Committees & partnerships

Dr. Brendan Boyd

PhD (Victoria)
Associate Professor
Discipline Coordinator

780-633-3227
boydb26@macewan.ca

Brendan Boyd specializes in Canadian public administration and public policy. Dr. Boyd’s research focuses on the role that non-partisan public servants play in a 21st-century democracy. He has co-edited two academic volumes and over a dozen peer-reviewed works in national and international journals and publications. Recent research publications have compared how public servants, elected officials and the public view the evolving role of public service in Canada and examined levels of trust among different actors involved in public governance. In his career, Dr. Boyd has served as a board member on various regional chapters of the Institute of Public Administration of Canada and recently was a member of the City of Edmonton Councillor Budget Review Task Force and Social Planning Council of Edmonton’s Vital Statistics Advisory Council.

Dr. Alissa Overend

PhD (Alberta)
Associate Professor
Coordinator, Gender Studies minor

780-633-3313
overenda@macewan.ca

As a health sociologist working in food insecurity and alternative food networks, Dr. Alissa Overend has long been concerned with how social, political and economic systems and policies affect our collective ability to achieve wellness. She enjoys working in inter- and cross-disciplinary environments and upholds the vital role that food plays in creating and sustaining healthy communities. She is interested in highlighting food sovereignty approaches that build and develop urban food security, notably amidst rising food insecurity rates in Canada. Dr. Overend is excited by the opportunity to link food sovereignty initiatives to other axes of the institute and urban wellness.

Dr. Jeffrey Rice

PhD (Queen's)
Assistant Professor
Honours/Discipline Advisor

780-497-4524
ricej26@macewan.ca

Dr. Jeffrey Rice is an assistant professor at MacEwan University. His research examines the dynamics of international security organizations in multilateral warfare. In particular, he analyzes the role of the permanent staff and secretariats of international security organizations and the influence they have on state and organizational decision making. His areas of focus include the protection of civilians, force generation and the legitimacy of multilateral warfare.

Dr. Leslie Dawson is an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology, Economics and Political Science at MacEwan University. As a member of the Research Institute for Urban Wellness (RIUW) steering committee, Leslie looks forward to assisting with the development and implementation of an array of collaborative and impactful research projects and initiatives exploring wellness in urban contexts. Given that her medical anthropological research focuses on decolonial approaches to Indigenous health and well-being, Leslie is excited to bring anthropology’s holistic perspective and ethnographic methods to the interdisciplinary nature of this exciting new institute.

Dr. Sue Holdsworth has been learning what it means to live and be well, as well as ways to improve urban wellness through her work at the City of Edmonton on an initiative called RECOVER Urban Wellbeing. RECOVER focused on people living on the margins and used social research and development to find and test new solutions. Dr. Holdsworth is keen to explore the intersection of well-being, systems thinking and reconciliation. She believes that material and non-material elements of wellness are inseparable and is eager to work with the institute to find ways to intentionally link them to our policies and practices.

Dr. Shahidul Islam is a professor of Economics, specializing in agricultural and resource economics. His regular teaching areas are agricultural economics, resource economics, environmental economics, energy economics, urban economics and introductory microeconomics. His primary research areas include food demand analysis, resource and energy policy issues in developed and developing countries and economic education. He has been with MacEwan University for 25 years and has offered his services at various levels, including as the Department Chair of Anthropology, Economics and Political Science.

As someone who works at the health systems level, we know that most of our health is determined by social factors, including our relationships and lived environment. This is what excites Dr. Richard Lewanczuk about the Urban Wellness Institute. Being from the health system, he wants to be able to highlight the issues we see in our context to researchers from diverse non-medical backgrounds to help us all see health and wellness differently. As is said in Costa Rica, health is a form of wellness created by the community.

Dr. Karen K. Lee, MD, MHSC, is an associate professor at the Division of Preventive Medicine in the Department of Medicine at the University of Alberta. She is also an adjunct professor at the School of Public Health and an instructor at the School of Regional and Urban Planning at the University of Alberta. She teaches the course Designing Healthy Cities each June at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health’s EPIC Summer Institute.

Anna’s research interests in homelessness, inequality and lived experience drive her motivation to join the steering committee. As someone who grew up in Edmonton, Anna aims to consider how research and policy can better include individuals with a multitude of lived experiences to provide a more comprehensive understanding of urban wellness. Anna is most excited about engaging with various partners through the Institute, sharing various forms of knowledge and research and working to build the Institute and its influence in Edmonton and abroad.