15 Years of KI: Faculty and Staff

2008 - 2013

Like others who helped build the KI program, Linda inspired hundreds of high school students through her involvement with the Waterloo Unlimited and Shad Waterloo enrichment programs; in fact, she was one of Waterloo Unlimited’s original program designers. It is no surprise, then, that Linda was tapped to be one of the key architects for the Bachelor of Knowledge Integration. Linda relished the opportunity to create a truly interdisciplinary curriculum – and to teach its inaugural course, ‘Introduction to the Academy: Disciplines and Integrative Practices’ (now ‘The Art and Science of Learning’). In 2013, Linda passed the torch to two new KI faculty members and took on a new role at the university. Sadly, Linda passed away in 2021, but her accomplishments, reputation, and positive impact will live on. We dearly miss Linda’s energy, enthusiasm, and creativity – and are all tremendously grateful for the essential role she played in helping to build KI.

2004 - 2008 Waterloo Unlimited / Knowledge Integration

Stephanie’s first step in her KI experience was as the longest serving Program Assistant in the history of the Shad Waterloo program. For seven years, she spent every July sharing her compassion, enthusiasm, and musical talent with a community of outstanding high school students. When Waterloo Unlimited was created in 2004, Stephanie joined the development team. KI began to emerge when, after successfully launching the Unlimited experience, students started asking "Why isn't there an Unlimited undergraduate degree? How am I supposed to narrow my interests to choose only one university program?" This is when Stephanie became early developer, traveling recruiter, and amanuensis, eventually travelling across Canada to spread the word about Unlimited and KI. Stephanie recalls, "it was an absolute privilege to be part of the dreaming, design and launch of the Bachelor of Knowledge Integration.”

2003 - 2016 Waterloo Unlimited

Rae came to KI through Waterloo Unlimited. A former high school enrichment educator and performance poet, he was a natural fit. His contributions ranged from sessions on Poetry Off the Page to keeping watch on the fire during the late-night hours of Waterloo Unlimited’s Fire Keepers program on the theme of water. As KI emerged out of the Waterloo Unlimited experience, Rae became the first host of our weekly seminar series, welcoming all to what is still known as “the living room of the program”. Rae took on the role of Program Director for Waterloo Unlimited in 2008 and shepherded the program throughout the remainder of its existence. Rae recalls a particularly fond memory during his time at Waterloo Unlimited, where “the aurora borealis lit the sky during the first program of Waterloo Unlimited. An auspicious event. In fact, students energized each program with their desire to learn, their dynamic release of light." 

2008 - 2016

Dr. Ed Jernigan has spent decades teaching others that the most valuable and enduring education is one that actively draws upon and unites diverse kinds of knowledge. It’s transdisciplinary. At MIT, Ed studied engineering along with a substantial exposure to the arts and humanities. While teaching Systems Design Engineering at Waterloo, he was impressed by the department’s integration of systems thinking with design practice. Another pivotal moment came when he collaborated with Prof. George Soulis to start Shad Waterloo. In 2004, Ed went a step above by creating Waterloo Unlimited, a program that emphasized transdisciplinary learning for high-potential high school students — and which proved to be the catalyst for Knowledge Integration. To students interested in the unique program he pioneered, Ed has this advice: “Be prepared to take charge of your own education.”

Read Ed's full interview

2008 - 2020

As KI’s Undergraduate Advisor for many years, Darlene McGeer supported acted as consultant, confidant and guide to students trying to find their way not just through KI but also the complexities of university life. It was an important role and one she relished, providing academic advice, answering questions and listing options about the program. “Often I became the safe person with whom they could discuss anything,” Darlene explains. “I was always available and willing to listen to all the students.” Some of her  fondest memories of KI are the times students moved to KI from other programs, and how she helped them make the difficult transition. “Many of them were struggling with the programs that they were in and when they found out about KI they were so excited,” she recalls. “Suddenly they had the freedom to design their own degree — imagine.”

2008 - 2022

If two heads are better than one, a classroom of heads is better still. For KI Senior Design Instructor Paul McKone, collaboration is the first stop on the journey to true knowledge integration. It starts with staff and faculty at department meeting and seminars and continues with team teaching, where instructors act as role models for collaboration. “Most of our core courses involve group projects, where a sizeable part of the lesson is about how to work together,” he says. “It’s about how to organize yourselves, what roles to fill, when conflict is good, how to solve bad conflict — taking notes, ownership, and responsibility.” And this coordinated approach pays off. While most students arrive at KI with a negative impression of group work, Paul says the emphasis on collaboration at every level results in students understanding “the importance of working well together, shunning the myth of the lone genius.”

2008 - 2023

As the Outreach and Administrative Manager for KI during its first 15 years, Kim Boucher says her role was “helping interesting people make great things happen.” If it was a supportive role, it was also a major, all-encompassing one that involved administrative work, financial tracking, recruiting, and much more, even including, in KI’s early days, figuring out how to hire faculty and foraging for used furniture for the studio. But as important as her work was, perhaps Kim's most rewarding role was helping students determine if KI was right for them. It was the students who truly inspired her: those who chose to enter KI, were brave enough to challenge and push themselves, and who were “kindred spirits”, as she calls them. Kim states, “I’m a believer in enriched education and trying to help both high school and university students find their path."

