SALTISE 2024 Award Winners
Congratulations to the 2024 Awardees!
It gives us great pleasure to announce the recipients of this year’s SALTISE awards.
These awards honour individuals within our Community who represent models of outstanding dedication and exemplary instructional practices.
We are proud to call them our colleagues!
2024 SALTISE Lifetime Achievement Award
Éric Francoeur is a professor of Engineering and has been actively involved in various educational and research initiatives at École de technologie supérieure (ÉTS) over the past 20 years.
The SALTISE Executive is truly honoured to give Éric the 2024 SALTISE Lifetime Achievement Award, in recognition of his significant contributions to the community since the organization’s founding.
Some of you may know Éric from his years of participation on the Conference Committee, while others may know him as the principal connection between SALTISE and ÉTS. As a member of SALTISE, Éric has contributed significantly to promoting evidence-based teaching strategies and professional development for educators across Quebec. What is less known, Éric has actively contributed to SALTISE since its inception in 2013, helping to shape and grow our community within the francophone sector. His involvement with SALTISE highlights his dedication to improving educational practices through collaboration and research and is sincerely appreciated.
As a professor at ÉTS, Éric’s work primarily focuses on integrating technology into education, digital learning environments, and hybrid course designs. He co-founded a community of practice to enhance the use of technology in education, demonstrating his commitment to innovative pedagogical approaches. While chair of the pedagogy committee at ÉTS, he organized two events focused on educational innovation and the enhancement of teaching methods, bringing together faculty members to discuss and implement effective teaching strategies (Journées de la pédagogie). These contributions made him a key figure in both academic and community-oriented educational initiatives.
Finally, Éric’s generosity as an instructor, and mentor to newer faculty, and colleagues highlights his dedication to supporting students and educators. We appreciate your efforts to foster the development of this SALTISE community and promote the work to improve learning.
Congratulations!
2024 SALTISE Best Practices & Pedagogical Innovators Award
Award for College Instructors:
Daniel Goldsmith
Dawson College
Daniel Goldsmith has been teaching humanities at Dawson since 2009, where he has sought to engage students in meaningful learning through such fascinating subjects in the humanities as compassionate action, and enlightened consciousness. As a fellow in the Dawson Active Learning community of practice (DALC), he explored active learning strategies and shared with colleagues successes and challenges in a collegial atmosphere of continuous learning. He was an e-learning CoP fellow in 2019, where he produced an open access portfolio on a blended learning format for two of his courses. He has contributed social science resource activities through SALTISE and continued in DALC CoP meetings.
Reflecting on his role as an educator, Daniel asked himself what changes he could make to bring his class to more upper-level cognitive taxonomy discussions. He combined his explorations of active learning methodologies with e-learning concepts in collaborative learning, and developed a strategy to flip his classroom. He explored Moodle to help students learn effectively in a blended learning course. He created activities to engage students in core course concepts and provided low-stakes assignments to gauge student learning. In recent years, Daniel has integrated numerous somatic activities in a recognition of the essential role that the body plays in cognition. He encourages students to breathe, move, and vocalize in different ways in the hopes that their understanding spreads throughout their cells, not just the ones up in the head!
Daniel has observed that students are learning better through these pedagogical activities. He shares his explorations with Dawson communities of practice, participates in community meditation sessions for students and staff, supports his students, and is engaged in SALTISE. For this reason, Daniel has been nominated by his peers as a SALTISE Innovator.
Award for University Instructors:
Giuliana Cucinelli
Concordia University
Since arriving at Concordia University in 2014, Dr. Giuliana Cucinelli has distinguished herself as an excellent and innovative instructor who incorporates student-centred pedagogy into all of her work. Before joining the Education department, Giuliana taught as a Limited Term Appointment (lecturer) in the Communication Studies department at Concordia where her teaching earned her the Dean’s Award of Excellence for Teaching.
Wherever she has taught Giuliana has gone beyond implementing innovative pedagogical techniques, by creating a nurturing environment where every student feels valued and empowered to make their own learning decisions. In this environment, students are allowed the freedom to shape their assignments according to their unique perspectives, all while adhering to necessary protocols and regulations. Through detailed discussions and probing questions, Giuliana ensures that students understand not only their grades but also the underlying thought processes driving their work. She also uses and promotes active engagement and student-centred pedagogical models to foster deep learning and understanding. She makes special contributions regarding pedagogy to the community of higher education educators and designs innovative, technologically focused programs for students.
In addition to frequently presenting at SALTISE conferences (not only the one this June, but also in 2020-2023), Giuliana has made contributions to the community of teaching by serving on the university-wide working group on Universal Design for Learning; Serving on the departmental Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion committee, and arranging for workshops on accessibility, Indigenous teaching, and applications of inclusive design principles to influence teaching in the department.
Giuliana is a role model, an inspiration to the educational community, and is committed to the professional development of others as well as her own.
Award for College Pedagogical Counsellors or Educational Developers:
Sara Hashem
Champlain College – St. Lambert
Dr. Sara Hashem is an exceptional educator who has made remarkable contributions to the field of education at Champlain College Saint-Lambert and beyond.
In her role as a pedagogical counsellor, Sara has been acting as a catalyst for pedagogical innovation and development. She started an onboarding program that encourages the participation of all college units, offering new faculty a fulsome introduction to the college teaching experience. She developed the Workshop Series, an extensive professional development offering focusing on knowledge mobilization, inter- and intra-institutional sharing, and community building. Sara has equally been a driving force in advancing inclusive pedagogy at Champlain Saint-Lambert, collaborating with Faculty and Student Services to create more equity-driven classroom environments. Her global efforts have helped introduce diverse voices and varied pedagogical perspectives to further enrich learning experiences at the college.
Within the wider college network, Sara has been actively involved in multiple inter-collegiate and inter-institutional committees and initiatives. She graciously shares her expertise with her colleagues and reaches across institutional boundaries to collaborate. She is a trusted and valued member of the network.
As an accomplished researcher, Sara is the co-founder of the Artful Inquiry Research Group at McGill University. She published her latest edited book in 2023 and is currently working on another book that will carve a space for the voices of emerging researchers.
Sara is an outstanding educator who embodies the qualities of a pedagogical innovator. Her dedication to advancing pedagogical practices, supporting her colleagues through inter- and intra-college exchange, and fostering a culture of inclusion and innovation all make her an excellent candidate for this award.
John Bentley
Concordia University
John Bentley is an established and highly respected member of Montreal’s education community and established mainstay of Concordia’s Centre for Teaching and Learning. He is known for his commitment to supporting faculty and graduate students, advocating for high-impact pedagogical practices, innovative technology integration, and spaces that promote the adoption of active learning.
At the core of John’s practice is peer-based faculty development and over the years, he has led many peer-to-peer faculty interest groups, where faculty come to discuss their experiences and challenges on a regular basis. Some of the groups he has led include blended learning, active learning, and most recently his book club for Teach Students How to Learn.
His biggest legacy is the adoption of Active Learning Classrooms at Concordia. John played a key role in the design and installation of the first active learning classrooms at every step; he worked hard to convince reluctant stakeholders of the importance of active pedagogies and helped devise solutions to mitigate concerns. This achievement in combination with the initiation of several technology pilots (that would later come to be institutionally-adopted tools) demonstrate the lasting impact John has had on teaching and learning at Concordia.
John has been active within SALTISE since around 2010, working as part of a small community of educators who were committed to promoting active learning in higher education around Montreal. Over the years he has participated in many ways, such as the 3S project, the conference, committee work and other collaborative projects with other institutions. John is among only a few who have served as long and with as much integrity in the SALTISE community.