Meeting Invitation

Dear Chairs and Heads:

It is my great pleasure to invite you to the 52nd Annual Meeting of the Canadian Council of University Biology Chairs (CCUBC) to be held at the Banff Park Lodge in beautiful Banff, Alberta, November 2-4, 2023. The blue skies and mountain views beckon us!

For those of you who are new to the CCUBC, we are an organization comprised of the Heads and Chairs of the Biology Departments of Canadian Universities, large and small, located from coast to coast, founded in 1971. As department leaders, we encounter a unique set of chronic and situational challenges, and the position of Head/Chair has been accurately described to me as the most demanding of any academic leadership role.

The CCUBC Annual Meeting is a place and time for us to share our experiences and insight as departmental leaders, and the opportunity to reflect on our leadership practice and learn from our peer colleagues who encounter similar issues and endure comparable experiences. If you have never attended a CCUBC meeting, I strongly encourage you to do so. It provides an outstanding networking opportunity to discuss issues uniquely related to the Chair position with an open, respectful, and inclusive peer community in a pleasant, fun, and informal atmosphere. I promise that you will take something away from it that makes your job a little bit easier, and at the very least, you will meet peer colleagues who experience and understand the burden and the blessing that comes with departmental leadership.

The November CCUBC meeting to be held in beautiful Banff, Alberta, is your next chance to discuss a range of leadership, policy, and other issues important to biology departments across Canada. Please join the CCUBC and register for the meeting. I hope to see you there!

Dave Coltman
CCUBC President,
Chair, Department of Biology, Western University