks the singer-songwriter’s 25th year in the music industry. He has earned several platinum and gold records, has performed across Canada and Europe, has been nominated for three Juno Awards, and was twice named Male Artist of the Year at Quebec’s Félix Awards.
Jessica Katz, BA’98, is now affiliated with the Buffalo and Albany-based affordable housing and community development law firm of Cannon Heyman & Weiss, LLP as strategic policy advisor. She recently served as the chief housing officer for the City of New York. She previously worked for more than 10 years in a variety of roles for New York’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development. She is an adjunct professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, where she teaches a course on housing and homelessness.
Mariko Tamaki, BA’98, and her cousin Jillian Tamaki were among five Canadian graphic novel creators whose work was showcased on a recent series of stamps released by Canada Post. The award-winning graphic novels that the Tamakis have collaborated on include Skim, This One Summer, and Roaming. She recently won Eisner Awards for Best Writer and Best Graphic Album for her work on Roaming. The Eisners, awarded at the San Diego Comic Convention, honour excellence and achievement in comics.
Chiara Laricchiuta, BA’01, GrCertTESL’10, is a college professor in Montreal. North Star, her second collection of poetry, will be published in October by AOS Publishing. The collection “invites readers to a sacred place of deep awakening, encouraging them to move towards a mission, a goal, or a special project.”
Brittany Greenslade, BA’07, recently became the anchor for CBC Manitoba’s News at Six. Prior to joining the CBC in 2023, she worked with Global News for 11 years. She has had the opportunity to work across the country covering some of the top news stories in Canada, including the Vancouver Winter Olympics and the Humboldt Broncos bus crash. In 2018, she won the RTDNA Dan McArthur In-Depth Investigative award.
Alessandro Giardino, PhD’13, co-chair of the World Languages, Cultures, and Media Department at Saint Lawrence University, is the author of The Caravaggio Syndrome, an English version of his novel Sindrome di Caravaggio, which he translated from Italian with Joyce Myerson. The book was recently published by Rutgers University Press as part of its Other Voices of Italy series. A fusion of historical, queer, and speculative fiction, the novel involves an unusual love triangle, time travel, and 17th-century utopian philosopher Tommaso Campanella.
Sarah Balakrishnan, BA’14, an assistant professor of history at Duke University, was among five Canadians shortlisted for the 2024 Commonwealth Short Story Prize. An international judging panel selected 23 stories for the shortlist from 7,359 entries. Her story, “When Things End,” is about a sexual relationship between a white Zimbabwean professor and a young graduate student of color. It explores themes of gender, race, power and inequality.
EDUCATION
Sally Armstrong, BEd’66, DLitt’02, is the co-author with Sima Samar of Outspoken: My Fight for Freedom and Human Rights in Afghanistan. The book chronicles Samar’s experiences in Afghanistan as a doctor, a public official, a founder of schools and hospitals, and a thorn in the side of the Taliban. The book was recently named to the longlist for the Moore Prize, an award for works of non-fiction published in English that promote the values consistent with the advancement of human rights and dignity.
Susanne Lajoie, BA’78, MA’80, a professor emerita in McGill’s Department of Educational and Counselling Psychology, was recently awarded the McGill University Medal for Exceptional Academic Achievement. Known for her research on how to best use digital technology to enhance learning, she developed computer-based learning environments in multiple disciplines – including for medical students, avionics technicians, and pilots. Before her retirement in 2023, she taught at McGill for 32 years. She served an eight-year term as the chair of her department and is a past recipient of the Carrie M. Derick Award for Graduate Supervision and Teaching at McGill.
Myrna Lashley, MEd’86, PhD’95, an associate professor in McGill’s Department of Psychiatry and an adjunct researcher at the Culture and Mental Health Research Unit of the Lady Davis Institute for Medical Research, was named to the Order of Canada as a new member. The former chair of Canada’s Cross Cultural Roundtable on Security, and the former vice-chair of the board of the École Nationale de Police du Québec, she has played an important role in shaping policies, practices and interventions that promote equity, inclusivity and cultural sensitivity.
