Education: PhD, University of Waterloo

Areas of Expertise: Migration and food security of migrant households, social and health inequalities, intersectionality and gender-based violence in migrant populations, healthy communities, community engagement 

Elizabeth Onyango is an assistant professor of Healthy and Sustainable Communities in the School of Public Health at the University of Alberta. She is a critical, interdisciplinary and community-based health researcher with interests in explorative studies of what matters to populations, food security and nutrition, as well as social inequalities in the health and wellbeing of migrants. Her work also extends into intersections of gender, gender-based violence, household food security and associated health outcomes in minority populations. Onyango has published extensively on these topics.

She has taught graduate level courses on community-based and health promotion research, leadership and professional skills in public health, using and creating evidence in public health practice, anti-Black-Racism and transformative social work with immigrant and Indigenous people.

In her current work, Onyango works closely with migrant communities in Canada to explore the challenge of food insecurity. Previously, Onyango worked as an early career research fellow with MiFOOD Research Project and the Hungry Cities Partnership,Balsillie School of International Affairs & Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. Onyango is a recipient of several scholarships and awards including the Queen Elizabeth Scholars Postdoctoral Fellowship and the SSHRC-IDG Early Career Researcher Award.

Recent Publications

Otoadese, D., Kamara, I., & Onyango, E. O. (2025). Growing roots: the role of collective community gardening in cultural food insecurity and social integration of African immigrants in Alberta, Canada. BMC Public Health 25(1).

Otoadese, D., Kamara, I., & Onyango, E. O. (2025). Barriers and facilitators to engagement in collective gardening among black african immigrants in Alberta, Canada.  International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (IJERPH). 22(5), 789.

Onyango E. O., Mori, K., Fernandez, S., Seyyedin, B., Nkechi, C. A., & Kapfunde, D. (2025). Cultural relevance of food security initiatives and the associated impacts on the cultural identity of immigrants in Canada: A scoping review of food insecurity literature. Wellbeing Space and Society 8(33),100269.

Education: PhD, University of Alberta

Areas of Expertise: Counselling psychology, community psychology, immigrant mental health, refugee mental health, psychosocial adaptation, community-engaged methodologies, multicultural practices in applied psychology

Sophie Yohani is a psychologist and professor of counselling psychology in the Faculty of Education at the University of Alberta. She is also a registered psychologist with the College of Alberta Psychologist and Canadian Registry of Health Service Psychologists.

She has published on themes relating to immigrant and refugee mental health and wellbeing, including psychosocial adaptation and access to services. As a community-engaged and collaborative researcher, her recent work has examined African and Middle Eastern migrants’ mental health, psychosocial adaptation and community-engaged practices.

Recent Publications

Yohani, S., & Devereux, C. (2025). Key features of culturally inclusive, -affirming and contextually relevant mental health care and healing practices with Black Canadians: A scoping review. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 22(9), 1316.

Salami, B., Yohani, S., Alaazi, D. A., Maduforo, A. N., & Tulli-Shah, & M. (2025). Fostering culturally responsive research practices: Engaging Black communities in western Canada. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 24.

Devereux, C., Yohani, S., Tremblay, M., & Nour Eddin, J. (2024). Syrian refugees in Canada: a qualitative report of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on psychosocial adaptation. International Journal of Migration, Health and Social Care, 20(4), 576–596.

Punjani, N.S., Okeke-Ihejirika, P.E., Salami, B., Yohani, S., & Olukotun, M. (2024). “The children are not controllable because they follow western values” - Narratives of the parenting experiences of African immigrants in Alberta, Canada. Journal of Immigrant and Minority Health, 26, 895–904. 

Education: PhD, University of Alberta

Areas of Expertise: Aging, migration, transnationalism, intersectionality, post-colonial theory, community-based participatory methods, qualitative methods

Jordana Salma is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Nursing at the University of Alberta. Her program of research (IREA: Implementation Research for Equity in Aging) focuses on the health and wellbeing of immigrant and racialized older adults in Canada. Jordana is particularly interested in exploring cross-cultural and transnational dimensions of aging and the ways dominant health and immigration policies, practices, and discourses shape aging experiences. She draws from Feminist, Transnational, and Post-Colonial perspectives and my methodological expertise is in qualitative and participatory methods.

Jordana has led projects using different qualitative methodologies, arts-based approaches, community-based participatory research, integrated knowledge translation and mixed-methods. 

