D.R.P.I. Canada annual general meeting, 2008
Meeting Overview
Project Director Marcia Rioux presenting at the general meeting.
D.R.P.I. Canada hosted a two day general meeting in May 2008 at York University. Conceived as a think tank retreat for all project researchers, students and organizational partnerts, the meeting was an opportunity to update project participants on the work done thus far and also to enable teams to come together, share ideas, and strategize the next steps. The meeting involved approximately 30 participants from Ottawa, Quebec, the east and west coasts of Canada, and as far away as Sweden. Most of the participants expressed that it was very important to meet the research team and to have an overview.
Christo El Morr presenting on the Virtual Knowledge Network.
Beginning with opening remarks by York University's Vice President of Research and Innovation, Stan Shapson, the first day of the meeting involved presentations and discussions from the project leaders and students concerning the progress accomplished in each of D.R.P.I. Canada's themes (Monitoring Individual Experiences, Monitoring Media, Monitoring Law and Policy, and Monitoring Survey Datasets). At the end of the day, some of the participants traveled to downtown Toronto, where they were provided with a guided tour of an exhibit on disability taking place at the Royal Ontario Museum.
On the second day, the feedback provided during the previous day's meeting was applied in order to develop concrete plans for future directions. Meeting participants broke into groups in order to deliberate over each theme in-depth and then reconvened to discuss and formulate conclusions. A significant part of the discussions was dedicated to methods of integrating theme methodologies and the cross-fertilization of findings.
Marcia Rioux, Roxanne Mykitiuk, Ivana Petricone, and Michael Prince have some fun during coffee break.
The general meeting was a successful model of dynamic collaboration and knowledge transfer. Participants were pleased with the event, which they found to be very useful and informative. The participants were especially grateful to our students who were very helpful throughout the course of the meeting. D.R.P.I. Canada wishes again to thank all those who participated and contributed their ideas and expertise over the course of the meeting.