A light on leadership
Taking the lead is hard work, especially in the highly competitive world of academia. Concordia’s Centre for Academic Leadership created awards last year to recognize the hard work and commitment of Concordia’s top academic leaders.
Dominic Peltier-Rivest, director of the Centre for Academic Leadership, says the awards recognize the importance of ethical academic leadership and encourage faculty members to support the academic goals of the university. “When I saw the four recipients accept this institutional leadership award, I was not only proud of all their achievements but I also realized that the centre had succeeded at filling a void by creating university awards that give proper recognition to our colleagues who often sacrifice their own research agendas for the benefit of others,” he said.
The centre is currently seeking nominations for this year’s edition of the Concordia Academic Leadership Awards. The deadline for nominations is Friday, March 15.
There are two eligibility tracks: the Emerging Leadership Award recognizes current full-time faculty members or librarians with more than five years of full-time experience at Concordia, or part-time faculty members with more than 90 credits of part-time seniority at the university, who have not served in a formal administrative role.
The Academic Leadership Award recognizes anyone who is serving or has served in a formal administrative role, such as a program director, department chair, college principal, supervisory librarian, associate university librarian or associate dean.
The recipients are nominated by their colleagues on the basis of their accomplishments in academic leadership. Following an adjudication process by an advisory committee at the Centre for Academic Leadership, the recommended candidates are selected and approved by a group consisting of the provost and vice-president, academic affairs, the four Faculty deans, the university librarian, and the vice-president, research and graduate studies.
Robert Kilgour, chair of the Department of Exercise Science, was one of the recipients of an Academic Leadership Award last year. “To be recognized by my peers and by those whom I admire and respect further reconfirms and validates the time and effort that I have put into developing my personal leadership experiences,” he said upon receiving the honour.
Michael Kenneally, principal of the School of Canadian Irish Studies; William Lynch, chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering; and Danielle Morin, associate professor in the Department of Decision Sciences and Management Information Systems, were also recognized during the awards’ inaugural year.
The three expressed gratitude for the recognition from their peers, and also for the support the university provided for their leadership efforts. “I am thankful to Concordia, which has given me so many opportunities to further develop my leadership skills,” Morin said. “Concordia is an institution that values and promotes innovation and pursuit of excellence.”
Related links:
• Nomination form and instructions
• Centre for Academic Leadership
• “Centre for Academic Leadership supports current and future academic leaders” — NOW, May 29, 2012
• “Award recognizes academic leadership of four Concordians” — NOW, June 12, 2012