The craft of boat building goes back a long way in southwestern Nova Scotia. The French traders who founded the first European settlement in North America at Port Royal in 1604 had to build boats to deliver their valuable furs back to France.

When Rick Halpern and his wife drove back to Toronto after visiting relatives in Boston over Christmas, they both breathed a sigh of relief as they crossed into Canada at Fort Erie, Ontario. "I don't exaggerate when I say a day doesn't go by when my wife and I don't say to each other, 'Thank God we're here in Canada!'" declares Dr.

Queen's University, 1975. Professor Michael Axelrad is dying.

Commercialization is the buzzword in Ottawa these days, and that worries Mike Lazaridis. The founder of Research In Motion, maker of the Blackberry wireless solution device, has nothing against commercialization - he just doesn't think it's the role of universities to do the commercializing.

Perhaps it was the debates in the campus coffee shop that first sparked your interest, or that professor whose knowledge and passion turned lectures from a drudgery to a thrill. Maybe it was a research paper that led to more questions than it answered that ultimately prompted you to consider: Could graduate school be for you? Whether or not to pursue graduate studies can be a daunting decision, even more so if you don't know where to turn for guidance and advice.

Shelley Evans was midway through a master's of environmental studies degree at Dalhousie University when her son was born. She put her studies on hold to spend the next four years caring for him.

In recent Canadian elections, low voter turnout has led many people to ponder why so many citizens feel detached from the system, and what this means for our parliamentary democracy. In this context, the experiment in electoral reform taking place in British Columbia can only be seen as heartening by anyone who cares deeply about political engagement.