TeachingCity Oshawa celebrating 2024 post-secondary graduates

It’s convocation season in Oshawa, with graduates being celebrated from the city’s three post-secondary institutions.

Durham College, Ontario Tech University and Trent University Durham are home to world-renowned centres for research and development and nearly 30,000 students, with many of them preparing for the gowns, tasselled hats and happy tears that comes with the annual convocation ceremonies.

TeachingCity Oshawa, a partnership between the City of Oshawa and the three schools, has been addressing urban issues through innovation, collaboration, applied research and shared experiential learning opportunities since 2017, with the aim of positioning Oshawa as a local, national and global community of urban research and learning.

TeachingCity is putting the spotlight on three 2024 graduates: one from each school:

Andrew Neary, Journalism – Durham College

Neary studied the ethics, skills, and processes that go into the craft of journalism at the college’s Journalism-Mass Media program, publishing stories in the school newspaper and producing live shows with Riot Radio’s Chronicle broadcast.

He was also able to work on several projects with TeachingCity, sharing the stories of a virtual reality firefighter training program developing at the college and highlighting trailblazing women who led the way in the last 100 years of Oshawa’s history. Neary combined photography, videography, writing, graphics, and audio to share the stories and the feedback he received from TeachingCity helped him in the classroom and in his placement with CBC Toronto.

Neary accepted a job as a journalist with CBC Toronto to continue to share those kinds of stories.

Darcy Piercey–Andrews, Bachelor’s in Political Science, Diploma in Public Policy – Ontario Tech University

Piercey- Andrews developed a focus on equity policy, specifically how universities shape the public discourse on equity in their surrounding environments while studying at Ontario Tech. She credits courses focused on racism and gender-based discrimination with giving her the tools needed to address those issues in both her professional and personal life.

In her final semester, she was able to put her studies into action working with the City’s Innovation and Transformation team through the TeachingCity initiative. Her task was refreshing the City’s Inclusive Language manual, a 40-page document that hadn’t been updated since its launch in 2019.

Piercey-Andrews gained insight as to how municipal government works and how her technical knowledge can be applied in non-academic environments.

She will be back on campus this fall in Ontario Tech’s Master of Arts in Social Practice and Innovation Graduate Program, where she plans to do more research into equity policy.

Chidumebi Chukwuogor, Master of Management – Trent University Durham GTA

Chukwuogor gained a deep understanding of subjects such as strategic planning, leadership, marketing, and organizational effectiveness while at Trent Durham, all of which are preparing her to succeed in the business world.

One of her experiences included an Entrepreneurship class project where her team created and pitched a business idea, allowing her to harness her passion for videography and collaborate with teammates to produce a short advertisement video for their concept. Another was a Master of Management networking event organized by students, where she networked with industry professionals and had the opportunity to photograph the event.

Chukwuogor also worked with Dr. Rob Elkington and other faculty professionals on a research project that explored E-leadership Practices for Online Learning.

She hopes to continue using her skills and passion for multimedia production to bridge the gap between the worlds of business and visual storytelling.