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Visiting Scholar Profile

Professor Sonia Lawrence

Professor Sonia Lawrence is an Associate Professor of Law at Osgoode Hall Law School (York University). She joined Osgoode’s faculty in 2001 after graduating from the University of Toronto's joint LLB/MSW program, and went on to serve as law clerk to Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin of the Supreme Court of Canada. With the help of Fulbright and SSHRC Fellowships, she then attended Yale Law School where she focused on constitutional equality issues and welfare administration.

A past member of the Board of Parkdale Community Legal Services, Professor Lawrence has also provided expertise to the African Canadian Legal Clinic, the Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF), and the Court Challenges Program. She is a member of the Executive of the Canadian Association of Law Teachers and the case comments editor of the Canadian Journal of Women and the Law.

Her work centers on questions of equality and includes examinations of the Supreme Court of Canada’s equality jurisprudence, the influence of feminism in Canadian law, sentencing regimes for 'drug mules', and section 28 of the Charter.

She has served as Assistant Dean, First Year, and worked on Admissions and Curriculum Reform at Osgoode. She is currently on sabbatical from Osgoode, and her sabbatical research focus is on how conceptions of equality, including legal equality, are deployed in the debate over schools targeted to or restricted to specific demographic groups, with a focus on recent developments in the TDSB.

Professor Lawrence office at OISE is 6-174 and she is here until Summer 2010.

Selected publications can be seen here: http://osgoode.yorku.ca/osgmedia.nsf/research/lawrence_sonia

Publications and Presentations

Creso Sa

Sá, C. M. (in press). Canadian provinces and public policies for university research. Higher Education Policy.

Oleksiyenko, A. & Sá, C. M. (in press) Resource asymmetries and cumulative advantages: Canadian and US research universities and the field of global health. Higher Education. DOI 10.1007/s10734-009-9254-5.

Geiger, R. & Sá, C. M. (2009). Technology transfer offices and the commercialization of university research in the United States. In Patrick Clancy & David Dill (eds.) The Research Mission of the University: Reforms and Response (pp.177-196). Rottedam, Boston, Taipei: Sense Publishers.

Sá, C. (2009). 'Entrepreneurial Behaviors and the Research Cultures and Practices of Academic Departments in Canadian Universities'. Paper presented at the 22th Annual Conference of the Consortium of Higher Education Researchers (CHER) “Public Vices, Private Benefits? - Assessing The Role of Markets in Higher Education” Porto, Portugal, September 10-12, 2009.

Sá, C., Tu, Y., & Li, S. (2009). 'Research Productivity and Technology Transfer Activities of Foreign-Born Faculty in Canadian Universities'. Paper presented at Annual Conference of the Association for the Study of Higher Education (ASHE), Vancouver, British Columbia, November, 2009.

Sá, C., & Li, S. & Faubert, B. (2009). 'Strategies of Schools of Education to Disseminate Research: Preliminary Findings from an International Study'. Paper presented at Annual Conference of the Association for the Study of Higher Education (ASHE), Vancouver, British Columbia, November, 2009.

Sá, C. (2009).'American Universities, Innovation, and the Promise Economic Growth', Invited Address, Policy Issues in Post-Secondary Education Series, Green College, University of British Columbia, March 19th, 2009.

Sá, C. (2009). 'Interdisciplinary Institutions: Incentives and Disincentives for Collaboration'. Invited Address, Workshop 'Institution Building for Climate Change Solutions: Strategies for Universities' , York University, March 16th, 2009.

Sá, C. (2009). Getting it “just right”: What’s the right combination of values for universities as they adapt to changing social, economic, and political circumstances? Academic Matters: The Journal of Higher Education.ss, Senate Meeting on the Study on the accessibility of post-secondary education in Canada, Ottawa

Ben Levin

Panel member, 'The Future of School Reform in the United States', sponsored by Harvard University and Pew Charitable Trust

Keynote, British Education Research Association, Manchester, Setp 3

Keynote, Australian Council for Education Leadership, Darwin, Sept 26

Presentation, Sick Kids symposium on research mobilization, Sept 23

Presentation, Leading Student Achievement (secondary school principals) Toronto Oct 16

Publication

Piece with Michael Fullan in Education Week, The fundamentals of whole system reform, June 17

New contract with Canadian Education Association to produce short research summaries for parents for schools to include in their school newsletters

Continuing to write 'In Canada' column for Kappan magainze -most recent, Sept, 2009, was on public confidence in public education (www.pdkintl.org)

Tricia Seifert

Recent publications:

Asel, A., Seifert, T., & Pascarella, E. (2009). The effects of Greek
affiliation on college experiences and outcomes: A portrait of
complexity. Oracle: The Research Journal of the Association of
Fraternity/Sorority Advisors, 4(2), 1-15.

Seifert, T., & Holman-Harmon, N. (2009). Practical implications for
student affairs professionals' work in facilitating students' inner
development. New Directions for Student Services, 2009(125), 13-21.

Invited presentation:

Structuring Faculty Work to Support Student Learning presented to the
Midwestern Alliance for Learning in the Liberal Arts at Illinois
Wesleyan University, Bloomington, Illinois.