Recent Publications

Mazzullo, E., Salma, J., Walsh, C., Au, A., Sidani, S., Agrawal, S., Okan, B., & Guruge, S. (2025). Neighbourhood social influences on loneliness in older immigrants in two Canadian provinces. Canadian Journal on Aging / La Revue Canadienne Du Vieillissement, 1–9. 

Metersky, K., Guruge, S., Wang, L., Al-Hamad, A., Yasin, Y. M., Catallo, C., Yang, L. X., Salma, J., Zhuang, Z. C., Chahine, M., Kirkwood, M., & Al-Anani, A. (2024). Transnational healthcare practices among migrants: A concept analysis. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 81(7), 3647-3673.

Yasin, Y. M., Al-Hamad, A., Guruge, S., Metersky, K., Catallo, C., Wang, L., Yang, L., Zhuang, Z. C., & Salma, J. (2024). Healthcare practices among refugee older adults: A scoping review protocol.

Education: PhD, University of Alberta

Areas of Expertise: Knowledge translation; implementation science; improvement science; aging; long-term care; nursing homes

Carole has been a member of the faculty and principal investigator of the Knowledge Utilization Studies Program since 1997 and the longitudinal, pan Canadian Translating Research in Elder Care (TREC) research program since 2007. I hold a Tier I Canada Research Chair (CRC) in Knowledge Translation and am cross appointed in the School of Public Health, University of Alberta. Carole supervises undergraduate and graduate students and postdoctoral fellows and teaches in the areas of knowledge translation and research design.

Her research focuses on basic and applied aspects of inquiry in the knowledge translation, knowledge utilization and implementation science fields, with a particular focus on congregate setting where older adults with dementia live (i.e., long term care or LTC). I have been the recipient of several awards and achievements among them, the J. Gordin Kaplan Award for Excellence in Research, University of Alberta, (2018), the International Nurse Researcher Hall of Fame (2018), the Betty Havens Prize for Knowledge Translation in Aging (2014), the CAFA Distinguished Academic Award (2010), the Alumni Award of Distinction, University of New Brunswick (2007), the Alumni Horizon Award (2002), University of Alberta, and career scientist awards from CIHR/MRC (Health Scholar, 2000-2005) and AHFMR (Population Health Investigator, 2000-2003). In 2007 I was elected to Fellowship in the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences (FCAHS). In 2011 I was inducted as a Fellow into the American Academy of Nurses (FAAN). In 2020 I was inducted as a Fellow into the Royal Society of Canada. I received the Order of Canada in 2016.

Recent Publications

Futami, A., Noguchi‐Watanabe, M., Hoben, M., Takaoka, M., Estabrooks, C. A., & Yamamoto‐Mitani, N. (2025). Translation, adaptation, and psychometric assessment of the Alberta Context Tool for use with nurses in adult acute care in Japan. Japan Journal of Nursing Science, 22(4). E70013.

Hoben, M., Kilmen, S., Keefe, J., O'Rourke, H. M., Banerjee, S., & Estabrooks, C. A. (2025). Measurement invariance and differential item functioning of a care staff proxy measure of nursing home resident dementia-specific quality of life (DEMQOL-CH): do care aides' first language, and care aides' and residents’ ethno-cultural background matter? Social Science & Medicine, 375, 118089.

Saeidzadeh, S., Duan, Y., Norton, P. G., & Estabrooks, C. A. (2025). Factors associated with receiving therapy in long-term care homes for residents: A cross-sectional study. Journal of the American Medical Directors Association, 26(5).

Education: PhD, Carleton University

Areas of Expertise: Immigration policies and politics, refugees and human rights, multiculturalism and anti-racism, surveillance and border control, citizenship theory

Yasmeen Abu-Laban is professor and Canada research chair in the Politics of Citizenship and Human Rights in the Department of Political Science at the University of Alberta. She is also a fellow at the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research.

She has published widely on themes relating to immigration and border control policies, antiracism and multiculturalism, and citizenship theory. She is co-author (with Ethel Tungohan and Christina Gabriel) of Containing diversity: Canada and the politics of immigration in the 21st century. She is also co-editor (with Alain-G. Gagnon and Arjun Tremblay) of Assessing multiculturalism in global comparative perspective: A new politics of diversity for the twenty-first century? as well as co-editor (with Michael Frishkopf, Reza Hasmath and Anna Kirova) of Resisting the dehumanization of refugees.

She was elected president of the Canadian Ethnic Studies Association in 2022, and has also served as president of the Canadian Political Science Association and vice president of the International Political Science Association. 

