Vincent Hui is an architectural science professor at Ryerson University. He assigns his students projects that are often tied to competitions or initiatives to help students apply their designs in the real world. One of his initiatives is the RedUx Lab, where students use digital fabrication and technology to build their design ideas. The lab has helped students showcase projects across Canada and internationally. Hui also created an augmented reality app called Arch-App to provide information about significant Toronto buildings, and another app called ARIDD that allows students to virtually see building designs at full scale on site.

1. RESEARCH
NATIONWONG
V
incent Hui wakes up every
morning ready to do fun
stuff. For the architectural
science professor, that means
using technology to help students
take their designs from concept to
real-world application.
To that end, he assigns projects
that are often tied to competitions
or other initiatives. For example,
some assignments are designed
to add to the Arch-App. The app,
conceived and developed with the
help of the Ryerson Library and
students, provides information
about Toronto’s most significant
buildings. In all cases, the projects
bolster students’ portfolios and
in the process their confidence —
Hui’s ultimate objective.
Nowhere is this more evident
than in another Hui brainchild,
the [R]ed[U]x Lab, where archi-
tectural design students bring
their ideas to reality using digital
fabrication and interactive tech-
nologies. “Our program is known
for ensuring students can design,
detail and deliver,” says Hui. “The
lab gives students support so they
can realize their ideas and build
credibility.” The result — student
projects from the lab have been
featured in Toronto’s annual
art festival, Nuit Blanche, at the
Royal Ontario Museum and been
shown across Canada, in the U.S.,
Spain and the U.K.
Born and raised in Toronto, Hui
realized at a young age that archi-
tecture impacts both how people
behave and the welfare of society.
“I wanted to play a role in shaping
that.” He credits his teachers at St.
Michael’s Choir School with his
decision to become an academic.
“They had such a positive impact
on me. It motivated me to pay it
forward by trying to have a similar
impact on my students.”
Hui started his education in
architecture when the profession
was just beginning its transition
from drafting tables and hand-
drawn floor plans to computers
and software and was immediately
captivated. “Today’s students are
all about technology and they ap-
preciate that we’ve embraced it.”
Witness his use of augmented re-
ality in the Arch-App, which allows
users to hold their smartphones up
to buildings and access information
about the architecture.
After the success of the archi-
tecture app, Hui and a former stu-
dent, now co-researcher, Matthew
Compeau, created Augmented
Reality in Development Design
(ARIDD). “The software allows
students to virtually see their
designs built in full scale, on site.
It bridges the physical and digital.
You can see colours and material
properties. They can build what
they have in their head.” n
Professor Vincent Hui
in architectural science
studio with first-year
student projects.
DESIGN
LAB
VINCENT HUI TEACHES
STUDENTS TO
BRIDGE THE PHYSICAL
AND DIGITAL
BY MARY TERESA BITTI
W I N T E R 20 1 6 • Ryerson University Magazine 27
Ryerson University Magazine, Winter 2016

2. 20 Ryerson University Magazine • W I N T E R 2015
RESEARCH
LAKE
EFFECT
HOW POLICY RESEARCHERS ARE
HELPING RESTORE THE GREAT LAKES
W I N T E R 20 1 5 • Ryerson University Magazine 21
Politics and Public Administration Professor Carolyn
Johns in Lake Ontario, bringing together Canadian and
U.S. social scientists with the goal of making Great Lakes
waters drinkable, fishable and swimmable.
NATIONWONG
BY MARY TERESA BITTI, JOURNALISM ’89
H
ow do you make
sure that public
policy designed to
secure the health
of the Great Lakes − and by
extension the well-being of
the 35-plus million people
who rely on the system
for drinking water and
their livelihood − is actually
implemented?
That’s the question Ryerson
Politics and Public Administra-
tion Professor Carolyn Johns
decided to tackle when she
created the Great Lakes Policy
Research Network (GLPRN),
a collaborative partnership in-
volving policy researchers and
graduate students from eight
universities in Canada and the
United States.
