UVicSpace | Institutional Repository
UVicSpace is the University of Victoria’s open access scholarship and learning repository. It preserves and provides access to the digital scholarly works of UVic faculty, students, staff, and partners. Items in UVicSpace are organized into collections, each belonging to a community.
For more information about depositing items, see the Submission Guidelines.
Recent Submissions
Empowering the Victoria community to care for animals: Addressing the gaps in services for pet guardians experiencing poverty and homelessness
(2026) Hamill, Emma; Krawchenko, Tamara
Victoria, BC has one of Canada’s highest per-capita homelessness populations. With visible pet ownership among this group, their experience is intensified by rising living costs, scarce affordable and pet friendly housing and limited access to animal-related supports. Partnering with the BC Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (BC SPCA) as it shifts toward a community-care model, this project examined how local services can better support vulnerable guardians, reduce stigma, and strengthen supports. Using a mixed-methods design, data was collected in the Spring of 2025 from 33 service users and 8 service providers through trauma informed, accessible questionnaires, supplemented by publicly available organizational information. Quantitative data was analyzed descriptively, while qualitative responses underwent thematic analysis, resulting in 11 themes and 10 subthemes that highlighted strong emotional bonds and reciprocal relationships, substantial structural barriers particularly veterinary costs and access and widespread appreciation for low-barrier compassionate services. Service providers reported diverse offerings but faced chronic limitations including funding shortages, veterinary capacity constraints, foster shortages, and geographic barriers. These findings led to the development of the Victoria Pet Survival Guide. This guide is purposefully written in plain language, intended to be available digitally and physically accessible as a resource consolidating information on veterinary care, pet-friendly housing, emergency boarding, food banks, and lost and found supports. The project identifies opportunities for expanded services, cross-sector collaboration, mobile and low-cost veterinary initiatives, and broader advocacy to reduce systemic barriers. Together, this work provides a practical tool and strategic direction for improving community-based animal welfare supports and helping keep people and their pets together.
Culturally appropriate sexual health interventions for STBBI and HIV among racialised immigrant communities in Western nations: A scoping review protocol
(BMJ Open, 2026) Kwame, Abukari; Maina, Geoffrey; Langman, Erin; Ndubuka, Nnamdi; Caine, Vera; Spence, Cara; Maposa, Sithokozile; Kamrul, Rejina; Mason, Natalya; Etowa, Josephine; Eaton, Andrew D.; Caron-Roy, Stephanie; Abdulrasheed, Abdulmalik; Guliak, Dasha; Chowdhury, Isfar; Ahmed, Ashfaque; Nyoni, Nuru; Hanson, Jacelyn; Alvarez, Analu
Introduction Racialised immigrant communities in Western nations face disproportionate risks for sexually transmitted and blood-borne infections (STBBIs) due to systemic barriers, including racism, stigma and limited access to culturally appropriate care. While the need is well-established, a comprehensive synthesis of effective, culturally responsive sexual health interventions is lacking. This scoping review aims to map the available evidence on sexual health intervention needs and protective factors of racialised immigrants, and to identify and describe existing culturally appropriate programmes in Western nations.
Methods and analysis The review will follow the JBI methodology for scoping reviews and be reported as per the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) guidelines. A systematic search strategy, developed and peer-reviewed by a health sciences librarian, will be executed in MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL and Scopus, alongside grey literature sources, with no date limit. Two independent reviewers will screen titles/abstracts and full texts against the inclusion criteria. Data will be extracted using a standardised tool, analysed via narrative synthesis and framed by a socio-ecological model to categorise interventions across individual, interpersonal, community and structural levels.
Ethics and dissemination Ethical approval is not required for this review. Findings will be disseminated through a peer-reviewed publication, academic presentations and tailored summaries for community organisations and policy-makers to ensure practical application.
Review registration Open Science Framework (https://osf.io/9qah6).
Revitalizing Hupač̓asatḥ navigational knowledge: Mapping the waters of settler-colonialism using a critical, coastal, community-based consciousness
(2026) Sayers, Alana; O'Bonsawin , Christine; Sayers, Jentery
I’m the great granddaughter of a hereditary chief, the granddaughter of a residential school survivor, the daughter of a residential school survivor, and the daughter of a mother who was part of the first wave of native women lawyers in the country as well as an elected Indian Act Band Council Chief. In my life, I carry the things that have been passed down to me throughout the generations, and I also carry the emptiness and pain of the things that weren’t. Growing up on the Hupač̓asatḥ, I witnessed multiple forms of governance, leaders, and chiefs. I saw our hereditary governance in practice alongside my mother as the elected chief of our nation. I was at meetings for modern-day treaty negotiations with other Nuučaańuł Nations; I saw native nationalism shift and change through attending native political meetings at the AFN, BC, and First Nations Summit meetings. And one of the places where I learned the most was at family dinner tables. I grew up in a really special family of strong, vocal, passionate folks who have immense love for our people. My entire life, I’ve watched most members of my family spend their lives working for the continuation of our nations and the strength of our people in lots of different ways. Things in our lives at every level were talked about: last week’s band meeting, the upcoming AFN AGM, Delgamuukw, the Haida Case, UNDRIP. Something was always going on somewhere, and my family was discussing it in depth around dinner tables.
