Climate Resilience and Biodiversity Applied Research Coordinator

Staff - Non Union

Job Category M&P - AAPS Job Profile AAPS Salaried - Research and Facilitation, Level B Job Title Climate Resilience and Biodiversity Applied Research Coordinator Department Manager | Sustainability and Engineering | SEEDS Sustainability Program Compensation Range $6,747.50 - $9,701.42 CAD Monthly

The Compensation Range is the span between the minimum and maximum base salary for a position. The midpoint of the range is approximately halfway between the minimum and the maximum and represents an employee that possesses full job knowledge, qualifications and experience for the position. In the normal course, employees will be hired, transferred or promoted between the minimum and midpoint of the salary range for a job.

Posting End Date April 23, 2025

Note: Applications will be accepted until 11:59 PM on the Posting End Date.

Job End Date

Aug 21, 2026

This is an approximate 1-year leave replacement term position (desired start date - July 28th 2025 and anticipated end date Aug 21 2026).

At UBC, we believe that attracting and sustaining a diverse workforce is key to the successful pursuit of excellence in research, innovation, and learning for all faculty, staff and students. Our commitment to employment equity helps achieve inclusion and fairness, brings rich diversity to UBC as a workplace, and creates the necessary conditions for a rewarding career.

JOB SUMMARY

The University of British Columbia’s (UBC) Campus and Community Planning (C+CP) department works collaboratively to create a vibrant and resilient campus for an engaged community on the traditional territory of the Musqueam people, taking a leading-edge approach to sustainability, engagement, community building, planning, design, and development. C+CP is responsible for leading UBC’s operational sustainability plans that set UBC’s targets and actions for climate, green buildings, transportation, green infrastructure, waste, and water, using UBC as a living lab for a sustainable future, and plays a key role in developing partnerships that enhance integration of operational and academic efforts in sustainability. These major UBC campus sustainability plans are endorsed by the UBC Board of Governors and have connections to many other UBC plans and strategies, including UBC’s Strategic Plan, 20-Year Sustainability Strategy, Inclusion Action Plan, Wellbeing Strategic Framework, and the UBC Climate Emergency Response, among others. C+CP collaborates and coordinates with many units to advance and embed these goals across the university, including senior staff and leadership from UBC Financial Operations, Facilities, Sustainability Hub, Student Housing & Community Services, Communications & Marketing, Alma Mater Society, and other units in C+CP and across UBC Okanagan.

Within C+CP, Sustainability and Engineering (S&E) leads and coordinates many of the University’s sustainability plans and initiatives and provides a central hub to engage with the campus community to facilitate operational sustainability learning and practice. S&E activities support UBC’s Strategic Plan and goals of developing UBC as a living laboratory for environmental and social sustainability and embedding sustainability as a central component of its operations. The S&E unit works closely with units across campus to develop and implement sustainability initiatives that focus on moving beyond harm reduction toward a net positive regenerative campus and community.

Within S&E, the SEEDS (Social Ecological Economic Development Studies) Sustainability Program is an internationally recognized Campus as Living Laboratory initiative with a mandate to advance UBC’s sustainability, climate, and wellbeing commitments, UBC’s Strategic Plan, and help advance the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals as they align with the University’s strategic priorities through interdisciplinary partnerships, applied student research and advisory guidance. SEEDS “Big Five” Research Priorities represent key interconnected societal issues that advance knowledge and action on UBC’s sustainability and wellbeing commitments and are periodically adapted to align with the UBC’s sustainability and strategic priorities. Current SEEDS Research Priorities: 1) Accelerate Climate Action, 2) Maintain & Enhance Urban Biodiversity, 3) Enable the Great Food Transformation, 4) Create Circular & Regenerative Economies, and 5) Foster Community Wellbeing & Inclusion. SEEDS collaborative interdisciplinary initiatives spanning biodiversity, climate, circularity, and food systems that work in parallel to advance priorities and harness the Campus as a Living Laboratory.

SEEDS Goals:

1. Advance strategies to achieve UBC’s sustainability and wellbeing commitments and help advance the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals as they align with the University’s strategic priorities and mandate
2. Catalyze impactful applied research experiences that empower and equip students to explore and develop solutions to societal challenges and advance UBC’s sustainability and wellbeing commitments
3. Foster and strengthen interdisciplinary partnerships between campus students, faculty, staff, and community
4. Integrate operational and academic efforts in sustainability that connect UBC’s curriculum to UBC’s sustainability mandate
5. Generate scalable solutions to critical societal issues that leverage the Campus as a Living Laboratory
6. Co-create, mobilize, and amplify knowledge for inclusive and meaningful engagement, knowledge, and action to address critical societal issues with communities in which issues affect for shared solutions and collective impact

SEEDS goals contribute to UBC’s Strategic Plan’s Pillars including Transformative Learning, People and Places, Local and Global Engagement and Research Excellence, and many of the supporting strategies including interdisciplinary, sustainability, knowledge mobilization, inclusion, innovation, and reputation.

