Accelerating Innovation: Modernizing R&D Support and the BOREALIS Mechanism

Sarah Watts-Rynard assumed the role of Chief Executive Officer at Polytechnics Canada in July 2018.  Prior to this role, she served as Executive Director of the Canadian Apprenticeship Forum, supporting Canada’s apprenticeship community with research, promotion and by connecting stakeholders across trades, across sectors and across Canada. 

Sarah has a degree in Journalism and English from Carleton University.  Since graduating, she has built a career that includes time in government, the private sector and at skills-focused non-profit organizations.  She has experience related to non-profit governance, fundraising, advocacy and marketing.  She leads a team of passionate and dedicated employees committed to high-quality skills and innovation policy, reflecting the strengths of polytechnic education in Canada.  In 2018, Sarah was awarded an honorary diploma in the Skilled Trades by Niagara College. 

Sarah is Chair of the CWB Welding Foundation and Vice-Chair of the Canadian Centre for Women in Science, Engineering, Trades and Technology (WinSETT Centre).

Martin is a seasoned public servant with over 30 years experience in the areas of defence, national security, and public safety. This experience includes various roles in the Department of National Defence and Defence Research and Development Canada, emergency management policy and operational roles with Public Safety Canada and policy positions within the Privy Council Office’s Security and Intelligence Secretariat and Democratic Institutions Unit. In addition to his work with the federal government, Martin served as a civilian senior officer with the Ottawa Police Service.

Julie St-Pierre is the Vice-President, Research and Innovation of the University of Ottawa.

She was awarded BSc and MSc degrees from Laval University before earning her doctorate at the University of Cambridge, England. As a post-doctoral fellow, Julie St-Pierre conducted research in both Europe and the United States, including at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. From 2008 to 2017, she was an assistant professor and then full professor at McGill University, where she co-established a core facility in metabolomics and co-led it for eight years.

In 2017, the University of Ottawa recruited her and she established a similar core facility at the Faculty of Medicine. Today she is a full professor in the Faculty’s Department of Biochemistry, Microbiology and Immunology.

Her research deals with metabolomics, a science based on powerful technology that serves to deepen our understanding of the metabolic states of physiological and pathological conditions. Julie St-Pierre is especially interested in how metabolic adaptations in breast cancer can fuel therapeutic resistance.

Before her appointment as Interim Vice-President, Julie St-Pierre had been Associate Vice-President, Research Support and Infrastructure within the Office of Vice-President, Research and Innovation since 2023.