Participant Testimonials

It is important to support and collaborate with Minerva as they are the only organization working to improve health and safety training of our future workers and leaders in post-secondary institutions.Jules Arntz-Gray, Director - Training and Awareness Branch, Prevention Office, Ontario Ministry of Labour

We [Chemical Engineering at University of Waterloo] have been attending the Forum since the beginning and hold a strong belief that safety should be instilled into the culture of engineering. We’ve made attempts to globalize the teaching of it across all engineering departments, but the traction is not always there. Today’s event, however, shows that we have been able to engage every single department…Participants are talking and asking questions after every presentation.Marc Aucoin, Academic Director for Professional Development, University of Waterloo

I’m very impressed with the good work of Minerva. This event is more than any advocate of health and safety could hope for.Tony Dean, Chair - Ontario Expert Advisory Panel, Occupational Health and Safety Prevention and Enforcement System

Minerva is doing an excellent job through its communications with universities and its teaching modules and, as a result, the curricula is improving with the addition of good, strong material about health and safety management.Shahzad Barghi, Assistant Professor and Program Director, University of Western Ontario

I like what Minerva is doing – it gets future leaders thinking about safety. We look at Minerva as an ongoing partnership. You are trailblazers…and should go even broader.George Griziotis, Chief Prevention Officer, Ontario Ministry of Labour

I cannot be more thrilled that Minerva and the companies that support Minerva have been at this for over 20 years.Elizabeth Mills, President & CEO, Workplace Safety & Prevention Services

I attended the University of Calgary Mini Summer Institute which inspired me to attend the Learning Forum in Toronto to learn more. It was a great motivation for me to pursue the mission of incorporating H&S education into our engineering curriculum. I strongly recommend others attend Minerva’s annual Learning Forum. It is a unique opportunity to meet experts from industries, academia and policy makers at the government level. Besides learning from the experts, the Forum creates opportunity of sharing thoughts.Anis Haque, Instructor, Electrical Engineering, University of Calgary.

I liked the interaction among professors, the open discussions on what’s missing today and knowing more about the current situation teaching safety in universities.Don Jones, Associate Professor, Department of Civil and Resource Engineering, Dalhousie University

I would like to see all professors attend Minerva Forums as it would significantly impact the development of a proper health and safety culture in universities.Pierre Laflamme, Health, Safety and Risk Manager, Faculty of Engineering, University of Ottawa

It was good to talk to people with similar interests and to have the opportunity to disseminate best practices.Dean Millar, Bharti School of Engineering, Laurentian University

I will try to get some of the high level things discussed this year into my students’ hearts and minds. The networking at these Learning Forums is valuable because it’s an opportunity to get reenergized. You can get worn down in the university system trying to make this happen so it’s nice to have other people say health and safety teaching is important.Dave Mody, Chemical Engineering, Queen’s University

I was looking for inroads to get more linkages between faculties of engineering and medicine, so what I found most valuable was the cross-seeding of concepts from other schools. It was also interesting to find out where the Canadian Engineering Accreditation Board is going with respect to health and safety.Paul Bozek, School of Public Health, University of Toronto

I am not an academic but, through the discussions and presentations, it was very easy for me to grasp the importance and necessity for more in-depth education in this area. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was a very thorough overview and I think that Minerva is endeavouring to do a truly wonderful and necessary thing.Sandra Walker, Institute of Biomaterials & Biomedical Engineering, University of Toronto

I teach a third year chemical engineering process design course at the University of Ottawa and after attending this workshop I plan to implement some of the knowledge I gained. I do touch base on process safety in this course; however I now see the need to expand on the topic.Poupak Mehrani, Faculty of Engineering, University of Ottawa

I am the academic advisor to the Institute of Biomaterials & Biomedical Engineering Undergraduate Teaching Laboratory facility where we provide hands-on experiences for many of the first and second year engineering students. As a consequence of this experience, I have a better understanding of how we should be curtailing our in-lab safety training to provide a good perspective for these students.Dawn M. Kilkenny, Assistant Professor, Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering, University of Toronto

Many of my students and faculty work with engineers. Once their awareness about health and safety is heightened, they’re amazing and are off and running. The Learning Forum is a fantastic way to raise the awareness.Lissa Ceolin, Adjunct Professor, Occupational & Environmental Health, University of Toronto

I had heard a lot of good things about the Learning Forum and had seen the binders – very impressive. I couldn’t wait to participate.Mary Robinson, University of Waterloo, Chemical Engineering

The Minerva learning forum allowed us to better identify health and safety learning gaps in our curriculum. Our laboratory experiments are practiced with safety in mind, and students learn of process safety management and complete a Process Hazards Analysis (via a HAZOP) in our capstone design course. However, this is insufficient to create a sense of safety culture for our students as health and safety notions are not cohesively linked throughout the program. Minerva, via its experienced members and well-developed modules, will allow us to integrate sustained, comprehensive and evolving notions of health and safety throughout the curriculum. Perhaps, we can even develop a certificate program such that students obtain explicit recognition for their acquired skills and expertise. Merci!Arturo Macchi, Professor, and David Taylor, Department Chair and Professor, Chemical and Biological Engineering, University of Ottawa

If we, as professors, are our students’ supervisors and are responsible for the safety of our students, then safety should be our number one priorityTony Insinna, Professor, Cambrian College

There are 5,000 students in the faculties of engineering and architectural science. Together we are making the world a better and safer place.Mohamed Lachemi, Provost, Ryerson University

Zero risk doesn’t exist. People often accept higher/tolerable risks if they perceive substantial benefit and if reasonable measures are taken – for example, driving our cars.Marcello Oliverio, Baker Engineering and Risk Consulting

Include H&S on the agenda of your curriculum committee so that it officially becomes part of the process of putting it on the curriculum.Vic Pakalnis, CEO, MIRARCO

Since I am new to health and safety issues, my goal is to try to improve protocol for new students, so I appreciated the presentation on instilling a culture of safety.Azemi Benaissa, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Royal Military College of Canada

I enjoyed very much the talks from all presenters. The second day discussion was extremely helpful. I want to include all the info from the Learning Forum selectively for my 4th year Capstone design class, especially HAZOP, risk identification and the case studies.Ariel Chan, Department of Chemical Engineering and Applied Chemistry, University of Waterloo

I liked the self-study module developed by Smart Workplace which is easy to implement and can be used without any prep. I will be introducing the web based courses next academic year.Dr. Mostafa Hefnawi, Professor, Electrical & Computer Engineering, Royal Military College of Canada, Kingston