Last fall, the University of Alberta joined 40 other peer institutions across Canada in signing the Scarborough Charter on Anti-Black Racism and Black Inclusion in Canadian Higher Education, a document outlining a national plan of action to fight structural racism.
As a part of this commitment to diversifying the institution’s professoriate, we launched an inclusive excellence initiative, the Black academic excellence cohort hire, that included hiring twelve tenure-track Black scholars across a range of disciplines and Faculties. We are delighted to report that many of these colleagues joined our campuses this past July (2022). A welcoming reception for these new colleagues sponsored by the Office of the Provost and the Office of the Vice President (Research and Innovation) was held at the University Club in the fall that invited these new Cohort hires, along with Chairs, Deans, and members of the Black Faculty Association.
I would like to express my gratitude to those who were key in moving the cohort hire forward, including the Black Faculty Collective, deans and participating faculties, and all those involved. On behalf of the entire university: thank you.
Please join me in warmly welcoming each of these excellent academics to our University of Alberta campuses, including North campus, Campus Saint-Jean and Augustana.
COLLEGE OF HEALTH SCIENCES
Faculty of Kinesiology, Sport & Recreation
Dr. Josephine Godwyll, Assistant Professor
Research areas: Connections between individual and community well-being; access to public spaces; inequitable spatial and systemic barriers that exist to accessing recreation facilities; development of disadvantaged populations.
School of Public Health
Dr. Elizabeth Onyango, Assistant Professor
Research areas: Health geography; population health and food security; gender based violence; household and food security; youth and maternal health; environmental health
Rehabilitation Medicine
Dr. Victor Ezeugwu, Assistant Professor, Department of Physical Therapy
Research areas: Precision health using behaviour change and ecological approaches to personalize rehabilitation interventions; neuroimaging biomarkers, physical- and social-environment correlates and determinants of movement behaviours in people with neurological and cognitive impairments; relationships between sleep, sedentary behaviour, physical activity, and health.
Nursing
Dr. Oluwakemi (Kemi) Amodu, Assistant Professor
Research areas: Addressing sexual and reproductive health issues faced by women who have experienced conflict and forced displacement.
COLLEGE OF NATURAL + APPLIED SCIENCES
Faculty of Engineering
Dr. Osezua Ibhadode, Assistant Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering
Research areas: Engineering specializing in Mechatronics; design for additive manufacturing (3D printing), especially metal additive manufacturing.
Dr. Olubukola Alimi, Assistant Professor
Research areas: Civil and Environmental Engineering specializing in water treatment (arriving 2023)
COLLEGE OF SOCIAL SCIENCES + HUMANITIES
Faculty of Arts
Dr. Domale Keys, Assistant Professor, Department of Women’s and Gender Studies
Research areas: Transnational Race, Gender, and Feminist Studies; the experiences of Black women with violence and their organizing against violence.
Faculty of Education
Dr. Giselle Thompson, Assistant Professor, Department of Educational Policy Studies
Research areas: Black Studies in Education; Black Communities in transnational, local, and diasporic contexts.
Faculty of Law
Dr. Faith Majekolagbe, Assistant Professor
Research areas: Intellectual property and public interest, with specific emphasis on the nexus between copyright and global development goals; adaptation of copyright laws to support digital education in a pandemic and post-pandemic world.
Dr. Godwin Dzah, Assistant Professor
Research areas: International environmental law; climate change; public international law; sustainable development law.
AUGUSTANA CAMPUS
Dr. Michael Omoge, Assistant Professor, Department of Fine Arts/Humanities
Research areas: Philosophy of mind; epistemology; African philosophy.
CAMPUS SAINT-JEAN
Dr. Charlie Mballa, Assistant Professor at Faculté Saint-Jean
Research areas: Francophone Sub-Saharan Africa
Carrie Smith
Vice-Provost (Equity, Diversity and Inclusion)