Faculty of Arts and Science

Faculty of Engineering and Computer Science

Faculty of Arts and Science

Faculty of Commerce and Administration

Jean Sutherland Boggs has been a vital participant in the art community of Canada and the United States for more than half a century, notably as director of the National Gallery of Canada.

She earned her undergraduate degree in fine arts at the University of Toronto, and her Master's and PhD at Harvard University. By that time, she had already served as education secretary of the Art Association of Montreal, now the Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal, with Arthur Lismer. She taught at Skidmore College, Mount Hollyoke College, the University of California Riverside, Washington University and Harvard.

She began her museum career as curator at the Art Gallery of Toronto, now the Art Gallery of Ontario. In 1966, she was named the director of the National Gallery of Canada, the only woman to head a major North American museum. It was a position she held for 10 years, revitalizing its scholarship, administrative efficiency and professionalism. The gallery's position on the world stage today is a legacy of her directorship.

After a period as director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, she became chair and CEO of the Canada Museums Construction Corporation, where her determination led to the construction of a custom-built National Gallery building and the unique Canadian Museum of Civilization.

Dr. Boggs' commitment to the art of Picasso first manifested itself in the 1964 exhibition Picasso and Man, the first large-scale showing of that artist's work in Canada, and more recently, in her curating in 1992 of Picasso and Things: Still Lifes by Picasso in Cleveland, Philadelphia and Paris. Her principal lifelong interest, however, has been the art of Edgar Degas, on whom she has published since 1955 to international recognition.

A woman of exemplary modesty and generosity, she has been a key force in the shaping of young art historians.

Barrie J. Frost, PhD, is an international leader in sensory neuroscience and psychology.

Originally trained as a primary school teacher, he obtained his BA and Master's degrees from the University of Canterbury in his native New Zealand. His doctoral work brought him to Dalhousie University in Halifax, where he held the Rutherford Scholarship from the Royal Society of London.

Following his post-doctoral fellowship at the University of California at Berkeley, he moved to Queen's University, in Kingston. For the past 30 years he has taught there in the Departments of Psychology, Biology and Physiology.

Dr. Frost has made outstanding contributions to our understanding of vision, hearing and the brain mechanisms underlying their functioning. His work incorporates a psychologist's grasp of perceptual principles, a neurophysiologist's expertise in recording neural signals and analyzing brain circuitry, an ethologist's sense of adaptation to the natural environment and an engineer's feel for the design of information processing and real-time control systems.

His visual neuroscience research has focused on how motion is processed in the brain, and in particular, how motion of objects is distinguished from motion of the image produced by the eye, head and body movement.

He has also worked on applied projects such as developing a miniaturized artificial ear for the profoundly deaf. His research projects have included studies to help Parkinson's patients move, studies of low-frequency hearing in birds, and studies of human visual processing.

Professor Frost has also played an important role in the formulation and implementation of Canadian science policy. He has hundreds of scientific publications to his credit, and has collaborated with fellow scholars at many universities and research centres in Canada. He is also a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.

Serge Godin is chair of the board and chief executive officer of CGI, a leader in the field of information techonolgy.

As a teenager growing up in Quebec's Saguenay region in the 1960s, he became fascinated by the potential of computers. He enrolled in computer technology and management at Université Laval, and at the age of 26, launched CGI Inc., a computer consulting and management company in Quebec City. What began as a two-person operation in his basement in 1976 has grown into Canada's largest independent information technology consulting company and the fifth largest in North America.

In the course of this rapid growth, Mr. Godin has assembled a confident management team who have concentrated on five key areas: finance, telecommunications, government services, and distribution and manufacturing of goods. Listed on the stock exchange in 1995 at $14 million, the Groupe CGI is now, five years later, listed at more than $7 billion.

Five principles form the basis of Mr. Godin's success: dealing with one client at a time, doing what he says he will do, respecting his promises, maintaining his independence, and promoting teamwork. A firm believer in keeping his workforce happy, he has a staff turnover that is half that of other companies in the same sector. This includes 10,000 professionals in 40 offices in Canada and the United States and 21 other countries around the world.

Serge Godin has been president of the Board of Trade of Metropolitan Montreal and currently sits on the the board of directors of the Societé générale de financement. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Certified Management Consultants and is active in several charitable organizations. In 1996, he was honoured by the Université du Québec à Chicoutimi for his business achievements and his involvement in social issues.

For more than three decades, Ann Saddlemyer has been a pioneer in Irish studies, and is the most highly respected and widely known scholar in the field outside of Ireland itself.

Born and raised in Sas-katchewan, she earned her undergraduate degree in English and psychology from the University of Saskatchewan, her Master's in English from Queen's University, and her doctorate from the University of London, after which she taught at the University of Victoria.

In 1971, she went to the University of Toronto, where she was director of the Graduate Centre for the Study of Drama, introducing the first classes in Canadian theatre. She stayed at the university for close to 25 years, and also served as Master of Massey College (1988 to 1995), the first woman ever to hold that position. In 1995, she returned to the University of Victoria, where she continues to conduct her research and writing.

Dr. Saddlemyer's work has played a central role in establishing the writers of the Irish literary renaissance as a subject worthy of study outside the traditional parameters of the English literary tradition, particularly through her publications on Lady Gregory and John Millington Synge. Her international scholarly reputation will, no doubt, be further enhanced with the forthcoming publication of a critical biography of Georgie Yeats, wife of William Butler Yeats.

Whether lecturing in Japan, Sweden, Egypt or Italy, her audiences are struck by her ability to convey in lucid and energetic language the universal civilizing aspects of literature.

Dr. Saddlemyer is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and the Royal Society of Arts in England. She is a member of the Canadian Association for Irish Studies and the International Association for the Study of Irish Literatures, which she chaired for three years, and is the founding president of the Association of Canadian Theatre Research.

James M. Stanford is the recently retired chair, president and chief executive officer of Petro-Canada, and president of the newly established Stanford Resource Management Inc.

He was born in Montreal, raised in Calgary, and returned here to earn his Bachelor of Science degree in mining from Loyola College.

Alberta's oil industry was booming then. He took a summer job on an oil rig near Calgary, and has been hooked on the oil patch ever since. He completed a second undergraduate degree in petroleum engineering at the University of Alberta, and spent 19 years at Mobil Oil Canada in a succession of engineering and managerial positions.

In 1978, Mr. Stanford joined the fledgling Petro-Canada at a difficult time for the Crown corporation. In 1993, Stanford became CEO of Petro-Canada. The federal government's ownership began to drop off in 1991, and the company began to function largely as a private one. Under his stewardship, Petro-Canada was effectively restructured. He continues to serve on its board of directors,

Jim Stanford has served on the Business Council on National Issues, the Task Force on the National Economy, the Task Force on the Environment and the Canadian government's Y2K Task Force. He sits on the boards of directors of NOVA Chemicals, Inco, Fortis and the Canadian Wheat Board, and has been on the board of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers.

He has been involved in several Alberta arts organizations, and maintains close ties with both alma maters. The University of Alberta has also awarded him an honorary doctorate this spring.

During Concordia's recent capital fundraising campaign, Stanford was a leading volunteer for the Western Division. He also brought the Petro-Canada Young Innovator Award to Concordia, creating an endowment to provide research funding to young researchers who are working on environmental issues.