“I wanted to bring together
Canadian and U.S. social
scientists interested in Great
Lakes governance and policy
issues to mobilize around
the renegotiated Great Lakes
Water Quality Agreement
and do research that would
lead to better success.”
A little environmental policy
history: In 1972, Canada and
the U.S. signed the Great Lakes
Water Quality Agreement in
order to restore and protect
the ecological health of the
Great Lakes, starting with Lake
Erie, which had been declared
dead in the late 1960s due to
widespread contamination
from urban areas, agriculture,
industries and sewage treat-
ment plants. Because it is the
shallowest of the five lakes,
Lake Erie issues clear warning
signals about pollution prob-
lems in the Great Lakes. The
goals are simple: drinkable,
fishable, swimmable waters.
Periods of concerted clean-
up efforts restored Lake Erie
and resulted in other successes
but this was followed by a
period of indifference in the
mid- to late-1990s. The result:
by the mid-2000s, Lake Erie
started to experience the
negative effects of algae
blooms including contami-
nation. Today it is in serious
decline. Algae blooms are also
leading to public warnings
around Lake Ontario.
In 2009, Canada and the
U.S. announced they would
renegotiate the Great Lakes
Water Quality Agreement,
which had not been revised
since 1987. At that time, the
two federal governments
promised to clean up 43 of
the most polluted areas. By
2012, when the latest reitera-
tion was finalized, only four
had been cleaned up.
“The Great Lakes basin
is a complex ecosystem that
requires complex human
intervention. We look at why
we aren’t having more success.
We can’t have ebbs and flows
of government and public
engagement,” says Johns,
who serves as project director
of the network that is using
public opinion research and
social network analysis to
understand the complexity of
implementing the agreement.
The project website is: www.
greatlakespolicyresearch.org.
“We are doing a network
survey of all the organizations
and individuals with policy
implementation mandates to
understand how they work
together or not. We already
know Great Lakes efforts
require a lot of government
leadership and sustained
attention and if it’s not there,
not a lot happens. We want
to know more about who is
doing what and who isn’t
engaged but should be.
“We also want to know more
about our capacity to address
issues such as groundwater
management, offshore wind,
invasive species, nutrient pol-
lution management, shale gas
and climate change.
“We hope that the parties
that signed the agreement
become aware of the gaps in
capacity and shortfalls and
where to target their efforts.
We want to help create more
accountability so that the goals
and objectives can be achieved
in a timely manner.” n
MARY TERESA BITTI
IS A WRITER BASED IN
OAKVILLE, ONT.
Ryerson University Magazine, Winter 2015

3. W I N T E R 20 1 5 • Ryerson University Magazine 23
One challenge? Payment
structures. To access the
kind of small-scale-farm
produce that often typifies
local eating, you need to
cut smaller cheques more
frequently to independent
farmers who don’t operate
on long pay cycles. Another
is managing relationships
with those small-scale
farmers and providers
themselves. Sourcing from
smaller businesses can easily
multiply your supplier list
from a handful of people to
60. The results, however,
are worth the work. Today,
Ryerson buys from more than
60 Ontario farmers and food
producers. The university’s
newly renovated Hub
Cafeteria offers fresh-from-
scratch soups; its catering
services boasts menus of
artisanal Ontario cheese
platters; and students can
choose organic, vegan sweets.
“Institutions are built
to support a specific kind
of food service,” says
Maharaj, “but ideologically,
universities are great for
new programs to grow and
incubate. It takes some
visionary thinking to bring
these ideas to light.”
Idea-wise, Ryerson
has been thinking about
food — how we produce,
sell, regulate and ensure
everyone has enough of
it — for years. The school’s
Centre for Studies in Food
Security (CSFS) celebrated
its 20th anniversary last
year, while the Certificate
in Food Security at The G.
