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Tier 2 Canada Research Chair in Mental Health and Intersectional Inclusivity

News Date: Thursday, November 19, 2020 - 15:15

Tier 2 Canada Research Chair in Mental Health and Intersectional Inclusivity

(Tenure Stream Assistant Professor or Associate Professor)

The Department of Educational & Counselling Psychology, and Special Education (ECPS) in the Faculty of Education at the University of British Columbia invites applications for a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair (CRC) in Mental Health and Intersectional Inclusivity as part of their CPA-accredited Counselling Psychology (CNPS) program. The successful candidate will be nominated by the University for the Chair, and upon approval of the Chair by the CRC Secretariat, they will be offered a tenure stream faculty appointment at the rank of either Assistant Professor or Associate Professor in ECPS. The appointment start date is contingent on the approval of the Chair but is anticipated to be Jan 1, 2022.

Tier 2 CRCs are intended for exceptional emerging scholars, who have completed their PhD within the last 10 years at the time of nomination. Applicants who are more than 10 years from having earned their highest degree and have experienced legitimate career interruptions (maternity, parental or extended sick leave, clinical training, or family care) may have their eligibility for a Tier 2 CRC assessed through the program's Tier 2 justification process. Please consult the Canada Research Chairs website (https://www.chairs-chaires.gc.ca) for full program information, including further details on eligibility criteria.

The successful candidate for this Tier 2 CRC position will hold a doctoral degree in counselling psychology (or a closely related field) with expertise in educational or work settings who is a member of one or more of the following designated groups: women, visible minorities, persons with disabilities, and indigenous people, and is an emerging leader engaged in research that will facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration. Eligibility for registration as a psychologist in BC is also required. They will have a strong record of research in promotion of mental well-being within vulnerable populations. There are many possible populations that can be a focus for such research, including immigrants, refugees, those who have experienced trauma, and members of Indigenous and LGBQT communities. The candidate’s research may approach mental health promotion from any perspective grounded in counselling psychology (e.g., prevention, intervention, resilience, career or academic success, couple and family relationships). It is also expected that the Tier 2 CRC position will act as a catalyst in drawing and supervising graduate students and working with other researchers with similar interests from within UBC as well as provincially, nationally and internationally, greatly increasing research and programmatic capacity in addressing this critical need.

The central focus of this position is on furthering understanding of inclusion and intersectionality in influencing the experience of mental well-being in educational and work settings, consistent with the World Health Organization (2014) definition of mental health as a “state of well-being in which an individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and is able to make a contribution to his or her community.” Intersectionality refers to the overlap of different societal and personal factors and identities that contribute to the positions that people are in, and how they live and interact with others. Interactions between and among issues like homelessness, disability, education, racial, ethnic and gender discrimination, addiction, and poverty are all examples of challenges faced by individuals and communities that can greatly compromise access to mental health services and opportunities for mental well-being for both individuals and groups. Adopting a social-ecological perspective (individual within a particular context), this Tier 2 CRC position will centre on scholarly activity that will stimulate research, policy and practice to improve the mental health of vulnerable populations, with particular focus on women, people with disabilities, racialized people and Indigenous people.

The University of British Columbia is located on traditional unceded Musqueam territory in beautiful Vancouver, Canada. The University is a global centre for teaching, learning and research, consistently ranked among the top 20 public universities in the world and recently recognized as North America’s most international university. The UBC Faculty of Education is one of the leading faculties of its kind in the world, advancing educational research and understanding of teaching and learning in a way that celebrates diversity, equity and innovation, and welcomes international collaboration in an increasingly borderless globe. We provide a comprehensive set of programmatic offerings at the baccalaureate, magisterial, and doctoral levels. Academic units include the Department of ECPS, the Department of Curriculum and Pedagogy, the Department of Educational Studies, the Department of Language and Literacy Education, the School of Kinesiology and the School of Okanagan. For further details about the Faculty of Education and its research and teaching programs, please visit www.educ.ubc.ca

As the largest academic unit in the UBC Faculty of Education, ECPS has a number of faculty members across program areas who engage in initiatives to promote mental wellbeing in marginalized groups, through both research and educational practice and in both teacher education and graduate programs. Consistent with our teacher education focus on mental health literacy, faculty members in Human Development Learning and Culture, and in Special Education have long promoted socially inclusive classrooms as a foundation for student mental well-being through Social-Emotional Learning, Self-Regulated Learning, and Universal Design for Learning. Both independently and collaboratively, our School Psychology and Counselling Psychology graduate programs focus on research and interventions to support individuals with mental health challenges in schools and beyond. Counsellors and counselling psychologists, however, are central to the provision of mental health support. They work with individuals across the life span who experience distress and difficulties with life events and transitions, and engage in prevention, education and advocacy to reduce the risk of mental health difficulties. The main aim of this Tier 2 CRC position will be to address issues of inequity, marginalization and exclusion that will positively impact research, policy and practice to promote the mental wellbeing of women, people with disabilities, racialized people and Indigenous people and their ability to live mentally healthy lives.

All CRC nominations are subject to review and final approval by the CRC Secretariat. To meet the criteria of the CRC program, the Tier 2 Chair nominee must be an excellent, emerging, world-class researcher who has demonstrated particular research creativity and the potential to achieve international recognition in the field in the next five to ten years. The chair holder should have the potential to attract, develop and retain excellent trainees, students and future researchers; and should propose an original, innovative research program of high quality. The Tier 2 CRC has a term of five years which may be renewed once.

The tenure steam appointment at the rank of either Assistant Professor or Associate Professor is subject to a positive review of the candidate’s records following the process established by the University and in accordance with the UBC Collective Agreement. For more information on the review process and criteria for an appointment at the ranks, please visit: www.hr.ubc.ca/faculty-relations/collective-agreements/appointment-faculty/. This position is subject to final budgetary approval. Starting salary is determined both by the candidate's qualifications and experience and by their placement on the career progress scale within the Faculty of Education.

Applications must include (i) a letter indicating the position being sought and outlining potential teaching and research contributions to the Department, (ii) an updated curriculum vitae, (iii) a 5-year research plan to deliver upon the mandate of this research chair position, (iv) evidence of teaching excellence (such as course outlines and student evaluations) and (v) two samples of relevant publications. The complete application file should be submitted in the format of one book-marked PDF file and should be addressed to Dr. Jenna Shapka, Department Head, and sent electronically to Ms. Silvia Almanza-Alonso (Assistant to Head) at silvia.almanzaalonso@ubc.ca. Applicants should also arrange to have three letters of reference external to UBC and external to the applicant’s current home institution sent directly to Ms. Almanza-Alonso (email: silvia.almanzaalonso@ubc.ca ). Application reviews will commence on November 30, 2020 and will continue until the position is filled.

 

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