My lived experience and academic training have provided me with the foundation for the creation of the Critical Coastal Community-based Consciousness which I designed to help me better understand how settler-colonialism functions specific to myself. To do this, I attempt to map out Hupač̓asatḥ and Hupač̓asatḥ First Nation in an ocean of settler colonialism by revitalizing our navigational knowledge to guide my decolonial praxis.
Or
The author views this dissertation as a curation of knowledges (generational, lived experience, and academic) designed to reveal how Hupač̓asatḥ First Nation has been racialized, one of the foundations of settler-colonialism, by the Canadian state. To view these knowledges and guide the curation of them, the author developed a Critical, Coastal, Community-Based, Consciousness which she uses to present specific instances of how she has experienced colonization in the form of an intergenerational mapping space.
Efficient, secure, and intelligent wireless systems: From edge AI to network management
(0020) Chegini, Mohammad Aaron; Baniasadi, Amirali
In one sentence: this thesis makes AI efficient, secure, and explainable enough for real-time wireless systems.
The vision of AI-native 6G networks is blocked by three barriers. First, state-of-the-art deep learning models are too large and power-hungry for battery-powered edge receivers, where modulation schemes can change every few milliseconds and must be classified in real time. Second, the edge hardware that hosts these models is vulnerable to physical denial-of-service attacks that degrade performance without any software breach. Third, when network faults occur, diagnosis remains a slow, manual process because existing AI systems cannot explain their reasoning to engineers. This thesis presents a unified framework that addresses all three barriers.
To solve the efficiency problem, we introduce RFNet, a lightweight neural network for Automatic Modulation Classification that reduces model size by over 90% compared to standard baselines. We validate this on real hardware with Tiny-RFNet, deployed on an NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano, where it processes the full 255,590-sample RadioML 2018.01A test set in approximately 30 s under 3 W, fast enough to track adaptive modulation changes in real time.
To address the security problem, we present NoCSNet, a deep learning framework that detects thermal attacks on chip interconnects with 93.8% accuracy, catching malicious patterns that evade conventional threshold-based monitors.
To enable interpretable diagnostics, we introduce TRACE, a cascaded system for 5G root cause analysis. TRACE achieves 99.65% diagnostic accuracy on the TeleLogs benchmark, outperforming even 32-billion-parameter Large Language Models (95.86%), while running in milliseconds on a single CPU and providing transparent reasoning traces that engineers can verify.
Together, these contributions demonstrate that trustworthy AI for next-generation wireless requires co-design across efficiency, security, and interpretability.
Stitching together: Relationships, partnerships, and Kanyen'kéha revitalization at Tyendinaga
(2026) Brinklow, Nathan Thanyehténhas; McIvor, Onowa
Tsi Tyónnheht Onkwawén:na Language and Cultural Centre (TTO) has supported Kanyen'kéha (Mohawk) language revitalization in Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory since 2000, with adult immersion and intensive language programs offered from 2004. During this time, TTO has partnered with three Ontario universities to design and deliver full-time and part-time programs in addition to offering independent programs. This study documented this history through organizational records, administrator memories, student experiences, and textile‑based Onkwehón:we research methods to uniquely preserve a multi-dimensional organizational story.
The study developed and deployed a quilting methodology grounded in Indigenous making traditions and the author’s own inheritance as a quilter. This approach positions object, process, and person in continual dialogue, and its material practices enable collective authorship, relational knowledge‑building, and meaning to emerge through the shared handling of stories and textiles.
Four interconnected texts ground the dissertation at its center. The initial two papers within offer institutional perspectives: 1) an organizational history tracing TTO’s growth from grassroots language circle to community language center; and, 2) revealing the relational approach that vitally shaped and sustained post‑secondary partnerships. The third paper represents the case study of the TTO-Queen’s University joint Certificate in Mohawk Language and Culture, journeying through program development, expansion, and the tensions that can arise between community-based needs and university‑based administrative structures. The fourth text centers the students’ voices, revealing that learners seek connection to family, community, ceremony, and identity more than credentials; and highlights how university systems oriented toward individual achievement can struggle to support the collective, relational work of language reclamation.
The quilt metaphorically wraps itself around the research narrating the collaborative creation of a story quilt, honoring the students, teachers, supporters, and partners who have worked over twenty‑five years to reclaim and strengthen Kanyen'kéha at Tyendinaga.