The Green College Advisory Board advises the Principal on all aspects of the College’s organization, membership, programming and development. The current members of the Advisory Board are:
Chair of the Advisory Board
ARNIE GUHA, Ph.D., M.A., B.A.
Arnie Guha is the multidisciplinary creative behind Acid4Yuppies, which focuses on experiential art works – from illuminated light boxes and electric murals, to psychedelics-inspired scarves and fine art prints. His 'trippy' works are complemented by an extensive body of minimalist photography and portraiture. From vivid colours to subdued hues, his practice explores both realms of the visual experience from extreme intensity to soft suggestion.
Born and raised in Jadavpur, a fabled neighbourhood at the southern edge of Calcutta, India, Arnie spent much of his childhood in neighbourhood printing shops, and at the local portrait photographer’s studio, where he became fascinated by the intersection of painting and photography as he watched the photo-artist manually touch up pictures with brush and pencil.
Educated at Jadavpur University, Calcutta, and then at Cambridge University, UK, Arnie fell in love with medieval manuscripts: the unapologetic vibrance of the colours and the power of the image to communicate what remains ineffable in the verbal realm. This would later inform his doctoral work on secondary orality and information visualization in digital, hypertextual environments at the University of British Columbia, where he was also a Resident Member of Green College.
Since then, Arnie has built a leading Canadian Experience Design practice at Phase 5, where his clients include the London Stock Exchange Group, media companies and several of Canada’s largest banks. When COVID-19 put a halt to traveling, he found himself meditating in his garden in downtown Toronto. Acid4Yuppies is his collection of transformative art, born out of meditation during the forced stillness of COVID-19.
Arnie splits his time between Toronto and Montreal, and enjoys collaborating with DJs and other visual artists to create experiential, accessible art. His last solo exhibit, “Northern Borealis,” was held at the John B. Aird Gallery in Toronto, in the summer of 2022. In October 2022, Arnie’s experimental video, “Entropy: A Walk in the Woods” was exhibited as part of NOCTURE: ART AT NIGHT in Dartmouth, N.S.
Ex Officio Members
GAGE AVERILL, Ph.D., B.A.
Provost and Vice-President Academic
Dr. Gage Averill is Provost and Vice-President Academic, at UBC Vancouver, and Professor in the UBC School of Music. From 2010 to 2022, Dr. Averill served as the Dean of the Faculty of Arts at UBC. Dr. Averill, a renowned ethnomusicologist whose research in Haitian popular music has earned him several awards, joined UBC in 2010 after holding positions as Vice-Principal, Academic, and Dean for the University of Toronto, Mississauga campus, and also Dean of Music at the University of Toronto. Prior to that, he served as Chair of the Department of Music at New York University.
DEBORAH BUSZARD, Ph.D.
Interim President and Vice-Chancellor, UBC
Professor Buszard served as Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Principal of UBC’s Okanagan Campus from 2012 to 2020. Before joining UBC in 2012, Professor Buszard was at Dalhousie University where she served as Director of Environmental Programs and coordinated an initiative to create a new College and university-wide academic programming in sustainability. Prior to joining Dalhousie in 2006, she was Professor of Plant Science at McGill University and served as Dean of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences and Associate Vice-Principal of the Macdonald Campus from 1996 to 2005. A plant scientist and strawberry breeder, Professor Buszard is author of numerous scientific and technical publications. She holds an academic appointment as Professor of Biology in the Irving K. Barber Faculty of Science on the Okanagan campus. Her current research interests include institutional innovation and sustainability. Professor Buszard was born in the U.K. and received her PhD from the University of London. In addition to her academic work, she is active in her profession and as a volunteer.
NATALIE DES ROSIERS, Ph.D., L.L.M., L.L.B., C.M., O.Ont.
Principal, Massey College at University of Toronto
Nathalie Des Rosiers is the Principal of Massey College, Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law, Senior Fellow of Trinity College and Professor of Law at the University of Ottawa (Common Law). From 2016 -2019, she was the MPP representing the riding of Ottawa-Vanier and Minister of Natural Resources and Forestry (2018). Prior to politics, she was Dean of Law, Common Law, University of Ottawa (2013-2016), General Counsel of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (2009-2013), Vice-President, Governance, University of Ottawa (2008-2009), Dean of Law, Civil Law (2004-2008) and President of the Law Commission of Canada (2000-2004). With Peter Oliver and Patrick Macklem, she co-edited the Oxford Handbook of Canadian Constitutional Law (2017). She has written extensively on civil liberties, human rights and law reform, focusing her work on the right to protest and freedom of expression. Her early work on limitations of action for sexual violence has transformed Canadian law in the 1990s. With Louise Langevin and Marie-Pier Nadeau, she has also written L’indemnisation des victimes de violence sexuelle et conjugale (Prix Walter Owen, 2014). She has received the Order of Canada, the Order of Ontario, honorary doctorates from Université UCL (Belgium) and the Law Society of Ontario, le Prix Christine Tourigny (Barreau du Québec) and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.