Elma Moses, DipEd’91, MEd’96, PhD’13, became the new host of CBC Radio’s Cree-language program Winschgaoug in March. Winschgaoug — “wake up” in English — is a morning radio show that airs live every weekday from 8 a.m to 9 a.m in the Cree communities of James Bay. She worked at the Cree School Board between 2017 and 2022, serving as deputy director general and director of education services.
Derek Webster, DipEd’94, recently released National Animal, his second book of poetry. In poems that extend beyond the biographical toward the political, the collection’s quiet, sharp-eyed narrator – a man “tripping / my way forward, trying to lead my own life” – watches history being erased in favour of more socially palatable ideas and comforting self-portraits. His previous collection Mockingbird was a finalist for the Gerald Lampert Award for best first book of poems in Canada.
Daniel Jacob, BEd’05, has joined the American Hockey League’s Laval Rocket as an assistant coach. He spent last season as an assistant coach with the Syracuse Crunch and served as an assistant coach with the San Diego Gulls during the 2021-2022 season. He rejoins the Rocket, having spent three seasons (2018-19 – 2020-21) as the team’s assistant coach. As a McGill student, he played four seasons with the McGill men’s hockey team.
Leslie Oles, BEd’17, recently joined the McGill women’s hockey team as a full-time assistant coach. She was a physical education and fitness teacher at Kuper Academy from 2019 to 2024, and her previous hockey coaching experience includes two years at Dawson College. A four-time RSEQ conference all-star during her five years as a McGill player, she ranks third among the team’s all-time leaders in overall games played (199), and goals (144), and fourth in points (293).
Jacinthe Paillé, GradCertEdLeadership’18, is the co-founder of the Montreal Mystery Festival, a new book festival in Montreal dedicated to the mystery and thriller genres. The first festival, which took place at the Grande Bibliothèque in May, involved 24 authors from Quebec, the rest of Canada, the United States and abroad, including guest of honour Lilja Sigurðardóttir (the Reykjavík Noir Trilogy).
ENGINEERING
Ian Cameron, BEng’79, MEng’82, is the recipient of the 2024 MetSoc Sustainability Award from the Metallurgical Society of the Canadian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy. He is the principal metallurgist, ferrous, at Hatch Ltd., where he helps iron and steel clients with process improvement and decarbonization strategies. He has extensive international experience in ironmaking process technology, plant operations, and new technology implementation. The prize recognizes his efforts to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the global steel industry.
Lawrence Chen, BEng’95, a professor in McGill’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, received the Guy-Rocher prize for excellence in undergraduate teaching at the university level from Quebec’s Ministère de l’Enseignement supérieur. He began teaching at McGill in 2000. Since then, he has earned multiple teaching awards, including the McGill President’s Prize for Excellence in Teaching and the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) Canada J. M. Ham Outstanding Engineering Educator Award.
Carl Colizza, BEng’98, is the new president and CEO of Saputo Inc. Since joining Saputo in 1998, he has held key leadership positions in the areas of engineering, operations, business development and strategy. He was appointed president and COO, Dairy Division (Canada) in 2015 before taking on the role of president and COO (North America) in 2019.
Jeff Karp, BEng’99, is a professor at Harvard Medical School, a principal faculty member at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute, and an affiliate faculty member at the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology. He has published over 165 peer-reviewed papers, and the technologies developed in his lab have led to the launch of seven companies. His new book LIT: Life Ignition Tools: Use Nature’s Playbook to Energize Your Brain, Spark Ideas, and Ignite Action, offers techniques for fostering greater focus, creativity and motivation.
Rhys Adams, BEng’02, MEng’05, a physics professor at Vanier College and an adjunct professor in McGill’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, received the Paul-Gérin-Lajoie prize for college teaching from Quebec’s Ministère de l’Enseignement supérieur. He was also the recipient of the 2022-2023 Vanier College Teaching Excellence Award.
