Group meets to discuss First Nations research opportunties
Industry Canada's Saskatchewan Smart Communities Demonstration project, the Headwaters Project, invited an interested group of people to meet via video and telephone on Feb 18 to discuss research opportunities and partnerships. Representatives from groups from coast to coast joined the meeting to share their thoughts and developments.
Video conferencing sites included FNESC (Vancouver), Headwaters Project (La Ronge), Industry Canada (Saskatchewan office), K-Net (Sioux Lookout) and Smart Labrador (Forteau). Industry Canada SchoolNet (Ottawa) and Michael Gurstein (New Jersey) joined the meeting by telephone.
Discussions began with the host site (Saskatchewan) presenting information about the Mid Canada Research Institute (MCRI) and Dr. David Malcolm reviewing their business case to develop an institute serving the communities and regions in the Boreal Forest region from coast to coast. Each of the other meeting participants shared their own work in research and upcoming opportunities for collaboration. Michael Gurstein spoke about the CRACIN initiative that his team is leading to examine community networking initiatives across Canada (including a case study about K-Net).
The meeting ended with an agreement to continue sharing information on-line within a list serve being hosted by MCRI. Everyone is welcomed to join this list serve by sending an e-mail to discussion-subscribe@mcri.ca. For more information about this mailing list, please visit the MCRI website at www.mcri.ca. Information about this mailing list can be found in the Communications section. A streaming media file with the recording of today's videoconference will be posted shortly in the History section.