Teaching shapes the overall academic experience. It influences how ideas are examined, how understanding develops, and how students grow intellectually. The impact of excellent teachers extends far beyond the classroom and into professional life.
UBC Okanagan is proud to recognize educators whose teaching reflects a strong commitment to student learning. Through their work, classrooms become spaces for thoughtful discussion, inclusion and academic growth.
We are pleased to announce the 2026 recipients of the Killam Teaching Prize and the Provost’s Award for Teaching Excellence and Innovation:
2026 UBC Okanagan Teaching Award recipients
KILLAM TEACHING PRIZE
Ms. Sheila Epp, Associate Professor of Teaching, School of Nursing
Dr. Julien Picault, Professor, Irving K. Barber Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
PROVOST’S AWARD FOR TEACHING EXCELLENCE AND INNOVATION
Dr. Abdallah Mohamed, Associate Professor of Teaching, Irving K. Barber Faculty of Science
Ms. Mayu Takasaki, Lecturer, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies
Dr. Ying Zhu, Associate Professor, Faculty of Management
We invite students, faculty and staff to join us as we recognize the recipients of the 2026 UBC Okanagan Teaching Awards and celebrate the many significant contributions to teaching and learning that have taken place this year at UBC Okanagan.
Date: Monday, May 11, 2026 Time: 4 to 6 pm | Award presentation followed by a reception Location: UBC Ballroom | UNC 200
RSVP: If you have not received an invitation and wish to attend, please email okanagan.ceremonies@ubc.ca
We congratulate the recipients on this remarkable achievement and thank them for their commitment to teaching excellence and innovation.
We look forward to celebrating these accomplishments with you and continuing our journey of teaching excellence together.
Sincerely,
Marie Tarrant Provost and Vice-President, Academic, pro tem UBC Okanagan
Jackie Denison Associate Provost, Teaching and Learning UBC Okanagan
I am pleased to share several important updates to the leadership team in the Office of the Provost and Vice-President, Academic. These changes align with upcoming transitions and provide an opportunity to realign roles to better support the evolving needs of the portfolio and campus.
Dr. Peter Simpson’s term as Associate Provost, Academic Affairs and Strategy, is set to end on June 30, 2026. With the conclusion of Dr. Simpson’s appointment, two revised Associate Provost positions will be established.
Ms. Jackie Denison, who was appointed Associate Provost, Teaching and Learning, effective January 1, 2025, will assume the revised role of Associate Provost, Strategy and International. In this role, Ms. Denison will focus on campus- and system-level strategic initiatives, including continued support for the new academic structure. She will also provide leadership in strategic enrolment management, international partnerships, pathway development, and the coordination of external reviews.
We are launching an internal call for the position of Associate Provost, Academic Programs, Teaching and Learning. This role will advance UBC’s teaching and learning mission through a one- to three-year appointment, providing leadership to enhance student learning, strengthen curriculum and advance the effective use of learning technologies.
Further details about the position and the expression of interest process are posted on the Office of the Provost and Vice-President, Academic website at the following link: Searches and Appointments
I look forward to implementing these changes, which will better position us to support UBC Okanagan’s academic mission and institutional priorities.
Sincerely,
Marie Tarrant Provost and Vice-President, Academic, pro tem UBC Okanagan
Co-op education at UBC Okanagan is evolving through a series of administrative and program-level developments across campus. The Centralized Co-op Education Program (CCEP), formerly known as the Interdisciplinary Co-op Program, is undergoing an administrative transition. This transition occurs alongside the introduction of a new Business Co-op Program within the Faculty of Management. We greatly appreciate the Faculty of Management’s role as the academic home of the Interdisciplinary Co-op Program at UBC Okanagan for the past ten years.
The Okanagan Senate has approved a change to the CCEP’s academic home, which will now reside within the Faculty of Science. Oversight of centralized co-op operations will be jointly supported by the Office of the Provost and Vice-President, Academic, and the Associate Vice-President, Students. Centralized co-op staff have relocated to UNC 207. More information about the co-op team is available on the co-op directory page.
The CCEP will continue to serve undergraduate students in Arts, Fine Arts, Health and Exercise Sciences, Media Studies, Science and Sustainability. Students currently enrolled in the CCEP have been advised of the new office location, and there will be no disruptions to program delivery or services. Students can expect the same high-quality experience and support throughout the transition. In addition, the Applied Science Co-op in the School of Engineering will continue to be offered as part of UBC Okanagan’s broader co-op landscape.
