Congratulations.


The following projects have been awarded ARC Fund grants and will commence spring 2024:

Real-time Object Deployment ($3,495.00)
Thi Quynh (Monica Nguyen) – Mathematics and Statistics
Companies based in British Columbia and Ontario have continued to hire recent graduates from the Data Analytics Diploma (DANA) program due to their valuable experience gained through their capstone projects. The most recent hiring news is that Xenon-pharma hired a DANA graduate due to his/her unique expertise in the whole data product cycle. These unique expertise includes deployment of a data product and continuous development of that data product.

Experiences of Baccalaureate Nursing Students Preceptorship During COVID-19 Pandemic: A Qualitative Systematic Review ($3,500)
Denise Thompson – Nursing
Nursing education programs support quality clinical practice learning experiences, which are essential for preparing students for both the current and future workforce. The COVID-19 pandemic has drastically changed the health care system and the global shortage of nurses has almost doubled the previous estimates. Understanding nursing students’ clinical experiences during the pandemic can assist with identifying the needs of the future workforce. Nursing students complete the final practicum, also known as the last clinical, internship, or preceptorship before they are eligible to apply for licensure. This review seeks to explore these pre-transitional, unprecedented preceptorship experiences during COVID-19 to better understand how to prepare the pre-licensure nurse for the altered workforce.

Contrada Mella Ceramics Project ($3,500)
Jennifer Knapp – Interdisciplinary Studies (Classical Studies)
A study on the coarseware (cooking and transport vessels) pottery from the site of Contrada Mella (near Oppido Mamertina) in Calabria, Italy. This material will give us perspective into the living, cooking, eating, and trading habits of the native Italians who lived in the city during the Hellenistic/late Republican period (3rd—1st centuries BCE). This material was excavated from 1987 to 2001 and is thus long overdue for study and publication.

AI-enhanced Personalization for Engaging Gamified Learning ($3,500)
Hazra Imran (Computer Studies)
The project utilizes advanced AI to personalize gamified education, aligning with students' personality traits for improved engagement. It involves developing and validating language models fine-tuning to the Big Five Personality Traits, using these models to predict and enhance individual learning experiences. The ultimate goal is to create a nuanced, AI-assisted framework that dynamically adapts educational content to cater to diverse student personalities.

What is the ARC Fund?

The Applied Research Centre (ARC) Fund is an internal source of financing to encourage and support small-scale, original research and/or scholarly activities at Langara. Over 50 ARC Fund grants have been awarded Langara faculty since 2016. Through a competitive application process, the fund grants up to $3,500 per year to support eligible activities, which may include, but are not limited to:

  • building upon (or undertaking) projects of original research or scholarship involving community partners
  • initiating, maintaining, or extending an individual research portfolio
  • employing Langara College students
  • building infrastructure pertaining to research and scholarship
  • conducting field research, such as archaeological or anthropological studies, and work involving the collections of remote libraries, or museums

Who may apply?

If you are a term, “reg-in-temp”, or regular member of the faculty at Langara College, in either regular or continuing studies, you may apply to the ARC Fund.

How often may I apply?

There are three calls for proposals every year, one in each term. You may apply as often as you like. However, you can only hold one ARC Fund award at any given time. (You may hold ARC Fund and ARC Release awards simultaneously.) If you have received an award in a previous round of funding, you must bring the project to a close and submit a final report before applying for another award

May I apply for an award retroactively?

No. You must apply for your award to upcoming research-related activities. You may not apply retroactively to fund activities already undertaken. If the proposed activity takes place before the deadline for applications, the application is considered to be retroactive.

May I use ARC Fund for research-related travel?

You must first apply available professional development funds to eligible travel expenses, such as field work and in-person, remote conferences. If you have insufficient professional development funds to cover these costs, ARC Fund may be used to supply the balance. In order to use ARC Fund to cover conference travel specifically, you must present the results of your research at the funded conference, either orally or by way of a poster. ARC Fund cannot be used to support conference attendance without presentation.

Am I required to hire students?

You are not required to hire students to help you to conduct your research, but you are strongly encouraged to do so. Not only does research provide excellent experiential learning opportunities for students, but also training of highly qualified personnel (HQP) is very favourably considered by external funding agencies, like SSHRC and NSERC. If you intend to apply to these agencies in the future, hiring students now will bolster your application considerably. If you plan to hire students in your application to ARC Fund, they should be included as a line item in your proposed budget at $23.00/hour.

May I propose a collaborative project with another Langara faculty member?

Yes. Successful projects will be funded up to $3,500 per faculty member.

Are there any limits on the kind of research I may pursue?

Yes. You may not keep live animals on campus for the purpose of study. You may, however, propose to observe animals in the wild, or study animal artefacts, such as bone, hair, teeth, tissue, DNA, et cetera, that the animals have left behind during the normal course of their lives.

If your research involves humans in any way, you must seek approval from the Langara Research Ethics Board prior to applying for ARC Fund.

Is the ARC Fund the same as Education Leave?

No. ARC Fund and Education Leave are not related. However, should you apply for, or receive, Education Leave, you are encouraged to apply to ARC Fund to augment your research opportunities while on Education Leave, bearing in mind that ARC Fund supports research and scholarly activities, rather than accreditation, educational, or pedagogical initiatives. Your approved ARC Fund activities must be carried out during your regularly assigned duties. You may not carry forward vacation because you were working on your project.

How long may I hold an award?

You have one year from the day you accept the award to use the funds.

When are the application deadlines?

The application deadlines typically fall early in the last month of each academic semester. Please contact Seetha Kumaran for specific dates.

Where can I find the application form?

Make your application to the ARC Fund by filling and submitting this online form.

Who adjudicates the ARC Fund application?

The ARC Fund Adjudication Committee adjudicates applications to the ARC Fund. Each member ranks applications independently, and successful candidates are subsequently selected by consensus. Applications are ranked according to the quality of the criteria listed in the ARC Fund adjudication rubric; those applications with the highest rankings usually receive funding as permitted by budgetary constraints.

Are there any conditions attached to the funding?

Yes. You are expected to present the results of your research at Langara’s Applied Research Day, which is typically held annually around the third week of March. You are also required to submit a final report at the close of your project to the Associate Vice-President Academic, Julie Longo. All final reports will be uploaded to the Langara Institutional Repository (The LaIR).

 Where do I go if I have questions?

The Applied Research Centre is here to help you! Please reach out to the appropriate coordinator for assistance.