Raymond Chang School
for Continuing Education
ushered in its 10th.
To talk about food
security, let alone study it,
understanding and agreeing
on what it means as a
concept is vital — and wasn’t
particularly easy in 1994,
when the CSFS was born.
“Most discussions of it made
people think of different
things. People would confuse
it with food safety,” says
Mustafa Koç, a professor of
sociology, co-founder and
co-ordinator of the centre
until 2004. The term food
security came into popular
use after a UN World Food
Conference in the mid-70s,
but was often wielded to
discuss developing-nation
food shortages. “We wanted
to redefine it as a broader
issue of access.”
The CSFS wanted to
promote a view of food
security that looked at a few
aspects of the food we eat,
locally and at large. If it was
available, if it was accessible
to everyone, if it was
adequately nutritious and
safe, and if it was culturally
appropriate and didn’t
compromise the dignity of
the people obtaining it.
By the mid-2000s, the
CSFS was producing research
for international journals,
and partnering with other
organizations on massive,
multi-year projects. Some
notable ones include School
of Nutrition Professor
Cecilia Rocha’s CIDA-
funded partner study of how
government policy addresses
hunger in cities in northeast
Brazil, and Koç’s partner
project with University of
British Columbia and the
Vancouver School Board
on developing school
curriculums around healthy
eating and understanding
food systems.
Closer to home, Joe
Nasr, a course instructor
for The Chang School’s
Certificate in Food Security
and CSFS associate scholar,
has been studying city
food production for some
time, with a particular
focus on urban agriculture.
In 2010, he co-authored
a report for the Metcalf
Foundation that dispelled
some common misbeliefs
about the potential to grow
food in, and feed, urban
neighbourhoods.
For example, space isn’t
Toronto’s biggest barrier in
22 Ryerson University Magazine • W I N T E R 2015
CHEF JOSHNA MAHARAJ TAKES THE CAMPUS ON A HEALTHY-FOOD QUEST AS HER
REVAMPED RYERSON EATS COOKS UP FRESH, WHOLESOME, LOCAL MEALS
BY CHANTAL BRAGANZA, JOURNALISM ’09
FROM FARM
TO TABLE IN
THE HEART OF
THE CITY
EIGHTEEN MONTHS AGO, JOSHNA MAHARAJ CAME TO RYERSON UNIVERSITY WITH AN EXCITING,
if daunting, imperative: change the way a downtown Toronto institution fed its community. She was
charged with developing a strategy that would reinvent the food being served at Ryerson’s residences,
Hub Cafeteria and in catering, to menus that are wholesome, affordable, fresh-made and locally sourced
wherever possible. Now executive chef and assistant director of Food Services, Maharaj wasn’t entirely
new to this kind of work. Having consulted with Toronto-area hospitals to redesign patient menus to
focus on fresh, local produce, she understood plenty of the challenges that came with shifting large,
industrial food systems to think local.
Ryerson University Magazine, Winter 2015

4. JESSICABLAINESMITH,IMAGEARTS’03
DANA YATES IS A
TORONTO-BASED
WRITER.
YOUNG ARCHITECT
GETS A KICK
OUT OF CREATING
PAN AM PLAYSPACE
BY DANA YATES
DESIGNING A LEGACY
Every dish at Signs restaurant
comes with a side of good
karma and a sprinkle of novelty.
That’s because most of
the Toronto establishment’s
staff are deaf, so having a
meal there helps individuals
facing extra barriers to
employment. What’s more,
patrons enjoy a unique
dining experience — learning
basic sign language so they
can interact with waiters.
The innovator behind this
first-of-its-kind business is 28-
year-old Anjan Manikumar,
Ted Rogers School of
Management (MBA) ’13. Seven
years ago, while managing a
casual restaurant in Markham,
Ont., he observed that a deaf
customer could only order food
by pointing at menu items. To
serve him better, Manikumar
learned basic greetings in
American Sign Language
(ASL). On his next visit to the
restaurant, the gentleman was
so delighted that he returned
the next day with friends.
