Cannon Design Blog

Cannon Design’s Toronto office (with the help and support from many across the firm in different offices) hosted a key event in conjunction with the Education Advisory Board in late November titled, “Innovation In A Changing Academic Environment.” The event took place at The University Club in Toronto and featured four presentations on current trends and transforming aspects of higher education. The four presentations are bulleted out below and each featured two presenters – one from the EAB and one from Cannon Design. For those unfamiliar with the EAB, the group works hard to provide best practice research and practical advice to academic, business and student affairs leaders at the nation’s leading universities. The science and technology piece reflected a new Canadian custom research report by EAB, presented at the event for the first time. You can learn more here.

The four presentations at our November event included:

~ The Big Picture: Challenges for Post-Secondary Education in Canada – Introduction by Safdar Abidi, presented by David Attis

~ Learning Spaces: Maximizing Classroom Utilization and Designing Innovative New Classrooms – David Attis and Brad Lukanic

~ The Information Commons: The Future of the Academic Library on Campus and in the Cloud – David Attis and Stephen Johnson

~ Science and Technology: Building the Infrastructure to Support World-Class Research Programs – David Attis and Mark Whiteley

I approached David Attis with the idea of this event during the Higher education summit in Baltimore (2010). Initially it was meant to be a smaller event where the EAB would host a small group with us in our office. But over time, the idea and the size of the event grew. We had to move the location to The University Club, an elegant and appropriately named facility near our office in Downtown Toronto. We had over 30 people including Guests, Cannon Design and EAB members. Senior leadership from Academics, Administration and facilities were represented in the audience.

Both our Toronto office and the EAB invited all our contacts in the Canadian higher education market to the event. While there were a few people who were unable to attend due to scheduling conflicts, there were absolutely zero no-shows for our event. Those people who said they would be there made sure they were in attendance and some guests had to leave for other commitments but returned to join the discussion. We even had representatives from the University of Manitoba and University of Carleton who flew in for the event.

To our knowledge- the event proved a hit. There was strong dialogue that stemmed from each of the presentations and we’ve received positive comments and feedback ever since. There was a “buzz” at the Colleges Ontario summit the following weekend where Cannon Design had a booth as a sponsor. Many in the audience commented on their appreciation of the two approaches/aspects for each topic from the Cannon Design and EAB perspectives. Our office even received an e-mail from a local University Provost who was unable to attend but mentioned the great comments they’d heard about this event.

There are a number of people across Cannon Design and the EAB who deserve great thanks for making this event a success and I want to thank all of them. This is a strong step forward for the Higher Education practice in Canada East. From all accounts, we will look into making this an annual event.

Here is a full list of the universities/colleges that attended the event.

Queens University, Ryerson University, George Brown College, Wilfrid Laurier University, University of Toronto, University of Manitoba, Carleton University, St. Clair College, Humber College, McMaster University.

Safdar Abidi - 07 Dec 2011

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