Education

Emilie Isch (SHE/HER)

UBCO MA Student (2022-2024)

Interdisciplinary Graduate Studies (Urban and Regional Studies)

Teaching Assistant, Political Science

University of British Columbia | Okanagan Campus | Sylix Okanagan Nation Territory

Research interests: Urban studies, Community Planning, Public Space, Walkable cities, Alternative/ active transportation, Blue/ Green space, Urban agriculture, Placemaking, Architecture and emotion, Anti-capitalist perspectives

Emilie Isch currently lives, works, and plays on the unceded territory of the Syilx people. She is an interdisciplinary researcher, activist, and designer interested in issues around our built environment and community resilience. She is a current MA student in the Interdisciplinary Graduate Studies program specializing in Urban and Regional studies. Her thesis explores how public libraries serve as a model to respond to and address homelessness in small Canadian cities. She will focus her fieldwork in 'Vernon' and 'Nelson', British Columbia.

Her academic journey started at Carleton University where she attained her honors bachelor’s in 2020 finishing her undergraduate thesis titled: Meanings and Experiences of Space, Place, and Atmosphere on Campus: A Note for the Next Masterplan. Throughout her time at Carleton, she published two works, one based on an internship in Nepal with a women’s owned craft business: “Culture, Craftwork and Globalization,” and another on “Palestine: Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women and Girls in the Middle East.”

Emilie also holds a graduate certificate in Human Centered Design from Algonquin College where she joined the Human Centered Design Lab in 2021 completing multiple design research projects. After her studies at Algonquin College, she went on to work at Nokia as a UX researcher and later joined two departments of the Canadian Government and was part of ongoing projects in the sphere of digital government and client experience.

University of British Columbia Okanagan, Interdisciplinary Graduate Studies, Master of Arts, and Teaching Assistant September 2022 – Present

Algonquin College of Applied Arts and Technology, School of Media & Design, Graduate Certificate in Human Centered Design September 2020 – August 2021

Carleton University, Arthur Kroeger College of Public Affairs, Honors Bachelor of Global and International Studies September 2016 – June 2020