Gopal Menon: One of McGill's builders

"I love working. If I don't have enough work, I feel bored." Though how he would know anything about boredom is a mystery.

Menon is one of three project managers with the Department of Facilities Development, the unit responsible for putting up new buildings and making changes to existing ones. Once funding for a construction or renovation proposal is approved, the project manager makes it happen, overseeing everything from hiring architects to ordering nails.

"I have 42 projects going on as of today," says Menon cheerfully. "They're all at different stages -- design approval, tenders, construction. And this is our slowest time."

His biggest job is the EcoResidence at Macdonald Campus, a new, $1.5-million project which will turn old student housing into a totally environment-friendly living and research space. Any other project at Macdonald is his to handle and he also looks after a chunk of the downtown campus.

"My colleague Richard Siteman handles most of the jobs from the Arts Building down. Behind the Arts Building going up the hill, it's all mine. Our third project manager, Bob Stanley, handles the really major things, over $5 million."

In addition to hard work, Menon says the key to his job is being really organized. Experience helps, too, and he has plenty. "I started in 1977 as a building designer. That meant structural changes to the interior of buildings. My background is mechanical engineering, and as long as you know the codes, you can make changes like adding labs or moving classrooms. For big jobs or when you need to move fast, we hire architects or engineering consultants."

In 21 years, Menon has honed management skills and learned all about building codes, budgets and contracts, but says his biggest challenge has come from his family.

"I have two boys, 13 and 17. They took up hockey and I was asked a few years ago if I would help coach. I used to play field hockey at college in India, so some things about the game are similar. The coaching part is easy, but learning to skate -- now that was hard," he laughs. "I even play a little hockey myself now."

Between work and time spent at the arena, Menon says his days usually run to 18 or 19 hours. Still, he wouldn't change anything. "I love working at McGill. My brother worked here in the '70s and he recommended me for an interview. It was for a temporary position and the pay wasn't very good, so I decided there was no reason to leave the job I had. Six months later, they offered me a permanent position. I liked working here right away, and I haven't thought about going anywhere else since I started."

On reflection, Menon says there is one problem with his job. But he acknowledges that, for the moment, there seems to be no solution.

"We build a lot of things, but we don't have the money to maintain them. So many things we do are just patching up. We don't have the resources to really fix things properly. I find that very sad."

Diana Grier Ayton

We collaborate with industry on projects of our own choosing. All our graduate students will have a job within a year of graduation. Where is the shame in that? Where's the prostitution?


Food science and agricultural chemistry professor Ashraf Ismail, in an interview with The Gazette about university/industry collaborations. Ismail's research team has attracted more than $2 million in industrial funding since 1990.

Biochemistry student Valerie Cavar, a short-track speedskater from Nepean, wasn't able to compete at the Nagano Olympics, but she was delighted just to be there.

Back in 1994, Cavar's speedskating career was in jeopardy after she suffered a serious knee injury. She missed the rest of the season, but worked her way back onto the national team. In the trials for Nagano, Cavar finished sixth, grabbing the last spot on the women's short-track team as an alternate.

The 23-year-old Cavar thinks the best is yet to come for her. She told The Ottawa Sun that Canadian skaters tend to peak in their mid-to-late 20s. "Right now, Isabelle Charest is the top skater in Canada. She's the world record holder in the 500 metres and she's 27. Christine Boudrias and Annie Perreault, all the top ones on our team, are around 25. So I don't consider myself to be too far behind or anything. I just consider myself on track for where I want to go."

David Allardice, a history major, went to Nagano as well. He's also a short-track speedskater and was a member of the British squad that finished seventh in the 5,000 metre relay on Saturday.

Allardice, who took this year off to train, has competed with the British national team for the past two seasons. At the 1997 British championships, he finished first in the 500 metres and was third overall. A native of Southampton, Allardice has been living and training with the Saint John Speed Skating Club in New Brunswick since 1989.

The Globe and Mail asked Cavar for her take on one of Canada's biggest Olympic stories -- snowboarder Ross Rebagliati's controversial gold medal. Rebagliati almost lost the medal after drug testing turned up traces of marijuana in his system -- the result, he claims, of secondhand smoke.

Cavar says that if Rebagliati did smoke a joint, she isn't impressed.

"Japan has a strict policy on marijuana... Seven years [in prison], no questions asked. Knowing that risk, I'd say it was pretty stupid."

Source: McGill Sports Information Office

Riel waged war against the government, and more than 100 people died. He was convicted after a fair trial, and paid the penalty under the laws of the time. Today's revisionism doesn't change Riel. He was a complicated figure who -- like the Unabomber -- came to believe that it was acceptable to kill people to advance his beliefs.


History professor Desmond Morton, director of the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada, speaking to The Boston Globe about the current lobbying campaign to declare Louis Riel a father of Confederation.

While many of us spent much of last month waiting for the lights to come back on, Noemi Berlus hung out with the prime minister, most of Canada's premiers and hundreds of the country's top business executives in sun-soaked Latin America.

Berlus, a marketing and finance student, was one of a handful of Canadian business students selected by the federal Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade to take part in the Team Canada mission to Latin America.

Berlus was supposed to have some McGill companions on the trip -- vice-principals Bill Chan and Pierre Bélanger were scheduled to take part in portions of the mission, but those plans were scotched by the ice storm, the resulting blackout and the need for senior people to stay close to McGill during the crisis.

The trip involved jam-packed days filled with presentations and seminars. According to Berlus, the Canadian business leaders and Latin American officials all seemed keen to expand a trade relationship that already involves billions of dollars in transactions.

Berlus has a job lined up after graduation as a consultant specializing in strategic planning. Not surprisingly, she has some strategic advice to offer McGill if it ever sends a student on another Team Canada mission: be more, wellÉstrategic.

She thinks students should be given the opportunity to be ambassadors for their schools. "We could be a link between businesspeople and our deans, for instance."

She also advised federal trade minister Sergio Marchi that his department's mentoring program should allow students more responsibility and greater access to the business figures taking part in the trade mission.

Berlus confesses that she didn't know a great deal about Latin America before the trip. And now? "I'm a lot more interested in learning Spanish."