We are confident that these developments will support the continued delivery and growth of co-op opportunities for students across UBC Okanagan.
Sincerely,
Lael Parrott
Dean, Faculty of Science
Marie Tarrant
Provost, Vice President Academic, pro tem
At UBC Okanagan, we proudly recognize the exceptional contributions of our educators, whose commitment to teaching excellence inspires, engages and supports students across all stages of their academic journeys. We are pleased to announce the recipients of the 2025/26 Outstanding Instructor Awards.
Recipients of the Outstanding Instructor award have demonstrated an ongoing commitment to supporting student success in their classrooms, creating meaningful and impactful learning experiences that benefit students.
2025/26 Outstanding Instructors
Irving K. Barber Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies
Renaud-Philipe Garner
Nathalie Hager
David Geary
David Jefferess
Evan Habkirk
Annick Pellegrin
Lauren Human
Stephanie Tolman
Colin Osmund
Jon Vickery
Geoffrey Sigalet
Shannon Ward (posthumously)
Faculty of Health and Social Development
Irving K. Barber Faculty of Science
Shirley Chau
Jake Bobowski
Heather Gainforth
Stephen Brown
Laura Mercer
Chad Davis
Alex Santos
Summer Li
Charlene Strumpel
Craig Nichol
Okanagan School of Education
Faculty of Management
Stephen Berg
Nathan Beloud
Anita Veal
Candice Loring
School of Engineering
Nicolas Peleato
Zahra SarpanahSourkouhi
Mohammad Tiznobaik
Please join us in congratulating these exemplary educators in our teaching and learning community.
Sincerely,
Jackie Denison
Associate Provost, Teaching and Learning
Jannik Eikenaar
Academic Director, UBC Okanagan Centre for Teaching and Learning
The OER Excellence and Impact Awards recognize outstanding work by faculty who materially advance the use and impact of open educational resources in credit courses at UBC.
Recipients were selected based on their overall excellence in creating, revising or using OER in teaching and learning; the impact of their OER work on students, including addressing the affordability of educational materials; and their contribution to the greater open education community at UBC.
UBC Okanagan: Individual award
Dr. Derrick Wirtz
Dr. Derrick R. Wirtz, Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, Faculty of Arts, University of British Columbia
Dr. Derrick Wirtz has advanced open educational resources (OER) in psychology by creating accessible, research-informed, and student-centered learning materials that remove barriers and foster experiential learning. Since 2019, Dr. Wirtz has developed, adapted, and implemented OER for high-enrollment, required courses—including PSYO 121 (Introduction to Psychology), PSYO 270 (Introduction to Research Methods and Design), and PSYO 349 (Positive Psychology)—ensuring students have immediate, cost-free access to foundational course content. His open lab manuals and Pressbooks-hosted materials integrate weekly guided activities, templates, exemplars, and archives of student-created research, supporting over 3,600 students and saving an estimated $622,000 in textbook costs.
Dr. Wirtz’s OER approach is deeply pedagogical: materials are modular, flexible, and empirically tested, allowing students to develop research literacy, methodological reasoning, and collaborative skills through project-based learning. During the COVID-19 pandemic, his resources were rapidly adapted to virtual formats, preserving critical experiential components such as poster symposia. This work reflects an intentional shift from instructor-created course materials to provincially hosted, openly licensed textbooks, enhancing sustainability, reuse, and community contribution across institutional and disciplinary contexts.
A central advantage of OER is not only affordability, but flexibility. The modular design of the PSYO 270 materials allows them to be continuously refined and aligned with course objectives while supporting a scaffolded, term-long research experience. Students engage in a sequence of structured activities that culminate in the production of a research proposal, dataset, analysis, and poster, ensuring equitable access to hands-on research experience that is often critical for academic and professional advancement.
A defining feature of Dr. Wirtz’s approach is the integration of student-generated content into the OER ecosystem. Through open archives of undergraduate research posters, students contribute to publicly accessible knowledge, engaging in authentic forms of scholarship and shifting from passive learners to active producers of psychological science. Affordability, in this context, is not merely an economic outcome but a pedagogical one.