Julien Letartre, BEng’04, was recently made a partner at Accelia Capital, a venture capital fund that focuses on innovative technology companies with high growth potential. Before joining Accelia Capital in 2022, he worked in venture capital and private equity at the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec.
INFORMATION STUDIES
Dorothy Williams, MLIS’11, PhD’06, was named an officer of the Order of Montreal in May. She is a historian who specializes in Black Canadian history and the author of Blacks in Montreal, 1628-1986: An Urban Demography and The Road to Now: A History of Blacks in Montreal. She was a consultant for the NFB films Show Girls and Black Soul/Âme Noire.
LAW
Norman Steinberg, BSc’71, BCL’75, was named an officer of the Order of Montreal in May. The vice-chair of BFL Canada, he is the former chair of Norton Rose Fulbright and its predecessor firm, Ogilvy Renault. He has sat on boards and executive committees associated with many prominent Montreal organizations and institutions, including the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, Centraide of Greater Montreal, the Foundation of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, and the McGill University Health Centre Foundation.
Geneviève Saumier, BCom’87, BCL’91, LLB’91, is the new dean of the Faculté de droit at the Université de Montréal. She had been teaching at McGill’s Faculty of Law since 1996. In 2016, she was named to the Faculty’s Peter M. Laing, Q.C., Chair. She served as the Faculty’s associate dean (academic) from 2005 to 2008. An authority on consumer law, international dispute resolution, and cross-border class actions, her work has been cited many times by the Supreme Court of Canada. In 2016, she received the Canadian Bar Association’s Paul-André-Crépeau Medal.
Karine Morin, BCL’93, LLB’93, was recently appointed as the new president and CEO of the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences. Over the past 15 years, she held senior and executive positions at organizations such as Alberta Innovates, Genome Canada, and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. Most recently, at the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, she led the tri-agency action plan on equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) and was instrumental in developing and implementing Dimensions, a flagship program that provides guidance to universities and colleges on advancing EDI across their research ecosystems.
Margot L. Fleming, LLB’94, MSW’95, was appointed a justice of appeal of the Court of Appeal for British Columbia in Vancouver. She had been serving on the Supreme Court of British Columbia since 2013. Before her appointment to that court, she was an associate at Somers & Company and her main areas of practice were family law, child protection and labour law.
Christopher Greenwood, LLB’96, was appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of British Columbia in Vancouver. He had been working at what is now the Public Prosecution Service of Canada since 1997, most recently as senior general counsel. His practice included lengthy prosecutions involving criminal organizations, complex wiretap cases, and national security files.
Patrick Ferland, BCL’98, LLB’98, was appointed a judge of the Superior Court of Quebec for the district of Montreal. He was a founding partner of the law firm LCM Attorneys Inc. His practice covered many aspects of civil and commercial litigation, as well as public and administrative law. He taught evidence law at McGill’s Faculty of Law for many years and is co-author of the “Droit international privé” chapter of the Collection de droit de l’École du Barreau du Québec.
Alan Jacobson, LLB’98, was appointed as a judge to the Provincial Court of Saskatchewan in Swift Current. He joined the province’s Ministry of Justice and Attorney General as crown counsel in 2000. He remained with the ministry, where he became senior Crown counsel in the Constitutional Law Branch and, later, chief legislative Crown counsel in the Legislative Drafting Branch. He received his King’s Counsel designation in 2019.
Catherine McKenna, LLB’99, was awarded an honorary degree by McMaster University in June. As Canada’s minister of environment and climate change, she was a lead negotiator of the Paris Agreement and led the effort to implement Canada’s first comprehensive climate plan. She later served as the country’s minister of infrastructure and communities. More recently, she was the chair of the United Nations’ High-Level Expert Group on the Net-Zero Emissions Commitments of Non-State Entities. She is currently the CEO of Climate and Nature Solutions, a climate advisory firm.
