Concordia celebrates its top 8 newsmakers of 2018

The President’s Media Outreach Awards recognize the work of Concordia faculty, graduate students and staff who garnered media coverage over the past year in news outlets around the world. This eight 2018 recipients were honoured at a ceremony on November 23. 

The event also celebrated the university’s successful collaborations with the Montreal Gazette and its evolving partnership with The Conversation Canada, an innovative digital media outlet dedicated to bringing scholarly work to a general readership.

Concordia President Alan Shepard pointed to the Public Scholars Program — now in its second year — as one of the latest in a long list of connections forged between the university and the Gazette over more than two decades. The program ensures the newspaper’s readership is exposed to the groundbreaking research of 10 Concordia doctoral candidates each year who are supported in producing opinion pieces for publication.

Lucinda Chodan, editor-in-chief of the Gazette and regional vice-president, Editorial, for Postmedia, attended the award ceremony. She spoke of the value news media attribute to the research-based expertise of academics in this age of so-called “fake news.” 

Concordia’s chief communications officer Philippe Beauregard joined Shepard in presenting the awards. He echoed Shepard’s appreciation of the university partnerships with the Gazette and The Conversation.

Beauregard reminded researchers about the imminent launch of La Conversation, the Montreal-based French-language outlet of the online news platform. Beauregard and Shepard reiterated their invitation to researchers to join the dozens of Concordians who have authored more than 70 pieces since the launch of the Canadian edition of The Conversation in 2017.

‘My research can reach a larger audience, nationally and internationally’

The winner of the award for Opinion Leader of the Year is Yasmin Jiwani, professor in the Department of Communication Studies in the Faculty of Arts and Science and Concordia University Research Chair in Intersectionality, Violence and Resistance. She has published a total of nine pieces, in English and in French, which have been picked up by a variety of news outlets across the world, thanks to The Conversation’s open-source model. Her writing focuses on topics ranging from the Quebec government’s push to ban the hijab to Canada’s treatment of non-status migrants.

Jiwani has found the publishing experience immensely satisfying. 

“In the current climate in which critical thought is being attacked, it is imperative to counter this through the public sphere. For me, as a public intellectual, The Conversation represents a conduit through which my research can reach a larger audience, nationally and internationally,” she says. 

“Moreover, because the articles are accessible through Creative Commons licensing, they can be republished in other media, thus reaching niche audiences and potentially resulting in a greater impact.”

Jiwani is also grateful for the support the editors of The Conversation give to contributing authors. 

“The topics that I address are sensitive and provocative,” she points out. “It is critical to have people who understand this. If it hadn’t been for the culture, arts and critical race editor at The Conversation, I don’t believe that my pieces would have seen the light of day.”

The 2018 President’s Media Outreach Award winners are: 

Krzysztof Skonieczny — Research Communicator of the Year (International)
Sara Kennedy — Research Communicator of the Year (National)
Brad Aeon — Graduate Research Communicator of the Year
Pascale Biron — Communicator of the Year (Francophone Media)
Yasmin Jiwani — Opinion Leader of the Year
Fenwick McKelvey — Expert Commentator of the Year
Orenda Boucher and Geneviève Sioui — Communications Ambassadors of the Year

Sign up for one of an upcoming series of workshops on how to bring your research to a wider audience through The Conversation by contacting media.relations@concordia.ca.

The 90-minute workshops will take place:

* Tuesday, November 27 from 2:30 to 4 p.m.
* Wednesday, November 28 from 10:30 a.m. to 12 p.m.
* Thursday, December 6 from 10:30 a.m. to 12 p.m.
* Tuesday, December 11 from 10:30 a.m. to 12 p.m.