SIM Professor, Dr. Mike Smit, has been appointed Deputy Scientific Director of the Ocean Frontier Institute. OFI is a partnership led by Dalhousie University, Memorial University of Newfoundland, and University of Prince Edward Island. This will be a part-time role while Dr. Smit continues to fulfill his duties as Associate Dean, Academic (Faculty of Management).

From Dr. Smit: “I work with the leadership team to develop and implement strategy (pertaining to research themes); represent OFI within Dalhousie, regionally and nationally; work with colleagues to synthesize and share ocean research across Dalhousie. In the short term, I have been working with colleagues on a large research proposal involving Dalhousie, UQAR, Laval, and Memorial called Transforming Climate Action: Addressing the Missing Ocean. We were recently approved as as candidate for funding from the Canada First Research Excellence Fund. To understand why someone from SIM is in this role, it’s helpful to know that I’ve been an OFI researcher, leading one of the large research projects focused on how we manage the vast amounts of data from ocean observing. This is building on the ocean data work I started with MEOPAR, and then continued with my role advancing the Canadian Integrated Ocean Observing System. Data and information are critical to understanding the changing ocean, and I’ve had the pleasure of working with incredible ocean researchers who helped me become comfortable in this area.”

Congrats Dr. Smit!