RCMC Newsletter
August 2025
August 2025 - Live MeetingsAugust 14th.
Robin Anderson: Environmental Interactions: “Everything Everywhere All at Once” Presentation: Environmental interactions are key to understanding humans’ place in the environment and predicting and constraining the consequences of our actions on the ecosystems we exploit and manage. In this talk I will begin with an overview of my career as a research scientist with the Federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada. In this role I was responsible for providing advice to aquatic habitat managers on the consequences of human activities including offshore oil development, mine tailings disposal, fish and shellfish aquaculture and hydro-electric development. My research programs aligned to inform this advice, focussed on better understanding the interactions between humans and the environment and their consequences for fish, fish habitat and the humans who used the environments and relied on the fish for subsistence or livelihood. In the second part of my talk I would like to share with you some of the very cool stories that we can tell from many years of studying mercury in fish in Newfoundland and Labrador that was a major part of my research program for thirty years. Bio: I have always been associated with aquatic environments. I started life on Toronto Island where we travelled by canoe as often as by bicycle. I spent an amazing six years there. Next in Quebec City, I and my siblings played water polo, swam competitively and one sister and I spent six years on the Canadian national synchronized swimming team as it was known then. I did my undergraduate degree at Laval University in biology and then an MSc in biology studying kelp ecology in the St. Lawrence estuary. From there I switched to freshwaters and completed a PhD at McGill University studying the ecology of aquatic plants in lakes of the Eastern Townships. After an assistant professorship at the Universite du Quebec a Montreal and a visiting professorship at the University of Maryland, my husband and I moved to Newfoundland where he was offered a position at Memorial University. I was offered a position at the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Centre in St. John’s and then was given the opportunity to create the Marine Habitat Research Program for the Region of Newfoundland and Labrador. The research of this program was focussed on the effects of human activity on the marine environment. The other responsibility that I had as a federal government research scientist was to provide advice to fish habitat managers and the DFO Minter regarding the consequences of proposed development projects on fish and fish habitat. The first project I reviewed was the effects monitoring program for the Hibernia offshore development. Since then, I have led research programs and provided advice on other offshore development projects, on finfish and shellfish aquaculture projects, mining projects, hydro-electric developments, oil spill mitigation, seismic surveys, underwater cables and seaweed harvesting. 10am. To be followed by Live Questions. August 28th.
Greg Kennedy: Dancing On The Edge: How to Keep Upright As the World Falls Down Presentation: Leonard Cohen perhaps sang it best: “I’ve seen the future, brother, it is murder”. In many ways (ecological, social, geopolitical) it feels like this future is right on top of us these days. And yet live each single day we must. My lifelong concern has been how to do so responsibly, joyfully, creatively, consciously. Drawing on my studies of philosophy and my profession of spiritual direction, I would like to talk about our individual and collective roles of living in an age of apparent ecological and civil collapse without interiorly falling apart. The edge we are dancing on is thin, but this just heightens our chances of moving gracefully. Bio: Greg Kennedy holds a PhD in philosophy from the University of Ottawa and a Masters of Theology from the Javeriana University in Bogota, Colombia. For the past eight years, he has worked at the Ignatius Jesuit Centre in multiple capacities as a retreat director, instructor, spiritual director, Executive Director, and sometime farmhand. He is the author of An Ontology of Trash: the disposable and its problematic nature (SUNY Press), and three volumes of Reupholstered Psalms (Novalis Press). His preferred mode of transportation is walking, for all kinds of superlative reasons. 10am. To be followed by Live Questions. |
Robin Anderson
Greg Kennedy
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Messages
Future Meetings
Meetings for September
Sept. 11th. 2025
Chief Colby & Deputy Chief Dan Gill: Policing and Protection from Scams
Sept. 25th. 2025
Mike Finoro: Life as a Correctional Officer
Activities & Events
August 18th.
Ad Hoc Hike
UofG Arboretum 9:30am
East parking lot lower
August 20th.
Axe Throwing
Riot Axe
101 Beverley St, Suite D
2PM
September 12th.
A Night at the Races
Elora Raceway
See activities desk for more details
Coffee Mornings
Coffee/Breakfast
August 7th. and 21st.
RCMC Live Coffee Morning
9:30 am
The Boathouse
116 Gordon St.
or
Uptown Grill
694 Woolwich St.
More news to come regarding activities and live coffee mornings
Refer to the website often
August 7th. and 21st.
RCMC Live Coffee Morning
9:30 am
The Boathouse
116 Gordon St.
or
Uptown Grill
694 Woolwich St.
More news to come regarding activities and live coffee mornings
Refer to the website often
Other News
There is a new What's New section on the Home page of our website. This will give you quick links to any new information which has been posted on the website.
If you have any new content for the website, please send to Ritchie Zelk at [email protected]
Membership
Please send any updates to your entry in the Membership Directory, including any change in email address, to
Martin Alderwick; 519-763-6939 [email protected]
Members are encouraged to invite male friends and acquaintances to our meetings.
Martin Alderwick; 519-763-6939 [email protected]
Members are encouraged to invite male friends and acquaintances to our meetings.