Kristèle Younès, BCL’00, LLB’00, was recently appointed by United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres to be the UN resident coordinator in Guinea. She previously served as director of the Human Rights and Humanitarian Policy Concentration at Columbia University’s Graduate School of International and Public Affairs in New York; as head of office for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in South Sudan; as deputy regional director of the UN Development Coordination Office in the Asia Pacific Region; and as head of office for UN OCHA in Damascus, Syria. A UN resident coordinator is the chief of a UN diplomatic mission in a country.
Robert Leckey, BCL’02, LLB’02, McGill’s dean of law, is one of the recipients of the 2024 Hero Award from the Sexual and Gender Diversity Alliance Section of the Canadian Bar Association. Open to lawyers, professors, law students and judges who are members of the LGBTQ2+ communities, the award recognizes excellence within the Canadian legal profession in advancing the cause of equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and two-spirit people. His publications have addressed same-sex marriage, recognition of a variety of parenting arrangements, and the links between family law and the criminalization of homosexual conduct. He has chaired McGill’s Equity Subcommittee on Queer People and co-chairs McGill’s Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Committee.
Liliane Bantourakis, BCL/LLB’04, was appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of British Columbia in New Westminster. She had been crown counsel at the British Columbia Prosecution Service in Vancouver, where she specialized in criminal law and appellate advocacy. A former Supreme Court clerk, she served as a B.C. regional committee member for the Supreme Court Advocacy Institute, which provides non-partisan advocacy advice to lawyers who are scheduled to appear in an appeal before the Supreme Court.
Audrey Boctor, BCL/LLB’05, was appointed a judge of the Superior Court of Quebec for the district of Montreal. A former Supreme Court of Canada law clerk, she was a partner at IMK LLP. She is a former president of the Quebec branch of the Canadian Bar Association and served as a director on the boards of CBA-National and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association. In 2021, she received the CBA SAGDA Ally Award for her litigation work advancing equality for LGBTQ2+ people in Canada, and in 2024 she received the Prix Jules-Deschênes for her exceptional service to CBA-Quebec.
Maxime Laverdière, BCL/LLB’07, was recently appointed as the new chief legal officer and corporate secretary for the Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC). He now leads the legal and corporate secretariat team, which provides legal advice to all BDC’s business units and corporate functions, as well as to the board of directors. Before joining BDC in 2023 as vice president and assistant general counsel, he served as vice president, legal affairs at Resolute Forest Products.
Bennett Jensen, BCL/JD’11, is one of the recipients of the 2024 Hero Award from the Sexual and Gender Diversity Alliance Section of the Canadian Bar Association. He is the director of legal for Egale Canada, a non-profit committed to improving the lives of 2SLGBTQI people in Canada. Previously, as the deputy head of a New York-based law firm’s pro bono practice, he played a leading role in responding to the family separation crisis at the US-Mexico border and the Muslim travel ban. After returning to Canada, he served as a policy advisor and then as director of litigation to the federal minister of justice and attorney general, where he supported the passage of the criminal ban against conversion “therapy.”
Anthony Morgan, BCL/LLB’12, was appointed to the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal as a full-time member in May for a five-year term. From 2018 to 2024, he worked at the City of Toronto, where he led social policy initiatives focused on advancing social justice and human rights and addressing systemic anti-Black racism. He also served as co-chair of the Anti-Racism Advisory Panel of the Toronto Police Services Board from 2021 to 2023.
Joseph Paul Murdoch-Flowers, BA’08, BCL/LLB’12, was appointed to a five-year term as Nunavut’s ethics officer. A practicing lawyer, he has worked in the National Litigation Division for the Government of Canada’s Department of Justice. Prior to that, he worked in civil litigation with the Legal Services Board of Nunavut and as acting senior justice of the peace for the Nunavut Court of Justice.
