Faculty Honours & Awards

TMU congratulates faculty members who are recognized for their accomplishments, academic service and sustained influence in their fields through various honours and awards. The following is a small selection of the numerous accolades bestowed upon TMU faculty.

External Awards

Royal Society of Canada

Among the highest honours that a Canadian scholar can receive.

Pamela Palmater (Chair in Indigenous Governance), an award-winning Mi’kmaw lawyer, author and advocate, was named a Member of the Royal Society of Canada’s College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists for her work as a leading voice on the complex and numerous issues facing Indigenous peoples in Canada.

Other External Awards

Faculty of Arts

Hoa Nguyen (English), known internationally for her contributions to the world of poetry, received the C.D. Wright Award for Poetry from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts.

Sanjay Ruparelia (Politics and Public Administration), the inaugural Jarislowsky Democracy Chair, was awarded a fellowship by the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study to increase his knowledge of constitutionalism in the Global South.

Tracey Raney and Mike McGregor (Politics and Public Administration) received the Jill Vickers Prize for their paper examining public attitudes toward men’s harassment of women in Canadian politics.

Faculty of Community Services

Samantha Biglieri (Urban and Regional Planning) received the Ontario Professional Planners Institute’s PlanON Innovative Research Award for research into how land use and design impacts the ability of people living with dementia to access their neighbourhoods.

Faculty of Engineering & Architectural Science

Rania Hamza (Civil Engineering) was named to 3M Canada’s 25 Women in Science program for her groundbreaking research on extracting valuable resources from wastewater during the water treatment process.

Faculty of Science

Michael Kolios (Physics) received the IEEE Carl Hellmuth Hertz Ultrasonics Award for his groundbreaking contributions to qualitative ultrasound and photoacoustics.

Ted Rogers School of Management

Claire Deng (Accounting and Finance) received Emerald Publishing’s 2023 Emerald Literati Outstanding Reviewer Award as selected by the journal Qualitative Research in Accounting and Management.

Liang (Arthur) Li (Business Management), along with co-authors from Western University and the University of North Carolina, was awarded the Academy of Management’s best paper award for their study of general manager succession.

The Creative School

Owais Lightwala (Performance) received the Arnold Edinborough Award for his achievements as a champion of partnerships, innovation and inclusion in the arts.

Internal Awards

Scholarly, Research & Creative (SRC) Activity Awards

Nominated by fellow faculty members, TMU’s university-wide SRC Activity Awards recognize researchers for their emerging leadership in their fields, long-term or cumulative research contributions, or a specific project or collaboration shaping policy or advancing innovation.

The annual Sarwan Sahota Distinguished Scholar Award is given to one or more university faculty members for outstanding contributions to their research discipline. The award is made available through the joint contributions of Sarwan Sahota, a retired professor, and Toronto Metropolitan University.

Sharareh Taghipour (Canada Research Chair in Physical Asset Management), recognized as this year’s recipient, employs mathematical modelling and data analytics and develops state-of-the-art technologies to reduce costs, increase availability and enhance the energy efficiency of physical assets, ultimately reducing greenhouse gas emissions and creating more sustainable operations in health care and manufacturing.

Early evening photo of the Toronto cityscape with the CN Tower in the middle and well-lit buildings surrounding it against a cloudy sky.

The Early SRC Career Excellence Award was awarded to Rania Hamza (Civil Engineering), a distinguished scholar in wastewater treatment who champions a transformative vision emphasizing cutting-edge technology development, contaminant removal, energy efficiency and circular resource utilization from waste streams.

The Collaborative SRC Award went to Elsayed Elbeshbishy (Civil Engineering) for his contributions and commitment to collaborative research, intellectual property advancements, mentoring of Highly Qualified Personnel and groundbreaking research on greenhouse gas emissions.

The Knowledge Mobilization and Engagement Award was given to Josephine Wong (Nursing) who works closely with systematically marginalized communities to co-design community-centred research and interventions and mobilize and translate knowledge systems into social innovations that address health disparities.

The Social Innovation and Action SRC Award went to Shelagh McCartney (Urban and Regional Planning), who focuses on processes and models of partnership that promote co-creation with marginalized peoples in Canada's near-north and global south. This work leads to initiatives that remove barriers and engage community members in creating community-based and decolonized built systems.

Dean’s Scholarly, Research & Creative (SRC) Activity Award

The annual Dean’s SRC Activity Award recognizes individual faculty members for outstanding SRC achievements, teaching and service during the preceding academic year.