The following reflections are courtesy of our 2026 volunteers.
Our annual SALTISE Conference brings together a vibrant community of educators, researchers, and educational professionals. This event would not be possible without the dedication, enthusiasm, and hard work of our volunteers. Their contributions help create a welcoming and engaging experience for all attendees, and we are deeply grateful for their support.
Keynote Session – June 1 – by Walid Berrahma
Following the first round of sessions pertaining to the 15th edition of the annual SALTISE conference 2026, speaker Dr. Raquel Holmes, the founder and director of Improvescience, gave a moving speech on embracing our humanity and differences in the various scientific disciplines.
Throughout her speech, Dr, Raquel made significant effort engaging the audience, composing of professors, researchers, heads of departments, and students by having them wave to each other, acknowledge everyone’s presence and even doing a fun group activity to foster that intimate human connection that the speaker finds is lacking nowadays in her professional working fields.
She concluded her speech with a call to action, encouraging everyone to attend and participate in the upcoming Freedom Festival and Cultivating Ensembles conference both coming up in late June and July.
Session S-03 – Ethical and Responsible Uses of Artificial Intelligence in Higher Education: Faculty Narratives, Tensions, and Pedagogical Strategies – by Rodrigo Jared Lopez Robleto
In this talk, the presenters discussed how AI policies differ vastly between subjects and professors, and how this results in students feeling confused at which AI policies to follow or feeling justified in using AI despite policies stating otherwise. They stressed the lack of guidance from institutions to support both faculty and students in this current AI era, leading professors to feel that they have to individually develop AI policies despite it being a collective issue. Additionally, the presenters discussed how, even for the students who refuse to use large language models (LLMs) in their writing, they preventively limit their writing voice and therefore are still heavily impacted.
They finally emphasized the cognitive and emotional burdens faculty now carry for having to police students against AI, and how there’s an ongoing erosion of trust from professors due to the great diversity of knowledge depth of how LLMs actually work. It was a room full of diverse pedagogical voices. Through their shared love for their students, the presenters collectively explored the idea of a unified set of AI policy guidelines at the provincial level by the Ministry of Higher Education. Finally, the question was even raised on whether we should continue using the R-Score in this new era.
Session T-13 – Exploring the Link Between Belief in Neuromyths and Academic Performance in Undergraduate Science Students – by Lukas Strazza
Neuromyths are misconceptions about how human brains work. The primary goal of this project is to reduce the prevalence of neuromyths and see how it correlates with academic performance.
To address the neuromyths, the researchers used a McGill program called SciLearn, which strives to improve teaching using neuroscience. Students were given a survey before and after a SciLearn workshop and a score to determine how much they believed in neuromyths. It was found that the baseline belief in neuromyths is prevalent in students. SciLearn significantly reduced the neuromyth score of the students who attended its workshop. It was also found that reducing belief in neuromyth may improve academic performance, if only modestly. This was consistent across courses and subjects.
The researchers acknowledged some limitations with the research: causality was not shown, so using the results to inform real-world policy should be used with caution. Additionally, it was also found, in the control group, that the baseline belief in neuromyth does not have any correlation with academic performance, which raises the question of whether it is truly worthwhile to reduce belief in neuromyth (at least, for the purposes of improving academic performance).
Session T-10 – When You Go Hiking and Forget Your Water Purification Tablets – Problem-Based Learning Implemented in a Large General Chemistry Laboratory Class Setting: Challenges and Rewards (Irina Desinova (McGill)) – Ina Patten
Irina Desinova from the Chemistry Department at McGill University led an educational talk on the topic of problem-based learning (PBL) in McGill’s General Chemistry laboratories.
PBL is a form of education where students are given a loosely defined problem relevant to their respective curriculum. In small groups, they must adopt a deductive approach to design their own unique solutions to the given issue and write appropriate laboratory procedures. After having their proposed solution reviewed by a Teaching Assistant (TA), a physical experiment can be conducted in which this resolution is tested. Students record their observations and write their final report, which will also be reviewed and graded by a TA.
An educational style which remains quite new to McGill’s Chemistry Department, having been first run during the Winter 2025 semester, PBL has received mostly positive feedback from both students and TAs involved. In terms of engagement, students described having enjoyed being active participants in solving the problem and appreciated the aspect of social interaction necessary in developing a viable solution. However, feedback in terms of difficulty was mixed. In general, students found their PBL labs caused more frustration for reasons including high cognitive load and little guidance. Finally, for the TAs, the PBL labs were their favourite since they felt more involved, describing the experience as being a “PBL experience for them as well”.