The Climate Resilience and Biodiversity Applied Research Coordinator will work collaboratively to define and deliver R & D activities on critical intersectional topic areas to inform and advance UBC’s existing and emerging climate, adaptation, resilience and biodiversity commitments. The candidate is responsible for developing and managing campus-based student research projects and interdisciplinary partnerships that can inform campus policies and practices. Work will be guided by the strategic directives outlined in UBC’s emerging Biodiversity Strategy, Climate Action Plan (CAP 2030), Climate Emergency Declaration, Green Building Action Plan, Wellbeing Strategic Framework, Campus Vision 205 0 and Integrated Rainwater Management Plan, Neighbourhood Climate Action Plan and other intersectional priorities as directed. Building upon SEEDS research and collaborations, the successful candidate will lead and expand the SEEDS led, Campus Biodiversity Initiative: Research and Demonstration (CBIRD), with UBC students, staff, faculty and community partners. The candidate will facilitate collaborative research and applied learning models, while also expanding and enriching undergraduate and graduate student research and learning experiences in addressing societal issues.

ORGANIZATIONAL STATUS

This position reports to the Manager, SEEDS Sustainability Program in Sustainability & Engineering (S&E) within C+CP. The incumbent will work closely with the administration staff from across the University, including C+CP, Facilities, Botanical Garden, Sustainability Hub, UBC Wellbeing, Student Housing and Community Services, the AMS and GSS, UNA and other departments. Key faculty collaborative partners include Faculties of Applied Science, Science, Arts, Forestry, Geography, Land and Food Systems, Institute for Resources Environment & Sustainability, School of Community and Regional Planning, School of Architecture & Landscape Architecture and others.

WORK PERFORMED

Under the direction of the Manager, SEEDS Sustainability Program:

Research and Partnership Management:

• Establishes and manages student-led Community-Based Action Research (CBAR) projects and interdisciplinary partnerships that can inform UBC’s climate, adaptation, resilience and biodiversity policies, best-practices as well as monitoring and assessment of defined targets and actions. Key tasks include:
• Scoping, co-developing and writing project research proposals with clients, community partners and interdisciplinary committees and groups
• Managing project curricular and co-curricular participant recruitment
• Initiating project proposals with curricular or co-curricular research teams
• Developing supporting project working processes (project workflows, collaborations processes, milestones and timelines)
• Preparing budget forecasts and managing project budgets
• Overseeing and supporting project teams throughout the full project life cycle from project development, initiation, execution, monitoring, close and follow up phases
• Facilitates and guides applied student-led research teams and multi-stakeholder campus-based partnerships of varying compositions comprised of students, faculty, staff and community partners across the University’s faculties, schools, operational departments, and student organizations. Work will result in student-led research and collaborations that can inform a broad range of deliverables and outcomes that advance UBC’s climate action, adaptation, resilience and biodiversity initiatives. Examples of research and best practices that work will inform include:
• Campus Urban Biodiversity Baseline
• Campus Biodiversity Monitoring Framework informed by priority campus urban biodiversity assets
• Climate Risks and Vulnerabilities Assessment of Campus Biodiversity
• Campus Biodiversity Protection and Enhancement Practices focusing on four themes: Biodiversity Conservation, Resilient Landscapes, Nature Inclusive Built Environment, Nature for Human Health and Wellbeing
• Decision-making tools, guidelines and practices for sustainable landscape stewardship and nature inclusive urban planning and building design on campus
• Manages research project completion to ensure outcomes inform the development and implementation of UBC’s climate action, adaptation, resilience, biodiversity and related policies, plans and practices, while providing experiential learning, teaching and research opportunities with students and faculty.
• Identifies and pursues opportunities to integrate applied student research into various undergraduate and graduate curricular opportunities (e.g. courses, directed studies, thesis projects), and commission co-curricular opportunities (e.g. paid, volunteer) with faculty partners and others.
• Provides guidance and mentorship to students undertaking SEEDS research to support the delivery of impactful applied research experiences that can empower and equip students to help inform policy, plans and programs that help address societal challenges and advance UBC’s sustainability, climate and wellbeing commitments.
• Prepares background materials to inform research development and execution.
• Performs promising practice and related research to support student research and partnership development, including reviews of related policies and practices, research design and engagement models.

