2024 Awardees

                 October 8, 2024

We are pleased to announce the recipients of the 2024 APF recognition awards. We once again received many outstanding applications, which reinforced that postdocs make innumerable contributions to the McGill community, both academically and otherwise!

Congratulations to all recipients!

Please see below for a description of each award winner.

Dr. Devendra Pal – Mentorship Award

Devendra has mentored a remarkable number of trainees from undergraduates to PhD candidates, many of whom attest his mentorship skills. His approach to mentorship is rooted in a commitment to sharing expertise, providing constructive feedback, and fostering an inclusive and supportive environment. For instance, he initiated a writing club in the Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences department, offering weekly sessions to help students with thesis and scientific articles writing. Devendra looks forward to continuing to support and promote the success of the next generation of scientists at McGill University.

Bio: Dr. Devendra Pal is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow and seasonal course instructor in the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences at McGill University. He completed his PhD at McGill in 2023, where he developed innovative methodologies for studying aerosols, cloud microphysics, and air quality, earning international recognition for his contributions. Dr. Pal has mentored several trainees, many of whom have attested to his mentorship skills. His approach strives to help his mentees reach a point where they can surpass his expertise in a given area and take full ownership of their research, promoting both academic success and personal growth.

Dr. Sam Victor – Research Excellence Award

The Research Excellence Award recognizes an individual that has made tremendous contributions to their research field as measured by their research outputs and impact, and this year’s awardee is Dr. Sam Victor. Dr. Victor studies how people with polarizing political views collectively establish credibility through studies of evangelicals in the US that reject religious fundamentalism, and his work – published in both English and French – is now forging bridges between researchers in francophone Quebec and anglophone North America. His international reputation in the field of cultural anthropology comes from multiple publications in top journals in anthropology and religious studies, in addition to his service as a co-editor for a special issue in the Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute. Dr. Victor has presented at high profile conferences, and importantly, has also engaged the public through podcasts, blog posts, and a recent article in The Conversation that is the most read article by McGill University contributors this past year. An exceptional researcher and postdoc, Dr. Sam Victor is a welcome recipient of the Research Excellence Award.

Bio: Dr Sam Victor is a cultural anthropologist (M.Sc., Université de Montréal; Ph.D., University of Cambridge) specializing in religion, value conflict, and intellectual authority. His research seeks to better understand how people with competing worldviews perceive and respond to the ethical demands of living in a globalized world. He is currently writing a book based on two years of ethnographic fieldwork with evangelical Christians in Tennessee who reject religious fundamentalism and are attempting to reconcile long-held religious beliefs with new ethical and political commitments.

Over the years, Sam’s projects have been funded by the Cambridge Trust, Woolf Institute, SSHRC, FRQ, and McGill’s Centre for Interdisciplinary Research on Montreal. He is currently a FRQ-SC Post-doctoral Fellow in the Department of Anthropology where he is working with Hillary Kaell on a project about the fraught relationship between heritage church buildings and public money in Canada. Their work contributes to Municipalités, Religions et Laïcité, a Quebec-wide interuniversity study led by Solange Lefebvre (Université de Montréal). Sam is also an Affiliated Researcher at Université de Montréal’s Laboratoire de recherche en relations interculturelles and is collaborating with Frédéric Dejean (UQÀM) on an exploratory project about the ethics of street preaching in the context of laïcité, which is supported by the Chaire de recherche France-Québec sur les enjeux contemporains de la liberté d’expression.

Dr. Florian Golemo – Teaching Excellence Award

Florian Golemo is not only an inspiring teacher but also a mentor who truly connects with his students. Whether he’s teaching Python or Cognitive Science, he brings creativity and enthusiasm to the classroom, always encouraging students to think outside the box. Beyond teaching, Florian is developing robot guide dogs to help people with low vision, showing his deep commitment to making a real-world impact. His blend of passion, innovation, and care makes him an exceptional educator and mentor.

Bio: Dr. Florian Golemo is a research scientist at Mila and a lecturer at McGill University, where he also completed his postdoctoral training. He is interested in using his background in Cognitive Science to teach robots new tricks, inspired by how the brain works. Currently, Dr. Golemo is developing robot guide dogs for individuals who are blind or have low vision, aiming to enhance their mobility and independence. At McGill, he teaches Python at the Healthy Brains for Healthy Lives (HBHL) initiative and Cognitive Science courses in the Psychology Department. He earned his Bachelor of Science from the University of Leipzig and a Master of Science in Artificial Intelligence & Cognitive Science from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. He completed his Ph.D. in Computer Science and Robotics at INRIA Bordeaux under the supervision of Prof. Pierre-Yves Oudeyer, in collaboration with Prof. Aaron Courville from the University of Montreal. Since moving to Montreal, Dr. Golemo is enamoured with the city for its music, festivals, and wonderful people.

Dr. Celia Vara – Teaching Excellence Award

Celia Vara is a passionate educator who brings her unique background in psychology and feminist studies to the classroom. At McGill, she’s made a real impact by encouraging students to explore feminist cultural studies through creative and personal projects. Her empathetic teaching style, combined with her focus on collaboration and personal growth, creates a learning environment where students feel supported and empowered. Celia’s dedication to fostering creativity and reflection has left a lasting mark on her students.

Bio: Celia Vara is a postdoctoral fellow at the Moving Image Research Lab at McGill University. She holds a Ph.D. in Communication (2019) at Concordia University (QC, Canada). She is a psychologist since 1997, and her master thesis (“Feminist Video Art in the 70’s in Spain”) won in 2013 the 1st Prize-Award in Gender and Research by Jaume I University in Spain. She is also a visual artist and curator. Her writings and media work have appeared in Journal feral feminisms, Institute for Research on Women (Rutgers University), McGraw Hill Editorial, Art and Politics, humanities and entropy (MPDI Switzerland), and Journal of Embodied Research (University of Huddersfield, UK). Her PhD Thesis “Kinesthetic Knowledge and Corporal Agency” was ranked excellent in her oral defense (2019). She explores kinesthesia, movement, kinesthetic empathy and the use of sensorial body in 1970s feminist performance art and its relations with corporeal agency and feminist resistance in the current cultural and political context. Her research interests include corporeal processes of consciousness, perception, corporeal agency, feminist pedagogies and embodied research-creation methodologies.