Recent Publications

Abu-Laban, Y., Paquet, M., & Tungohan, E. (2025). Beyond knowledge, power, and migration: Contesting the north/south divide. McGill-Queen's Refugee and Forced Migration Studies, 18.

Abu-Laban, Y., Frishkopf ,M., Hasmath, R., & Kirova, A. (2024). Resisting the Dehumanization of Refugees. Athabasca University Press.

Abu-Laban, Y. (2024). Middle class nation building through a tenacious discourse on skills: immigration and Canada. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 50(7), 1803–1821.

Abu-Laban, Y. (2023). Building a new citizenship regime? Immigration and multiculturalism in Canada. In Mann, J. (Eds.), Citizenship in transnational perspective, 279–300. Springer International Publishing

Education: PhD, University of Toronto

Areas of Expertise: Digital humanities, text analysis and visualization, ethics of information and technology

Geoffrey Rockwell is professor of Philosophy and Digital Humanities at the University of Alberta, Canada. He publishes on video games, textual visualization, text analysis, ethics of technology and digital humanities. He co-edited Right research: Modelling sustainable research practices in the anthropocene and co-authored Hermeneutica: Computer-assisted interpretation in the humanities. He is the co-developer, together with Stéfan Sinclair, of Voyant Tools (voyant-tools.org), an award-winning suite of text analysis and visualization tools. 

Recent Publications

Correll, M., Impett, L., Klein, L., Panagiotidou, G., Abdul-Rahman, A., & Rockwell, G. (2024). Visualization Ethics: A Case Study Approach. In ADHO Digital Humanities Conference 2024.

Andes, P., Lau, R., Rockwell, G., & Mah-Fraser, T. (2024). A Rossian Method for applying principles in AI: The missing link between principles and policy. The International Review of Information Ethics, 34(1).

Adams, C., Pente, P., Lemermeyer, G., & Rockwell, G. (2023). Ethical principles for artificial intelligence in K-12 education. Computers and Education Artificial Intelligence, 4, 100131.

Bradley, J., Nyhan, J., Rockwell, G.M., Sinclair, S., & Ortolja-Baird, A. (Eds.). (2023). On making in the digital humanities: The scholarship of digital humanities development in honour of John Bradley. UCL Press.

Education: PhD, Georgia Institute of Technology

Areas of Expertise: Service-oriented architecture, legacy migration, object-oriented system evolution analysis, service systems, social networking, lightweight semantics for on-line collaboration

Eleni Stroulia is a professor in the Department of Computing Science, at the University of Alberta. From 2011-2016, she held the NSERC/AITF industrial research chair on Service Systems Management, with IBM. Her research focuses on addressing industry-driven problems, adopting AI and machine-learning methods to improve or automate tasks.

Her flagship project in the area of healthcare is the Smart Condo in which she investigates the use of technology to support people with chronic conditions live independently longer and to educate health-science students to provide better care for these clients. In 2011, the Smart-Condo team received the U of A Teaching Unit Award. She has played leadership roles in the GRAND and AGE-WELL Networks of Centres of Excellence. In 2018 she received a McCalla professorship, and in 2019 she was recognized with a Killam Award for Excellence in Mentoring.

She has supervised more than 60 graduate students and PDFs, who have gone forward to stellar academic and industrial careers. Since 2020, she is the director of the University of Alberta's AI4Society Signature Area. Since 2021, she is serving as the acting vice dean of the Faculty of Science.

Recent Publications

Celeste Jr, J., Tasnim, M., Valdés Cuervo, A. J., De La Cal, E. A., & Stroulia, E. (2025). A software pipeline for systematizing machine learning of speech data. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 16, 1451368.

Eng, K., Hindle, A., & Stroulia, E. (2024). Patterns of multi-container composition for service orchestration with Docker Compose. Empirical Software Engineering, 29(3).

Meherali, S., Rehmani, A. I., Ahmad, M., Kauser, S., Scott Fiddler, P., Pinzon-Hernandez, P., Khan, Z., Flicker, S., Okeke-Ihejirika, P., Salami, B., Stroulia, E., Vandermorris, A., Wong, J., Norman, W., Scott, S., & Munro, S. (2024). Between cultures and traditions: a qualitative investigation of sexual and reproductive health experiences of immigrant adolescents in Canada. Culture, Health & Sexuality, 1–17. 

Tasnim, M., Ramos, R. D., Stroulia, E., & Trejo, L. A. (2023). A machine-learning model for detecting depression, anxiety, and stress from speech. ICASSP 2024 - 2024 IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing (ICASSP), 7085-7089.