Knowledge Exchange:

• Performs research and writes progress reports to inform dissemination of research learnings and outcomes in accessible and creative ways.
• Develops and coordinates various knowledge exchange activities to disseminate, translate and mobilize student research and collaborative work to inform academic and practitioner bodies of knowledge and action on institutional advancements in climate action, adaptation, resilience, and biodiversity conservation.

Partnership Development and Management:

• Identifies and manages strategic partnerships with internal campus and external stakeholders, including new and ongoing partnership planning and relationship management, such as the Faculty of Forestry, Faculty of Science, Faculty of Arts, Campus + Community Planning, Facilities and the AMS.
• Facilitates partnership agreements through liaising with faculty, staff and other partners.
• Serves on and supports the coordination of various committees that support relevant SEEDS research, partnerships and knowledge exchange to advance UBC’s strategic climate, adaptation, resilience and biodiversity commitments, including the Campus Biodiversity Initiative: Research & Demonstration (CBIRD).

Administration & Student Recruitment:

• Recruits, hires, trains and supervises student staff and contractors as needed.
• Performs research to inform project and partnership development and program processes.
• Prepares reports on activities including managing and communicating progress of research and partnerships.
• Writes funding proposals as needed.
• Supports overall SEEDS reporting, data management and communications.
• Performs other related responsibilities as needed.

CONSEQUENCE OF ERROR

Must exercise tact and diplomacy when interacting with a diverse range of internal and external stakeholders. Proficiently facilitates decision-making and provides guidance across various facets of research, including scoping research development, assembling project teams, facilitating research activities, and disseminating research outputs that serve the client needs. Assumes responsibility for overseeing research activities, ensuring support for project teams in attaining research deliverables and desired outcomes. Poor decisions or lack of tact, diplomacy or sensitivity in dealing with internal and external funders and other stakeholders could result in missed opportunities, damaged relationships and loss of credibility across the university. Errors in documentation, judgement or the disclosure of confidential information could have very public consequences, and can result in reputational risk and loss of credibility for the SEEDS Sustainability Program, Campus and Community Planning, and/or result in embarrassment to the University of British Columbia and its senior administration.

SUPERVISION RECEIVED

This position works with a high degree of autonomy and reports to the Manager of the SEEDS Sustainability Program. Sustainability & Engineering, within Campus + Community Planning. Works in close cooperation with faculties and operational units across campus. Research work reviewed against achievement of project objectives. Research facilitation activities are reviewed for conformity to established objectives and standards.

SUPERVISION GIVEN

Supervises student staff as appropriate and provides direction, setting of priorities, and associated responsibilities. Facilitates research project teams of varying compositions including staff, faculty, students and community partners across a broad range of university departments, faculties and schools.

MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS

• University degree in a relevant discipline, such as Environmental/Interdisciplinary studies or other related discipline, a graduate degree preferred.
• Minimum of four years of related experience or the equivalent combination of education and experience.
• Willingness to respect diverse perspectives, including perspectives in conflict with one’s own.
• Demonstrates a commitment to enhancing one’s own awareness, knowledge, and skills related to equity, diversity, and inclusion.

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS

• Experience with the public sector, academic institutions, and/or UBC is an asset.
• Knowledge of biodiversity, ecosystem services, climate change and sustainability issues related to urban environments and ecological systems.
• Demonstrated experience developing and facilitating community-based action research or related participatory research projects, with a foundational knowledge of research methods and approaches.
• Demonstrated experience with project management, including leading and coordinating the full life cycle of applied research projects and teams.
• Experience leading and facilitating diverse multi-stakeholder and interdisciplinary audiences. This includes planning, managing and guiding teams to ensure that a group’s objectives are met effectively.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills.
• Demonstrated experience in the development of research proposals and promising practice reviews.
• Experience conducting secondary research, creatively communicating findings for a variety of audiences.
• Exceptional interpersonal skills, with demonstrated ability to develop partnerships and maintain strong supportive relationships amongst diverse stakeholders.
• Demonstrated ability to work in a multi-faceted work-based environment, ability to work flexibly and independently, establish and handle concurrent priorities, setting reasonable deadlines and meeting them.
• Experience with knowledge exchange including translating issues in creative and engaging ways to disseminate and increase the uptake to mobilize research into tangible actions with diverse stakeholders.
• Strong capacity for creativity and innovation; ability to exercise initiative, resourcefulness and judgment.
• Experience with developing grant and funding proposals is considered an asset.