Tremplin Award

Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences

Enhancing teaching practices with an integrative vision

An approach was developed to encourage future teachers starting university to develop their own cultural curriculum by combining literature, live arts, and culture. This innovative approach, centred on significant aesthetic experiences, comes from Martin Lépine, a young French didactician hired in 2017 as a regular professor in the Faculty of Education. While French didactics research must be innovative, in particular on learning how to read and understand literary works, Professor Lépine chose to integrate a cultural dimension, which has proven most relevant to the development of teaching practices.

To define the process, he initiated two large-scale research projects: Passeurs culturels and Partenaires culturels CSSRS. Through these programs, education students and faculty benefit from privileged access providing meaningful experiences in cultural mediation, which helps them to play an active role in integrating the cultural dimension at school with preschool, elementary, and secondary school students.

Professor Lépine can lay claim to enriching the very foundations of French didactics through this integrative approach, which guides and results in such significant contributions in research.

For his remarkably innovative vision of integrating culture into education, the Université de Sherbrooke takes great pride in awarding Professor Martin Lépine the Prix Tremplin in Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences.

• Professional Profile of Martin Lépine

Medicine and Health Sciences

Leading expertise in bioinformatics

Bioinformatics tools have been developed to discover and verify more than 100 new non-coding RNAs in humans. This outstanding scientific contribution comes from Professor Michelle Scott, a rising star on the international scene in the field of RNA and bioinformatics.

Since arriving in 2011 in the Department of Biochemistry and Functional Genomics of the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Professor Scott and her team have created several bioinformatics tools to characterize RNA molecules and gene expression regulators. She has a particular interest in the roles and regulation of small RNAs, referred to as “sRNA.” Using transcriptomics approaches and artificial intelligence, she also works to identify biomarkers, particularly in ovarian cancers.

Professor Scott’s contribution is also reflected in terms of sharing open-access scientific data, acting as a fervent advocate of the trend for many years. The bioinformatics characterization tools that she designed—including databases, Web servers, and quantification software—are available free of charge, fast-tracking knowledge advancement.

For her outstanding contribution to the development of bioinformatics, the Université de Sherbrooke is very proud to present Professor Michelle Scott with the Prix Tremplin in Medicine and Health Sciences.

• Professional Profile of Michelle Scott