Beyond his own teaching, Dr. Wirtz has championed OER adoption within the department and across UBC, demonstrating the transformative potential of open education to enhance accessibility, equity, and innovation.
UBC Okanagan: Group award
Dr. Robin Young, Associate Professor of Teaching, Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, UBC Okanagan
Dr. Lauren Dalton, Senior Instructor, Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, Oregon State University
Heather Ng-Cornish, Scientific Illustrator and Master’s Student in Science Communication, Laurentian University
Fundamentals of Cell Biology represents a transformative collaboration advancing open educational resources in foundational life sciences. Developed by Dr. Robin Young, Dr. Lauren Dalton, and illustrator Heather Ng-Cornish, the textbook provides an accessible, high-quality resource for one of the most widely required courses in biology programs.
Since its 2024 publication, the textbook has served as the primary resource for cell biology courses at UBC Okanagan and Oregon State University, supporting over 1,000 students annually while eliminating approximately $100 in textbook costs per student. Adoption has expanded to more than 24 institutions worldwide, including UBC Vancouver, reaching thousands of additional students each year. The resource has recorded over 300,000 page views, 100,000 unique users, and more than 18,000 downloads.
Designed for students encountering cell biology for the first time, the textbook emphasizes clarity, accessibility, and engagement with the scientific process. Rather than presenting knowledge as fixed, it situates core concepts within the experimental methods through which they are understood, fostering critical thinking, problem-solving, and scientific literacy. The text follows best practices in open education, incorporating Universal Design for Learning principles, accessible formatting, and inclusive design features such as colour-blind-friendly graphics, alt-text, and multimodal access.
A defining strength of the project is its commitment to representation and student connection. Drs. Young and Dalton intentionally create space for diverse identities within the scientific narrative, acknowledging varied cultural and educational backgrounds while highlighting contributions from underrepresented scientists. This approach reflects a broader pedagogical aim: to ensure that students can see themselves within the discipline and engage meaningfully with its practices.
Ms. Ng-Cornish, then an undergraduate student at UBC Okanagan, played a central and indispensable role as the primary illustrator. Her more than 200 original illustrations are integral to the clarity and accessibility of the material, particularly for students encountering complex cellular processes for the first time.
Importantly, the impact of this resource extends well beyond affordability. It exemplifies how open, thoughtfully designed materials can enhance learning, expand access, and support student success across diverse educational contexts.
I am pleased to announce that Dr. Bryce Traister has been appointed Dean pro tem of the Irving K. Barber Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS), effective July 1, 2026, for a one-year term. Bryce will assume this role alongside his current role as Dean of the Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies.
UBC Okanagan is hosting a Hong Kong trade delegation that will explore the region’s growing technology sector, and the innovation and research taking place on campus.
Innovation, technology and economic impact will be on the agenda as a delegation of business people from Hong Kong visit Kelowna later this week.
The visit is organized by UBC Okanagan and will feature delegates from the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office (Toronto), Invest Hong Kong (Canada) and the Hong Kong Trade Development Council. This is the first time a delegation of this type is visiting the Okanagan, says Dr. Marie Tarrant, UBCO Provost and Vice-President, Academic pro tem.
While facilitated by UBCO, the visit will introduce the delegates to many economic drivers in this region, including Okanagan College, the Central Okanagan Economic Development Commission, Accelerate Okanagan, Kelowna Chamber of Commerce, KF Aerospace, Days Century Growers Inc. and Melius Microbiomics, a firm developed by UBCO faculty and former students.
This visit is an opportunity for long-term collaboration in research and innovation, business exchange, talent mobility as well as technology and investment partnerships between the Okanagan region and Hong Kong’s education, research and business sectors, explains Dr. Tarrant.
“This visit will help us explore the strategic foundations for a potential Okanagan–Hong Kong innovation corridor,” she adds. “We have more than two days of meetings and events planned. During this time, we will be able to assess how global shifts in technology, trade and supply chains can create openings for new cross-Pacific innovation ties, and how each region’s strengths align.”
Established in 1991, the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office (Toronto) is the official representative of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region’s government in Canada, with a mandate to promote and strengthen the bilateral economic, trade and cultural relations between Hong Kong and Canada.