The experience sparked
what Manikumar originally
saw as just a fun idea. But
he says his MBA courses
in entrepreneurship and
corporate social responsibility,
and the encouragement of his
professors, made him realize
he wanted to start a business
that supported the local
community.
Aftergraduating,Manikumar
used the business case skills he
gained at Ryerson to critically
evaluate the feasibility of his
concept. He turned to local deaf
services organizations for help
with hiring employees, and at-
tracted about 300 applicants —
an overwhelming but not sur-
prising response, given the 80
per cent un/underemployment
rate among deaf Canadians.
Signs opened last August as a
150-seat restaurant serving con-
temporary Canadian and inter-
national fare, and Manikumar
says he’s already breaking even.
Patrons learn from servers signs
such as “yes,” “no” and “thank
you,” and order from a menu
featuring the signs for each
item. They can also use an ASL
“cheat sheet” explaining how
to request ingredient modifica-
tions or indicate food allergies.
“We are providing opportun-
ities for deaf people to succeed,”
Manikumar says, “and offering
an educational experience for
our guests that shows what
deaf people are capable of. It’s
a win-win situation.” n
SHARON ASCHAIEK IS A
TORONTO-BASED WRITER.
26 Ryerson University Magazine • S UMM E R 20 1 5
DARRENCALABRESE
ALUMNI PROFILES
UNIQUE RESTAURANT
OFFERS EMPLOYMENT
TO THE DEAF AND
A RICH EXPERIENCE
FOR DINERS
SIGN AND DINE
BY SHARON ASCHAIEK
Ana Stefanovic, Architectural Science ’07,
is a fan of sports facilities. As a child in
Belgrade, Serbia, she lived near the stadium
of the local football club, and when the
team wasn’t playing, she was a regular in the
building, competing in track and field events.
“It was my place,” she says. “I knew even
then that I wanted to become an architect and
design stadiums.”
Today her gargantuan dream has come true.
Her portfolio includes work on Hamilton’s
brand-new Tim Hortons Field, hosting Pan Am
soccer and also home of the Hamilton Tiger
Cats; the New York Islanders' hockey arena; and
Madison Square Garden, home of the New York
Rangers and New York Knicks.
Since 2014, Stefanovic has been co-ordin-
ator, games overlay, with the Toronto 2015 Pan
Am/Parapan Am Games Organizing Commit-
tee. In that role, she has worked with sports and
medical administrators, and officials overseeing
the Games' ceremonies, to design venues for
CIBC Pan Am Park, “action central” for the
24-day event that will be held this summer.
Located on the shores of Lake Ontario, and
encompassing Exhibition Place and Ontario
Place West Channel, the park will host 16 sport
competitions, making it the largest sport cluster
of the Games. For example, existing facilities
such as BMO Field and Ricoh Coliseum will
host rugby 7s and gymnastics, while more than
3,000 metric tonnes of sand will help turn an
everyday parking lot in Exhibition Place into
the Chevrolet Beach Volleyball Centre.
More than 10,000 athletes and officials from
the Americas and Caribbean will participate in
the Games. Another 250,000 visitors will attend
the event, which will be hosted by venues across
the Greater Golden Horseshoe region.
“I like the idea of leaving a legacy,”
Stefanovic says of her work with the Games.
“How many people will go [to a sports facility
you designed] and have the best time of their
lives? I love that.”
S UMM E R 20 1 5 • Ryerson University Magazine 27
Ryerson University Magazine, Summer 2015

5. RESEARCHERS AT THE CENTRE FOR URBAN
ENERGY ARE FINDING WAYS TO KEEP YOUR
LIGHTS (AND AIR CONDITIONING) ON
In the wake of massive power outages
related to weather, we’re reminded
that power is critical to our society. If
we look to the future, the demands
on Ontario’s aging electricity system
will only intensify as it faces the dual
challenges of urban densification and
climate change.