SUSAN PORTER, Ph.D., B.Sc.
Dean and Vice-Provost, University of British Columbia
Susan Porter is the Dean and Vice-Provost of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies at UBC, and a Clinical Professor in Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. Throughout her 20-year career in graduate education leadership, she has sought to promote a student-centric orientation to graduate education, with a special focus on holistic development and rethinking of research graduate education's core – students' research and theses – to better prepare them for the urgent needs of the 21st century. She was the President of the Canadian Association for Graduate Studies from 2017-19 and the 2020 recipient of the Council of Graduate Schools' Debra W. Stewart Award for Outstanding Leadership in Graduate Education.
Ex Officio Members – Residents' Council
ADITI NAGARAJ NALLAN, M.Sc., B.Sc.
Ph.D. Student, Bioinformatics, University of British Columbia
I am a bioinformatician trained in multi-omics data analysis and a current Ph.D student in Dr. Steven Hallam’s lab, Department of Microbiology and Immunology. I received a Bachelor of Science degree in Biotechnology, Zoology and Chemistry and a Master of Science degree in Bioinformatics and Applied Biotechnology from India. My ongoing reserach focusses on studying microbial community dynamics underlying Wastewater systems to help treatment plant operators harness microbes in designing efficient processes that reduce the overall carbon footprint and release cleaner waters into the oceans. I am a second year resident member at Green College and represent the resident community alongside fellow resident Reem at the Green College Advisory Board.
REEM SALAMEH, M.Sc., B.Sc.
Ph.D. Student, Resources, Environment and Sustainability, University of British Columbia
I am a PhD student at the Institute of Resources, Environment and Sustainability (IRES) at the University of British Columbia (UBC). My doctoral research is focused on Energy Transitions in the Middle East, and I am working under the supervision of Professor M.V. Ramana. Previously, I have joined the American University of Beirut (AUB) as a MasterCard Foundation Scholar and have earned a bachelor's degree in Environmental Health and a master's degree in Energy Studies. I have been resident member at Green College since June 2021, and I have been chairing the Sustainability Committee at the College during the academic year 2021-2022. I am delighted to represent the resident community alongside my friend Aditi at the Green College Advisory Board.
Board Members at Large
MARGARET MACMILLAN, Ph.D., B.A., C.C., C.H., F.R.S.L., Hon.F.B.A., Hon.F.L.S.W.
Emeritus Professor, International History, University of Oxford | Professor of History, University of Toronto
I am an historian who was educated at the universities of Toronto and Oxford and I specialize in the history of the British empire and the international relations of the 19th and 20th centuries. My publications include Paris, 1919, Nixon and Mao and The War that Ended Peace and War: How Conflict Shaped Us. I also contribute to print and electronic media. I gave the CBC’s Massey lectures in 2015 and the BBC’s Reith Lectures in 2018. I taught at Ryerson University for 25 years and then was Provost of Trinity College, Toronto from 2002-2007 and Warden of St Antony’s College, Oxford from 2007-2017. I am a trustee of the Imperial War Museum and sit on a number of non-profit advisory boards. I have visited Green College several times over the years and look forward to my new connection with it.
FRANCES PICHERACK, M.Ed., B.Sc.N., ICD.D
Senior governance and policy advisor
I am a senior governance and policy advisor. I have served with a wide-constellation of public authorities, boards and senior leadership teams throughout Canada and abroad during an era of remarkable transformations. I have had rich governance and advisory experiences with high-profile governmental, public health, higher education, academic health, professional regulatory, and private, public and faith-based institutions and their affiliated not-for-profit charitable structures. I am a lifelong learner, including completing graduate-level work in ethics and theology, both at St. Joseph’s College in Edmonton and the Vancouver School of Theology. I have been an active parishioner of Christ Church Cathedral since 2009. While taking graduate courses at UBC I attended a number of Green College events that enriched my university civic life and life as a lay leader.
KATHLEEN WOODWARD, Ph.D., B.A.
Director, Simpson Center for the Humanities, Lockwood Professor of the Humanities and Professor of English, University of Washington
Given my position as Director of a center that supports cross-disciplinary research in the humanities and humanistic social sciences, I have long admired, even envied the very existence of Green College as an incubator of the kinds of work and conversations among faculty and graduate students we seek to encourage at the University of Washington. Thus, I was pleased to participate in the College’s external review in 2012. As for my own research, I work in the broad domains of the emotions, women and aging, and technology and culture, with my last book entitled Statistical Panic: Cultural Politics and Poetics of Emotions (2009). I have served as president of the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes and am on the board of directors of the Association of American Colleges and Universities. My PhD in Literature is from the University of California, San Diego, my BA in Economics from Smith College.
