Enough. Prime Minister Stephen Harper is making discouragingly little headway with muted expressions of diplomatic “concern” about the fate of two Canadians who have been languishing for weeks in an Egyptian jail without explanation or charge. It’s time to channel some outrage, reported the Toronto Star Sept. 17….Dr. Tarek Loubani is a professor at Western University and a well-known emergency room physician who trains doctors and nurses at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza. He has also worked with refugees, the homeless and the mentally ill. John Greyson, an award-winning filmmaker, teaches film at York University and was planning to work on a documentary in Gaza. These men are idealists, not extremists. Read full story.
Tarek Loubani and John Greyson begin hunger strike in Cairo jail
Two Canadians jailed in Egypt have started a hunger strike to protest the “arbitrary nature” of their detention, one month after they were arrested in Cairo, reported the Toronto Star Sept. 16. In a statement posted online, friends and family of Tarek Loubani and York University film Professor John Greyson said the Canadians told their Egyptian lawyers they “will be refusing food” as of Monday. Read full story.
CANNEX acquires Quantitative Wealth Management Analytics Group
Toronto-based CANNEX, an independent provider of data and information services to the financial services industry in the US and Canada, announced Monday that it has entered into an agreement to acquire the Quantitative Wealth Management Analytics (QWeMA) Group Inc., a developer of unique intellectual property and educational software for the financial services and retirement industry. QWeMA Group was founded by York University Professor Moshe Milevsky in 2005 and has been incubated at the Fields Institute for Research in Mathematical Sciences in Toronto. As part of this agreement, Milevsky will join the CANNEX board and oversee scientific research activities, reported Investment Executive Sept. 16. Read full story.
Ontario byelection donations show strong Liberal fundraising machine
The five Ontario byelections held in early August were bruising for the governing Liberals – three out of the five Liberal-held seats fell to the Conservatives and NDP. But party donations connected to the byelections shows the Liberals are headed toward the next general election better-funded than their rivals….A party in power has a natural advantage in fundraising, said York University political science Professor Robert MacDermid in Global News Sept. 16. “People want a chance to influence government policy. And they hope, by giving money to a party, to influence a cabinet minister or the government in general – to pursue policies that are sympathetic to that industry or that company.” Read full story.
The policy of happy accidents
“This post is about one of my favourite issues in education and various areas of knowledge policy: the attempt to use policy to reliably generate the unpredictable,” wrote York University PhD candidate Melonie Fullick in University Affairs Sept. 16. “For good education and research to happen, even for those eventual economic benefits to materialize, we need place/spaces where we can allow for possibilities and work through failure and permit experimentation, where we can learn how to take chances and follow our noses – while encountering others – rather than just building on an assumed formula for success.” Read full story.