2009 - present

If the first academic love of Dr. Katie Plaisance was science, the second was philosophy. This goes a long way to explaining how someone who started university studying molecular biology segued into a Master’s, then a Doctorate, in Philosophy. It also explains why she now works as a philosopher of science whose message to Knowledge Integration students is to become scientifically literate. “Being scientifically literate means that you understand the process of science and the nature of scientific evidence,” Katie, who is also Chair of the KI program, explains. “You can sift through an ocean of information and be able to make important decisions in the face of uncertainty.” And if anyone doubts the need for scientific literacy, she has this to add: “There has never been a more important time in history to develop this attribute, given the issues we’re facing with climate change, potential food and water shortages, and a recent global pandemic.”

Read Katie's full interview

2010 - present

An electrical engineer who helped design Waterloo’s Mechatronics Engineering program, Dr. Rob Gorbet moved to Knowledge Integration in 2010 to teach the program’s Museum Course. In addition to recommending it for being “jam-packed” with all kinds of explicit and implicit learning, he emphasizes how this course enables students to practice applied knowledge integration. Rob loves watching students put their creation into the world and experience how doing so fills the students with feelings of pride and a sense of real accomplishment. Throughout it all, Rob's experience designing and installing in museums around the world, and his engineering background, help students apply effective group problem-solving approaches to significant design challenges. “In the best collaborations, disciplinary differences are a strength,” he says

Read Rob's full interview

2013 - present

Like other KI professors, Dr. John McLevey is a passionate researcher committed to conducting research with others and sharing the results with students, peers, and community members. The way he sees things, it only makes sense that a program that knocks down walls between academic disciplines also demolishes barriers between classrooms and the real world. John's work addresses problems that transcend any specific discipline and contributes to a variety of interdisciplinary research fields, including network science, computational social science and cognitive social science. It’s no coincidence that this same applied and interdisciplinary philosophy informs his course, INTEG 120: The Art and Science of Learning, which combines theory with practical learning skills for students to help them thrive.

Read John's full interview

2013 - present

Solving problems in the classroom is one thing. Solving problems outside the classroom is another - and often more challenging. KI students look to Dr. Vanessa Schweizer to do both. In courses such as INTEG 121: Collaboration, Design Thinking and Problem Solving, and the project capstone course INTEG 499A/B, she imparts an approach that is both distinctive and hands-on. “Typically, a mix of independent and collaborative work across disciplinary boundaries, honed through multiple iterations of prototypes, produces the best results,” Vanessa says. Her research focuses on the problem of cross-disciplinary knowledge integration and the design of scenarios for the human dimensions of large-scale environmental change. With her fundamental training in Physics, Environmental Studies and Engineering and Public Policy, Vanessa blends these interdisciplinary interests through her work on scenarios, which are common tools for collective decision-making.

Read Vanessa's full interview

2013 - present

At a time when many universities are developing interdisciplinary programs, Dr. Mathieu (Matt) Feagan believes Waterloo’s KI program is in a league of its own. A critical social scientist working on interdisciplinary pedagogies of social transformation and ecological consciousness, he explains that many “well-intentioned” interdisciplinary programs are expected to perform much like any traditional disciplinary program but with fewer resources or physical spaces, which leads to “mixed success.” In contrast, KI “truly owns its own interdisciplinarity,” Matt says. “It does not pretend to straddle two disciplines but rather aims to help any student learn how to make sense of a complex and dynamic world through collaboration and community building, design and critical thinking. It clearly supports each student’s own capacity for self-directed inquiry.” It’s no wonder, then, that Matt says working in KI “is the most dignified job I have ever had.

Read Matt's full interview

2021 - present

The KI story is worth telling to those who have never heard it, and a lot of Solène Jollivet’s job is doing just that — right across Canada. As the program’s current Outreach and Administrative Manager, Solène plays a vital role in KI both on- and off-campus. Solène engages with high school students through recruitment events and developing compelling narratives and stories about the program and its community. A graduate of KI and more recently its previous Undergraduate Advisor, Solène appreciates first-hand what it has to offer. “I greatly enjoy conversations with students who have been looking for a program that allows them to be their authentic, curious, multipassionate selves, and then discover KI,” she says. “Being part of such a supportive community is what makes me such a strong advocate for the program. I’m very grateful to KI for the unique experience it has allowed me to pursue.”

Read Solène's full interview

2024 - present

Emily Beilby wishes the Knowledge Integration Program had existed at the University of Waterloo when she was there earning her BA — she might have enrolled in it. But now she’s immersed in the program in a different way, not as a student or professor but as KI’s Undergraduate Advisor. Although still fairly new to the position, she’s excited about already helping students discover the courses that fit their interests while also ensuring that they meet their requirements. Emily says the flexibility of KI gives students “wonderful opportunities to tailor their education to fit their passions and career goals.” Having been extensively involved in the local community, running programs to support families and students in both elementary and high school, Emily says, “Seeing the huge range of areas KI students pursue is amazing to me. There is almost nothing they don’t explore. It is a privilege to help them on their journey.”