John Hutchings, BA’05, MA’07, BCL/LLB’15, was appointed to the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal as a full-time member in March for a five-year term. He joined the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada (IRB) as counsel in 2016. His roles at the IRB included training and supporting decision-makers, deciding claims for refugee protection as a member of the Refugee Protection Division, and acting as general counsel within the IRB’s Legal Services. Internationally, he has provided training to the International Association of Refugee and Migration Judges, and co-moderated a multilateral dialogue on asylum with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
MANAGEMENT
Jean Gattuso, BCom’79, recently became the new chairman of Café William’s board of directors. He was the president and COO of Industries Lassonde from 2012 to 2021. He has served as a board member of Investissement Québec and co-chaired the National Supply Chain Task Force at Transport Canada. Café William, a Canadian company dedicated to sustainable practices in its approach to producing organic fair-trade coffee, was recognized by Canadian Business as one of its Top 10 Most Innovative Companies for 2024.
Marie-Hélène Nolet, BCom’94, is the new chair of the board of directors for ADM Aéroports de Montréal. She has more than 25 years of management, investment and negotiation experience in Canada, the United States and Europe. Most recently, she was chief operating officer at Desjardins Capital. She has been a member of ADM’s board of directors since 2019. ADM Aéroports de Montréal is the airport authority for the Greater Montreal area responsible for the management, operation and development of YUL Montréal-Trudeau International Airport.
Yves Lachance, CBIS(MIS)’97 is the new vice president and studio head of Warner Bros. Games Montréal, leading the management of all design, art, engineering and production for the studio. Before taking on this position, he had been the studio director of Bethesda Game Studios in Montreal.
Pierre Legault, MMgmt’02, was named to the Order of Canada as a new member. He has co-founded social and environmental organizations that provide support to disadvantaged people, including Moisson Montréal, Quebec’s first food bank, and Renaissance, an innovative enterprise serving as a springboard into the job market for those seeking employment.
Anna Buksowicz, BCom’21, was selected by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for its Academy Gold Rising Program. As a production designer, art director, and creative executive, she has contributed to a range of projects including music videos, advertisements and short films. The Academy Gold Rising Program chooses emerging and diverse talent with promising potential as future leaders in the film industry from a pool of thousands of applicants.
MEDICINE & HEALTH SCIENCES
Norman Wolmark, BSc’65, MDCM’70, a professor of surgery at the University of Pittsburgh, received the 2024 American Surgical Association Medallion for Advancement of Surgical Care. The award recognizes individuals who have made innovative and lasting contributions to the care of surgical patients. An expert on the treatment of breast and bowel cancers, he has chaired the National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project since 1994.
Steve Nelson, MDCM’78, was named the chancellor of LSU Health New Orleans earlier this year. He had been the interim chancellor since the fall of 2021. He previously served as dean of the LSU Health New Orleans School of Medicine and as the vice-chair of research for its Department of Medicine. He has authored or co-authored over 250 peer-reviewed journal papers, seven books/monographs and 30 book chapters.
George Alexander Kuchel, MDCM’80, the Travelers Chair in Geriatrics and Gerontology at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine and the director of the UConn Center on Aging, has been elected a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in recognition of his “distinguished contributions to the field of medical sciences and aging research, particularly using multidisciplinary translational approaches to improve the lives of older adults.”
Anne-Marie Mes-Masson, PhD’84, was named a knight of the Order of Montreal in May. A professor in the Department of Medicine at the Université de Montréal, she is known for her major contributions to biobanking. The associate director of basic and translational research at the Centre de recherche du Centre hospitalier de l’Université de Montréal, the major focus of her research has been ovarian and prostate cancer.
Allan Peterkin, Medical Resident’90, DipPsych’92, a professor of psychiatry and family medicine at the University of Toronto, is the author of Staying Human During Residency Training: How to Survive and Thrive After Medical School. The book was first published while he was still a medical resident at McGill. A new 25th anniversary edition is now available with new content that explores subjects like new technologies in medicine (including AI and virtual assessment tools), and the impact of the COVID pandemic on learning systems and resident morale.
