On to more team Science & Innovation Canada intros! Continuing with my Toronto theme, let me introduce you to our Science & Innovation Associate, Claire Hastings.
Photo by Frank Wimart
Claire is a lovely person with a sparkling personality. She’s bubbly, intelligent, fun to be around, and VERY knowledgeable about all things FCO and UKinCanada (or so it always seems to me!). Claire is always encouraging (and has been a fantastic supporter of all my S&I related adventures in social media), ready and willing to participate any evil plans I may be concocting (don’t let the wording confuse you too much, my plans are rarely that evil, but it is much more fun to describe them that way ;P)!
Claire is also an avid foodie, who has the added bonus of also being a food writer/restaurant reviewer (I have to admit to being more than a bit envious here) for Toronto Life. She openly admits to planning her vacations based on the best places to eat (this year it’s the pacific northwest – I can’t wait to hear all about it!). In her other journalistic endeavours, Claire has written on non-food related topics for the Globe and Mail, the Walrus and Tunza magazine (the UNEP‘s youth
mag). Now I’ll give her the floor:
Claire Hastings
As the Science and Innovation Associate at the British Consulate – General in Toronto, I work with the small, (but perfectly formed) UK Science & Innovation Team throughout Canada. I also work with the Media and Politics Team, and so my day-to-day job is a constantly entertaining flurry of organising scientific projects and collaborations, monitoring media for coverage of a variety of UK policies, writing reports, and organising programmes and events for official visitors from the UK.
Toronto is a fabulous place to promote scientific excellence and collaboration. The windows of our office overlook the University of Toronto, the MaRS Centre and the Discovery District – a vast hub of medical and life science research in the heart of Canada’s largest city. But instead of contentedly gazing at the areas of scientific excellence in Toronto, my colleague Shiva and I are always on the move: meeting with researchers, science policy makers and university deans of research to identify areas in which Canada and the UK can work together for even more excellent science.
I’m constantly amused by my (recently acquired) ability to spout off about scientific topics, because before coming to the Consulate two years ago, the closest I got to science was inadvertently growing fungi cultures on day-old bagels. I grew up in British Columbia and my tightly knit family travelled frequently – consequently I developed a love of being immersed in different cultures and a rather staggering long distance phone bill. I attended the United World College of the Atlantic in Wales for two years, and, after a gap year in Lebanon, completing political science studies at McGill University, and working on a sailing yacht for a year, I returned to the UK to work for the United Nations Environment Programme in Cambridge.
Prior to fetching up at the Consulate, I worked as a journalist in Toronto. My peripatetic history and broad interests have been a boon for the work I do here – change and learning are constants, and flexibility of mind and time are always necessary! Ultimately, I’m going to have to learn how to bend the space-time continuum, and with Professor Hawking down the road at the Perimeter Institute in Waterloo it just might happen…