Beyond the Jargon
For two years, I produced Beyond the Jargon, a CFUV 101.9 FM podcast that translates graduate research at the University of Victoria into engaging, plain-language conversations for a broad audience. For Season 11 and Season 12 of the show, I was responsible for shaping each episode from initial concept to final cut. This includes recruiting guests, developing episode narratives, conducting and recording interviews, and managing all aspects of post-production.
A huge amount of exciting research happens behind institutional and disciplinary boundaries, and is completely inaccessible to a non-specialist. My goal was to create space for researchers to talk about their work as people (why they care, how they got there, and what their findings mean) while still communicating the substance and significance of the research itself.
The storytelling doesn’t stop when the episode airs. I also ran the Beyond the Jargon Instagram account, where I shared episode launches, guest highlights, and behind-the-scenes moments from each student’s research.
Season 12 Episodes
Who comes to mind when you think about playwrights? Authors like William Shakespeare tend to dominate the conversation, but this doesn’t reflect the incredibly diverse history of playwriting.
In this episode, English master’s student Mahayla Galliford discusses her work on Lady Rachel Fane’s May Masque, a play written by a fourteen-year-old girl roughly 400 years ago.
What does justice mean, and who gets to define it?
In this episode, Law and Society PhD student Aaron Leakey discusses his work on “the justice gap”: the disconnect between how legal institutions administer justice and how people who have experienced violence actually perceive justice. Through his work with the Access to Justice Center for Excellence (ACE) legal design lab at UVic, Aaron explores how to create legal systems that are more responsive, empowering, and centred around survivors’ lived experiences.
How do scientists keep track of wild animal populations? One common method is tagging, but things can get complicated when those tags fall off.
In this episode, Math and Statistics PhD candidate Arjun Banik discusses his work developing mathematical models to better understand tag loss in wildlife studies.
This week’s episode explores one of the great unifiers of the human experience: sleep!
Stephanie Engstrom, an Anthropology master’s student, shares her research on how our sleep patterns have changed throughout history and what that might mean for getting a better night’s sleep today.
Season 11 Episodes
How do you learn an Indigenous language when there aren’t any first language speakers around to help? In this episode, Nicki Benson, a PhD student in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, shares how adult learners are finding creative, community-driven ways to bring Indigenous languages back into daily life.
How did colonialism unfold off the coast of the Pacific Northwest? Jesse Robertson, a PhD student in the Department of History, explores how encounters between Indigenous mariners and colonial newcomers at sea shaped the course of history. In this episode, we dive into how the ocean became a central stage for colonial encounters.
What if we could make chemical reactions faster, cleaner, and smarter? This week, I’m joined by Ian Chagunda, a PhD student in the Department of Chemistry, who studies catalytic reactions—key processes behind the production of everything from medicines to materials. Using mass spectrometry, he uncovers their hidden mechanisms to make chemistry more efficient and sustainable.
How does the growth of cities affect the lakes around us? Biology master’s student Ashley Mickens is using a small but mighty fish, the threespine stickleback, to investigate how urban development impacts freshwater ecosystems on Vancouver Island.
Immigrating to a new country is never easy, and for Sikh women in Canada, the experience comes with its own unique challenges. Jasmine Padam, a master’s student in the Department of Sociology, explores the stories of Sikh women in British Columbia’s Lower Mainland to fill a critical gap in our understanding of immigration. We discuss how history, policy, and community shape these women’s experiences, and why their voices are essential to the conversation.
This week, we’re exploring how education policies can shape a student’s future, especially for those new to the country. Alycia Garcia, a PhD student in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, breaks down how American educational policies impact newcomer students and what that means for their learning, belonging, and success.
In today’s episode, we’re zooming out from individual stars to entire galaxies! Max Kurzner, a PhD student in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, takes us on a journey through the Virgo Cluster—the closest galaxy cluster to our own.
This week on Beyond the Jargon, we’re looking to the stars—literally! Breanna Crompvoets, a PhD student in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, joins us to chat about the science of star formation and what fuels the birth of these celestial giants.
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