Dan Poenaru, Medical Resident’93, a McGill professor of pediatric surgery, was named to the Order of Canada as a new member. He established a pediatric surgical unit and novel training program in a remote area of Kenya, which expanded the quality and quantity of treatments within the country and beyond. He also helped found three medical schools in Africa and has served in leadership roles with the Global Initiative for Children’s Surgery and BethanyKids, an initiative that trains pediatric surgeons from across Africa.
Robert Stein, BSc’93, MDCM’97, became the new associate dean, learner experience, at Western University’s Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry in February. He had been the assistant dean, learner experience (undergraduate medicine) since 2016. He joined the Children’s Hospital at London Health Sciences Centre as a pediatric endocrinologist in 2003 and has been the division head there since 2015. He also serves as medical director for Camp Discovery, a summer camp for children with Type 1 diabetes.
Saman Arfaie, MDCM’24, a recent McGill medical graduate, is the 2024 recipient of the Canadian Medical Association’s CMA Award for Young Leaders (Student). He co-founded the Canadian Medical Student Interest Group in Neurosurgery, and co-created the Neuro International Collaboration, a multi-continental research group. He is co-writing two textbooks, one being the first interdisciplinary volume on COVID-19 in Canada and the other titled Neurobiology of Creativity: Music & Medicine, both to be published in 2025.
MUSIC
Aldo Mazza, BMus’79, a percussionist/drummer, producer and music educator, and his wife Jolan Kovacs, BMus’93, MA’96, PhD’01, a violinist and concert pianist, have been involved in organizing cultural travel trips to Cuba since 2001. KoSA Cuba Travel can arrange for experiences custom-made for the needs of different groups or individuals interested in exploring Cuban music and culture.
Jenny Mitchell, BMus’96, the founder and CEO of the coaching and consulting firm Chavender, is the editor and co-author of Embracing Ambition: Empowering Women to Step Out, Be Seen, and Lead. In the book, 12 women leaders from different fields share their stories as a mentorship resource for the next generation of women leaders. The book identifies some of the obstacles that ambitious women might face, and proposes solutions based on the experiences of women leaders who have encountered them.
Christine Jensen, BMus’94, MMus’06, a Juno Award-winning saxophonist and composer, recently released her third jazz orchestra album Harbour. The album features her Montreal-based orchestra, along with guest soloists including Ingrid Jensen on trumpet and electronics, Gary Versace on piano, Chet Doxas, BMus’04, MMus’08, on tenor saxophone, Jon Wikan on drums and Steve Raegele on guitar.
Darcy James Argue, BMus’97, received the 2024 Jazz Journalists Association Award for Arranger of the Year. He was a nominee for two other JJA Jazz Awards in the categories of Composer of the Year and Large Ensemble of the Year for his work with his 18-piece ensemble, Secret Society. Their most recent album, Dynamic Maximum Tension, was released last September.
Hannah Darroch, DMus’20, was named the new chief executive of the SOUNZ Centre for New Zealand Music in April. The principal flute of the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra, she has taught at the University of Canterbury’s School of Music. She has 16 years of arts management experience and brings an active interest in New Zealand music to her new role. Her doctoral studies at McGill looked at connections between the timbre of taonga pūoro (a Māori musical instrument) and its use in contemporary New Zealand flute works.
Jeanel Liang, MMus’22, GrDipPerformance’23, Post-GradArtistDip’24 (violin), Jérôme Chiasson, BMus’23, GrDipPerformance’24 (violin), Celia Morin, BMus’22, GrDipPerformance’23, GradArtistDip’24 (viola), and Maya Enstad, MMus’23 (cello), are the members of the Katarina String Quartet, an ensemble formed at McGill in 2022. The group was recently awarded the gold medal and the BIPOC Composer Prize at the Saint Paul String Quartet Competition. They will begin a two-year residency at The Juilliard School in September as Juilliard’s graduate resident string quartet. Inspired by Katarina Guarneri, the wife of the renowned violinmaker Giuseppe Guarneri del Gesù, the quartet pays tribute to lesser-known women whose uncredited contributions have helped paved the way in the creation of classical music for centuries.
