About NICKEL

NICKEL arose in 2015 as an experiment of the Engineering Change Lab. NICKEL was originally an initiative of the Troost Institute for Leadership Education in Engineering at the University of Toronto (Troost ILead) and was funded by the UofT Community of Practice on Engineering Leadership. Today, NICKEL is self-sustaining and supported by a variety of Universities across Canada.

Participants in NICKEL are university professors, instructors and staff who are pushing boundaries to integrate leadership into the engineering curriculum in Canada. Annual conferences began in August 2016 and have attracted over 200 participants from 20 institutions. The 2020 and 2021 conferences were online; in 2022 conferences returned to in person delivery and have been hosted at the University of British Columbia - Vancouver, McGill University, and the University of Manitoba.

NICKEL also hosts online Community Meetings to exchange learning and insights about how to best provide leadership learning experiences for engineers. NICKEL is a community of practice.

To watch NICKEL in action click on the logo below.

Community Meetings

At our community meetings participants:

• Get to know community members

• Build their network

• Learn what others are doing

• Learn from invited speakers and panelists

• Share best practices

Meetings are online and usually occur about six times per year.

Steering Committee

Kathryn Atamanchuk, University of Manitoba

John Donald, University of Guelph

Amy Hsiao, University of Prince Edward Island

Nadine Ibrahim, University of Waterloo

Nate Quitoriano, McGill University

Patricia Sheridan (Chair), University of Toronto

Jonathan Verrett (past Chair), University of British Columbia