The International Migration Research Centre (IMRC) at Wilfrid Laurier University serves as a node of excellence in scholarship and research, social and cultural debate and policy formulation pertaining to international migration. The IMRC mission is to create platforms for debate, research, policy analysis, community engagement, and proposal development related to international migration and mobility at global, national, regional and local scales.
Our research is relevant to practice and policymaking in the areas of international governance of migration, mobilities, critical border issues, diaspora and development, displacement, labour migration, transnationalism, human security, and migrants’ human and labour rights. IMRC fosters research in new policy development and alternative models and practices of managing temporary, circular and permanent forms of international migration. IMRC also aims to impart the findings and implications of this research to government and other enabling and intermediary organizations working in migration and refugee studies.
Find out more at IMRC.ca.
Research Centres and Institutes
Cold Regions Research Centre (CRRC) was established in 1988, evolving from a large multidisciplinary, research and training, project on snow and ice hydrology in the Karakoram Himalaya of Pakistan that was based in the Department of Geography and Environmental Studies at Laurier. The Centre's initial focus on arctic and mountain glaciology and hydrology has broadened its scope and role to include research consulting on topics such as hydrology, climatology, glaciology, resource management, parks planning and biogeochemistry.
The Goals and Mandate of the CRRC are:
- To facilitate interdisciplinary research and teaching about cold regions.
- To facilitate academic and field training of students in a range of cold regions disciplines and locations.
- To provide a locus for interaction among faculty and between faculty and students interested in cold regions research and problems.
- To encourage cooperation and links with other cold regions research and training centres and organizations.
The CRRC provides:
- Research space and facilities for affiliated graduate students.
- Maintains cold regions research aids and support.
- Maintains contacts with northern and other research institutes interested in cold regions.
- Sponsors regular invited speaker series.
- Provides public and educational talks on cold regions topics.
The CRRC is based at the Centre for Cold Regions and Water Science.
Wilfrid Laurier University and the Government of the Northwest Territories signed a 10-year (2010-2020) partnership agreement in May 2010. The partnership has now been extended to 2030.
The purpose of the Government of the Northwest Territories-Wilfrid Laurier University (GNWT-WLU) Partnership is to provide new infrastructure and expertise to the GNWT for environmental research and education in order to expand the Territories’ capacity to conduct environmental research and monitoring, and to train the new expertise needed to manage its natural resources for future generations in face of emerging challenges from climate change and the impacts of growth and development.
The GNWT-Laurier Partnership is a step that will help ensure that the water of the NWT “remains clean, abundant and productive for all time”, as called for by the NWT Water Stewardship Strategy.
At Laurier, the partnership is headquartered at the Centre for Cold Regions and Water Science.
The Laurier Centre for Sustainable Food Systems addresses interconnected environmental, social and economic challenges facing the global food system. Food systems are an effective lens for understanding and acting on some of the most pressing issues facing communities, including growing global food insecurity.
Food can act as a vehicle for change. School snack programs that purchase fruit directly from local producers who use low impact farming methods make the connections between human, community, economic and ecological well being more explicit. Through food, citizens, practitioners, policy-makers and academics can experience and understand the importance of ecological stewardship, social justice, prosperous economies, participatory democracy and food security.
The centre brings together researchers studying these issues from across Laurier including Geography and Environmental Studies, Psychology, Biology, Global Studies, Religion and Culture as well as the Lazaridis School of Business and Economics.
The Laurier Institute for Water Science (LIWS) is a multi-disciplinary, collaborative undertaking among research faculty in the Faculty of Arts, the School of Business and Economics, and the Faculty of Science.
The focus of the institute is on research in three interconnected water-related disciplines:
- Hydrological Sciences
- Ecology and Biogeochemistry
- Public Policy and Management
The LIWS is based at the Centre for Cold Regions and Water Science.
The Interdisciplinary Research Institute for Mathematical and Statistical Modelling in Scientific Discovery, Innovation and Sustainability (MS2Discovery) strives to create a dynamic and engaging environment that is highly conducive to interdisciplinary research, collaboration, and communication. Having a broad and pervasive involvement in both research and education, the Institute is active in its promotion of synergetic developments involving mathematical and statistical modelling by stimulating exciting new research and projects via important interdisciplinary problems motivated by other disciplines, industry, public policies and developments in society. The Institute devotes its efforts to interdisciplinary projects that support three main pillars:
- fundamental and applied research in sciences
- innovative technologies in industry and business, economics and finance
- the development and applications of mathematical and statistical modelling to global issues of sustainability
It serves as a platform for enhancing the research experience of faculty, students, post-doctoral fellows, and visiting scholars and for increasing the social awareness of the key role played by mathematical and statistical modelling in our society.
The Viessmann Centre for Engagement and Research in Sustainability (VERiS) was founded in 2018 as a successor of the Viessmann European Research Centre. VERiS is a research centre for community engagement and sustainability research designed to accelerate the transition toward a culture of sustainability across multiple spheres of society.
With a strong emphasis on applied research and collaboration, the centre is ideally located in the evolvGREEN innovation hub, Waterloo Region’s foremost collaborative workspace. The evolvGREEN innovation hub is part of Canada’s first net-positive, multi-tenant office building, evolv1, developed and owned by the Cora Group. The evolv1 facility serves as a living lab for VERiS.
VERiS brings together university- and practice-based experts from a variety of disciplines and sectors as active and affiliated members of the centre. With the intention of affecting regional, provincial, federal and international policies, and community-based change, our research bridges the rigour of science-based evidence with the utility of applied knowledge.
History
Since its inception in 2000, the Viessmann European Research Centre has devoted itself to fostering and disseminating important research about Europe. However, with a decline in Laurier faculty focused on European research and the arrival of new faculty with new research areas, the centre has experienced an important transition. The centre shifted its orientation toward research and knowledge related to environmental sustainability and community resilience.
In 2018, this transition moved into its next phase with a new director, board, name, brand and home to complement the centres new focus. The newly named Viessmann Centre for Engagement and Research in Sustainability (VERiS) will maintain its connection to Europe and through our international networks, aim to build upon ground-breaking examples of sustainability in Germany and other European countries.