How can the province’s electricity
grid supply power more reliably and
efficiently to urban centres like the
GTA – home to 6.5 million people
today and a projected 9.4 million by
2041 – while also cutting pollution?
The traditional electricity network
must adapt quickly to these changes
and get smarter, says Bala Venkatesh,
academic director of the Centre for
Urban Energy (CUE) at Ryerson.
That’s one of the main goals of
more than 60 CUE researchers –
to help overcome these challenges
more effectively and economically.
“The energy delivery paradigm
is changing and it’s not just the
energy companies that have all the
solutions. We could be a big piece
of it by researching and trying to
find solutions in collaboration with
entrepreneurs and utility partners,”
says Venkatesh, a professor of
electrical and computer engineering.
Venkatesh sees CUE’s new
Schneider Electric Smart Grid Lab as
a catalyst for the development, testing
and implementation of innovative
ideas and products to transform the
delivery of electricity. That means
smart power solutions to plug renew-
able but intermittent energy sources,
like sun and wind, into the grid
safely and reliably. Developing and
deploying new and affordable energy
storage technologies to make the grid
more resilient and improve power
quality (a measure of how close the
actual power supply system is to an
ideal power supply system). Building
and integrating many more micro-
grids into the system, like those at
New York University and Co-op City
in the Bronx, which kept the lights
and heat on even as the large-scale
grid went down around them and
8.5 million customers from Delaware
to Massachusetts lost power during
Hurricane Sandy in 2012. A more
resilient grid could make a difference
in maintaining and restoring power
in severe weather such as the Toronto
ice storm of December 2013, or the
massive northeastern North America
blackout in 2003.
One key advantage of the Smart
Grid Lab is that it offers energy
researchers, entrepreneurs, utilities
and students the opportunity
to safely explore, refine and test
innovative ideas and technologies at
a fraction of the cost of conducting
trials on the existing grid. Historically,
utilities have been reluctant to
innovate because of the financial
and safety risks. This leading-edge
NASA Earth Observatory image by
Robert Simmon, using Suomi NPP
VIIRS data provided courtesy of Chris
Elvidge (NOAA National Geophysical
Data Center). Suomi NPP is the result
of a partnership between NASA,
NOAA, and the Department of
Defense. Caption by Mike Carlowicz.
22 Ryerson University Magazine • S UMM E R 2015 S UMM E R 20 1 5 • Ryerson University Magazine 23
BY MARK WITTEN
A SMART GRID IS
A STATE-OF-THE-ART
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM
THAT USES DIGITAL
INFORMATION TO
IMPROVE OPERATIONAL
PERFORMANCE OF
THE POWER GRID.
PLAYERS
POWER
Ryerson University Magazine, Summer 2015

6. May/June 2015
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18 September/October 2015
WOODCHIPS The latest news from around the woodworking industry
Biesse Group launches ‘Give’ campaign
“
”
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M
ore than 400 people
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Las Vegas, Nevada.
Federico Broccoli, president/
CEO of Biesse America and
Canada, kicked off the new
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Make-A-Wish foundation with
a check for $6,000 to sponsor
a child’s wish, pointing out
that while companies fight for
market share, these children are
the real heroes fighting for their
market share of life.
In addition to the first
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$100 to Make-A-Wish for each
machine sold at the show and
thanked everyone for helping
them bring hope, joy and strength
to children with life-threatening
medical conditions.
AWFS 2015 was the most
successful show to date for
Biesse America with more
than 1,000 attendees from
750 companies visiting their
booth for demonstrations. n
Federico Broccoli,
president/CEO of Biesse
America and Canada,
kicked off the new
campaign by presenting
the Make-A-Wish
Foundation with a check
for $6,000 to sponsor a
child’s wish.
PHOTO:WOODWORKING
Woodworking, May/June 2015