Lab Reports
The MEDIEVAL DIGITAL RESEARCH IN ARTS AND GRAPHICAL ENVIRONMENTAL NETWORKS LABORATORY (DRAGEN LAB) is at the centre of Environments of Change, a seven-year project using emerging technologies to investigate the historical relationship between climate and culture in the late Middle Ages.
DIRECTOR
Dr. Steven Bednarski
Professor of History and Co-Director, Medieval Studies Program (University of Waterloo)
Dr. Bednarski is an award-winning Canadian historian of the Middle Ages who specializes in 14th-century environment, crime, sex, gender, and microhistory.
TEAM
Co-Director Dr. Ann Marie Rasmussen; Associate Directors Dr. David Porreca and Zack MacDonald; Assistant Director and Lab Manager Dr. Caley McCarthy; Research Facilitator, Andrew Moore; and a team of senior research scholars, doctoral and graduate fellows, online interns, and international collaborators and partners.
CURRENT PROJECTS
• Virtual Northeye: An educational video game centred on a digital recreation of the deserted medieval village of Northeye and designed to teach elementary-school students about the relationship between communities and their environments. The video game is designed in collaboration with Queen’s University’s EQUIS Lab and a number of education partners, including the Waterloo Region District School Board and Kitchener-Waterloo Bilingual School. A completed prototype is anticipated in 2020 – 2021.
• Dendroclimatology: Partners at the Swansea University are conducting isotope analysis of tree rings to determine climatic conditions in late medieval Sussex.
• Sedimentological coring: Project co-investigators from the UW Faculties of Environment and Science have begun research that will lay the foundation for sedimentological coring in Sussex. This will be used to determine environmental conditions in medieval Sussex.
• Tourism App Development: Graduate Research Assistants in the DRAGEN Lab have begun creating immersive mobile tourism apps that will allow people to access historical sites in the UK remotely and to experience the historical environmental conditions that affected those sites.
NEWS
• The 3,600 square-foot DRAGEN Lab opened in the SJU Research Hub, completed as part of the Campus Renewal Project and SJ1 building and Library renovations.
• In 2019 – 2020, Environments of Change made an investment of $336,000 in student training opportunities to develop Highly Qualified Personnel (HQP), despite COVID-19 restrictions, which prevented UW undergraduate and graduate students from participating in the annual Archaeology Summer Field School held at Queen’s University’s UK campus, the Bader International Study Centre (BISC) at Herstmonceux Castle.
• John Johnston (University of Waterloo) delivered a workshop in the DRAGEN Lab on the use of Google Tours and Google Glasses. Once the BISC field school can accept students again, EOC will purchase a mobile set of Google glasses to use at Herstmonceux. A draft prototype of a tourist application that includes archival research, audio commentary, and innovative 3-D modelling of historical buildings, is also almost completed.
The WELL-LINK LAB at St. Jerome’s University, aims to investigate the mental health and well-being of emerging adults. The lab also researches various psychological factors that impact students’ success in higher education and afterwards – during the transition to the workplace following graduation.
DIRECTOR
Dr. Maureen Drysdale
Professor of Psychology and Adjunct Professor in Applied Health Sciences in Public Health (University of Waterloo)
Dr. Drysdale is an acclaimed global expert on work-integrated learning (WIL) and hence focuses much of the research in the lab on the mental health and well-being of students during WIL placements.
TEAM
The lab currently consists of a diverse, multidisciplinary team of undergraduate and graduate research interns, clinicians (e.g., registered psychotherapists, crisis centre counsellors, wellness coordinators, medical students), and international collaborators and partners.
CURRENT PROJECTS
- The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on student wellness;
,and seasonal variations as a determinant of perceived stress, mental health, well-being, and quality of life. Partner: University West, Sweden - The mental health of university students. Partners: University West, Sweden; Baden-Wuerttemberg Cooperative State University, Germany
- The health behaviours of university students. Partners: University West, Sweden; Baden-Wuerttemberg Cooperative State University, Germany
- Gender disparities in work-integrated learning placements. Co-Lead Dr. T. Bowen, University of Toronto Mississauga Partners: University West, Sweden; University of Canberra, Australia; Edinburgh Napier and Heriot-Watt universities in Scotland; and Drexel University, USA).
- Employment precariousness, mental health, and well-being; the mental health challenges, barriers, and solutions associated with finding work after graduation.
- The mental health of gifted students; mental health and well-being of student employees during work placements.
- Access to higher education for vulnerable populations.
- The lab is also developing a peer support e-Mental health platform which, in addition to online peer support groups, will also offer tools and strategies for enhancing mental health and well-being.
NEWS
• The Well-Link Lab has relocated to a workspace in the newly renovated SJ1 building, where lab members look forward to meeting and working together once it is safe to return to campus.