Green College Society Members
AJAY AGRAWAL, Ph.D., M.Eng., M.B.A, B.Sc., C.M.
Geoffrey Taber Chair in Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto
I am the Geoffrey Taber Chair in Entrepreneurship and Innovation at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research in Cambridge, MA, Faculty Affiliate at the Vector Institute for Artificial Intelligence in Toronto, and Board Member at Carnegie Mellon University’s Block Center for Technology and Society in Pittsburgh, PA. I have published many scholarly articles on the economics of innovation and am co-author of Prediction Machines: The Simple Economics of Artificial Intelligence and co-editor of The Economics of Artificial Intelligence: An Agenda. I serve on the editorial boards of Management Science and the Strategic Management Journal. I am founder of the Creative Destruction Lab and co-founder of Next Canada, both of which are not-for-profit programs to support entrepreneurs. I am a proud alumnus of UBC and former Resident Member of Green College and served as chauffeur for Sir Cecil Green during one of his visits to the College.
DARLENE SETO, M.A., B.A.
Lead, Policy and Partnerships, Foundry BC
I originally came to UBC for graduate studies after growing up with big blue prairie skies. Over a decade later, I’ve been fortunate enough to continue settling here and call these beautiful Coast Salish lands and waters home. My personal and professional life has spanned the social sector, including the anti-poverty, food security, and mental health and substance use fields. The core values of my work are embedding equity and justice-oriented principles into policy, research and decision-making processes to reduce systemic harms and support human wellbeing. Currently, I work at Foundry BC as Lead, Policy and Partnerships, to support health and wellness for young people across the province. I am a Green College Society Member, former Residents’ Council Chair and hold many fond memories and dear friendships struck in the Great Hall.
UBC Faculty Members of the Common Room
AGNES D’ENTREMONT, Ph.D, MA.Sc., B.Eng., P.Eng.
Associate Professor of Teaching, Mechanical Engineering, University of British Columbia
My work focuses on student learning and curriculum development in mechanical engineering. I primarily teach courses in mechanics, including orthopaedic biomechanics and injury biomechanics. My teaching-related interests include open educational resources and open pedagogy, student mental wellbeing and equity, diversity and inclusion issues in engineering. In educational research, I have examined links between gender and the decision to start an engineering program, evaluated mental health interventions in the classroom and explored relationships between usage patterns and student learning outcomes in online homework systems. My technical research is in human joint motion and cartilage health, with a particular focus on paediatric hip disorders and imaging methods. I have been a Faculty Member of Common Room at Green College since 2014. I was on the Membership Committee from 2015-2018, and joined the Advisory Board in 2020. I also led an active resident discussion group over the 2018-2019 academic year.
ALISON WYLIE, Ph.D, B.A., F.R.S.C., F.A.H.A.
Professor of Philosophy and Canada Research Chair (Tier 1), University of British Columbia
I am a feminist philosopher of the social and historical sciences with particular interest in archaeological research practice. What intrigues me are questions about how inquiry succeeds when evidence is sparse and uncertain, and how significantly it can be enhanced by bringing to bear a diversity of situated experience, knowledge and interests. Since joining UBC in 2017 I have worked with the Indigenous/Science research cluster and in that connection, I co-convened a Green College Interdisciplinary Series on Indigenous-led partnerships, “Exploring Histories and Environments” (2019-2020). I also assisted with “Working Tools: Community-Facing Data Management Platforms for Indigenous-University Partnerships” (2020). I have a longstanding commitment to equity, diversity, and inclusiveness in research and activism in the academy and beyond. I am currently working with a UBC-based philosophy collective on the “Philosophy Exception” website project.
MARK TURIN, Ph.D., B.A.
Associate Professor, Institute for Critical Indigenous Studies and Anthropology, University of British Columbia
I am an anthropologist and linguist. My research focuses on language reclamation, revitalization, documentation and conservation; language mapping, policies, politics and language rights; orality, archives, digital tools and technology. Indigenous methodologies and decolonial practice inform and shape my teaching and research. For over twenty years, my regional focus has been the Himalayan region (particularly Nepal, Sikkim and Bhutan), and more recently, the Pacific Northwest. I direct two international research initiatives, Digital Himalaya and the World Oral Literature Project, and I edit the Oral Literature Series with the Open Book Publishers. I am also the principal investigator for the Relational Lexicography project through which we are developing a framework and toolkit for collaborative, community-informed dictionary work with marginalized languages. I write about language policy, linguistic rights, digital technologies, cultural heritage and mother tongue instruction. As a firm advocate of collaborative research, I am committed to widening public engagement with anthropology and linguistics.