Invest Hong Kong (Canada) is the investment promotion agency of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. It supports Canadian founders and companies, from multinational corporates to startups, to plan, set up their business in Hong Kong, and to expand their operations and international reach via Hong Kong.
While in Kelowna, the visitors will have the chance to explore areas for continued dialogue, including shared research themes and high-value industry-university connections. They will also explore how co-op programs, visiting researchers, short exchanges and project-based teams could strengthen collaboration.
There are two opportunities on Thursday for the public to learn about the visit and explore mutual areas of interest and collaboration.
The Okanagan–Hong Kong Innovation Corridor
What: Panel discussion When: Thursday, March 26, from 12:30 to 2 pm Where: UNC Ballroom, University Centre, UBC Okanagan
Join UBC Okanagan, the Central Okanagan Economic Development Commission, and the Hong Kong delegation for a moderated discussion on how cross-Pacific partnerships can fuel regional and global innovation ecosystems. This is a free event with a light lunch provided.
What: Business networking event in collaboration with the Kelowna Chamber of Commerce When: Thursday, March 26, from 5 to 7 pm Where: UNC Ballroom, University Centre, UBC Okanagan
Commerce ConneX attendees will be able to connect directly with senior leaders from Hong Kong’s trade, investment and business‑development organizations. They can also explore business‑matching ideas, partnership and expansion pathways, and discover how UBCO supports business innovation, applied research, and talent development.
The University of British Columbia is launching a multi-million-dollar initiative to significantly strengthen funding support for PhD students and postdoctoral fellows.
Alongside concurrent increases in funding investments for graduate students and postdoctoral fellows across the broader research ecosystem (e.g., Canada Graduate Research Scholarships; Canada Impact+ Research Training Awards; BC Graduate Scholarships),this initiative represents a substantial expansion of funding resources. It forms one component of an ongoing, system-wide review of graduate and postdoctoral funding at UBC.
PhD students
This investment will support an increase to the guaranteed base funding for PhD students in Years 1-4 to $40,000 per year. The intent is to strengthen overall funding levels for current and future PhD students and should be understood as supporting enhanced funding levels rather than enrolment growth. It also reaffirms a model of shared, whole-of-university commitment to graduate student support, including essential ongoing contributions from Faculties, departments, and supervisors.
Funding associated with this commitment will be allocated to Faculties this spring through existing mechanisms, enabling graduate programs to begin ensuring that all PhD students within years 1-4 will receive a minimum funding package of $40,000/year, effective Fall 2026.
This implementation approach balances the near-term goal of bringing all PhD students in years 1-4 to the new minimum funding level, with the need to provide academic units and supervisors sufficient time and flexibility to plan, align local practices, and ensure a smooth transition to sustained implementation.
Over the coming months, the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies (Vancouver) and the College of Graduate Studies (Okanagan) will partner closely with Faculties and graduate programs, through existing academic governance processes, to share information and seek feedback on potential new funding models and mechanisms to support longer-term effective and equitable implementation. Additional information will be shared as these details are finalized.
Postdoctoral fellows
This investment will also support the establishment of a minimum annual stipend of $55,000 per year for all postdoctoral fellows holding either employee or award-recipient appointments, effective Fall 2026. Faculties and supervisors may, and often already do, provide stipends above this level in accordance with disciplinary norms and other considerations.
One-time incremental (top-up) funds will be available to support postdoctoral fellows whose current supports fall below the minimum after the implementation date through a review process, with more details to follow.
This initiative reflects UBC’s commitment to excellence across our scholarly communities and to supporting the academic pursuits and wellbeing of PhD students and postdoctoral fellows.
More information will be shared as implementation progresses.
I am pleased to announce that Dr. Paul Shipley has been appointed Dean pro tem of the College of Graduate Studies, effective July 1, 2026, for a one-year term.
Dr. Shipley has been a valued member of the UBC Okanagan community since 2005, and prior to that, at Okanagan University College. He is an associate professor in the Department of Chemistry and a respected leader and colleague. He most recently served as Associate Dean of the College of Graduate Studies, a role he has held since 2019.
Earlier this fall, we shared plans to update UBC Okanagan’s academic structure in support of our newly defined core academic focus: resilient people, communities, economies and environments in support of a sustainable future. As we consider the future academic structure, we aim to preserve what is working well in the current structure and identify opportunities for improvement.