SCIENCE
Vaira Vike-Freiberga, PhD’65, DSc’02, was named to the Order of Canada as an officer (honorary). A professor emerita in psychology at l’Université de Montréal, she returned to her native Latvia to become the first woman to serve as its president, helping the country enter into NATO and the European Union, and regain stability during its post-Soviet period. She remains committed to protecting democracy and human rights, and to promoting women leaders worldwide.
Fred Genesee, MA’70, PhD’74, an emeritus professor of psychology at McGill, is the recipient of the International Association for the Study of Child Language’s 2024 Roger Brown Award for exceptional research and leadership in child language acquisition. Over the course of his career, he has made groundbreaking contributions to the field of language learning in bilingual speakers and to the implementation and assessment of second-language education. The Roger Brown Award recognizes scholars who have done outstanding work in the field of child language acquisition.
Alan Rauch, BSc’77, a professor of English at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, recently published Sloth. Part of a series of books about animals from the British publisher Reaktion, Sloth offers a colorful and wide-ranging biological and cultural history of the fascinating mammals, exploring how today’s sloths evolved from gigantic prehistoric ancestors. Publisher’s Weekly described the book as “amusing and informative.”
Nadia Agopyan, BSc’84, PhD’91, was recently appointed the new senior vice president of regulatory affairs for Neurona Therapeutics, a clinical-stage biotherapeutics company focused on regenerative cell therapies for disorders of the nervous system. She joined Neurona from Marker Therapeutics, where she served as senior vice president of regulatory affairs, helping to develop T cell therapies for solid tumors and hematological malignancies.
Jeremy Quastel, BSc’85, a professor of mathematics at the University of Toronto, was awarded the Paul Lévy Prize during the 9th European Congress of Mathematics in July. His research is on the large-scale behaviour of interacting particle systems and stochastic partial differential equations, recently concentrating on the Kardar-Parisi-Zhang universality class, where he and collaborators discovered the first exact solutions of the KPZ equation, the polymer endpoint distribution, and, more recently the general solution of the model TASEP, and through it the fixed point of the universality class. Created jointly by the European Mathematical Society, École Polytechnique, the Fondation de l’École Polytechnique and Paul Lévy’s family, with the support of BNP Paribas, the new Paul Lévy Prize is designed to reward outstanding contributions in the field of probability theory and its applications.
Alexis Maciel, BSc’87, PhD’95, an associate professor of computer science and chair of the Department of Computer Science at Clarkson University, was awarded Clarkson’s Distinguished Teaching Award during the university’s spring 2024 commencement ceremonies. He teaches courses on software development, algorithms and data structures, and the theory of computation. Candidates are nominated for the award by Clarkson alumni, and the final selection is made by a faculty committee.
Christopher Martin, BSc’89, was one of the seven recipients of the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME)’s 2024 Distinguished Service Award in recognition of his contributions to organization and assessment in medical education. He is a professor of medicine and public health and the director of the Global Engagement Office for the Health Sciences Center at West Virginia University. His involvement with NBME began in 2007, and he has been involved in several test development committees. He recently completed an eight-year term on the NBME Council and currently serves on the NBME’s Global Advisory Committee.
Mona Nemer, PhD’08, was recently reappointed as Canada’s chief science advisor for a term of three years. She has served in the role since 2017. She and her office have provided scientific advice to the federal government on a number of issues, including managing the COVID-19 pandemic, preparing for future emergencies, promoting open science and scientific integrity, and strengthening Canada’s Arctic research enterprise.