2025 Military Psychology and Leadership Cyclical Program Review Implementation Plan Update of Cycle 1

1. Contact Registrar’s office and CIS for updating equipment in Hewett house                                                   
2. Division of offices will be  assessed once needs of faculty have been clearly identified                                 
3. Develop a common lab space.

1. Dept head
2. Dept head
3. Dept head and Dean

1. Resolved: All three classrooms have been renovated. New monitors that are directly hooked up to laptops have been put in the classrooms (no more projector units), new podiums have been purchased and installed. The classroom on the second floor in Hewett house has been converted to a dual-delivery classroom.
    
2. Resolved: Faculty have adequate offices. Those with required labs have been given labs.
    
3. In Progress: The basement could be used as a temporary lab to test 1-2  articipants at a time. MPL has written a plan to create a multi-use laboratory space that has been submitted to senior management. This space will encourage greater, controlled, experimental research. There has been no progress in the last AY regarding this request.

2. The Committee recommends an increase in published and peer-reviewed research output.

1. Discussion with the Dean of Social Sciences and Humanities to work at reducing teaching load 
2. Timetable discussion to ensure each faculty member has a research day
3. Stronger research culture within MPL needs to be encouraged

1. In Progress: 2019 and on – Workload will be examined as part of the joint workload committee established between management and the faculty association. The head is ensuring that instructors who need TAs because of large class sizes are getting them. This was partly made possible by greater recruitment efforts from the DL- co-ordinator, and because instructors
   do not require TAs to have security clearance. More
   MPL faculty are embracing the hiring of TAs.                 
2. This is a strong desire that remains in the hands of the registrar’s timetable co-ordinator. 
3. We have created,and are working atmaintaining a strong research culture within MPL.

1. Dept head
2. Time table co-ordinator
3. Dept head

1. In progress: 2019 and on – Workload will be examined as part of the joint workload committee established between management and
   the faculty association. The head is ensuring that instructors who need TAs because of large class sizes are getting them. This was partly made possible by greater recruitment efforts from the DL-co-ordinator, and because instructors do not require TAs to have security clearance. More MPL faculty are embracing the hiring of TAs.
    
2. This is a strong desire that remains in the hands of the registrar’s timetable co-ordinator.
    
3. We have created, and are working at maintaining a strong research culture within MPL:
   1. Since 2021, new indeterminate faculty hires with strong, peer-reviewed publications have been selected. This is obtained by requesting applicants have publications in peer- reviewed journals in the last 5 years. However, 2 of the 3 selected faculty members left RMC within 18 months of being hired. An additional indeterminate hire has been selected but has not been
      hired due to a hiring freeze. 
   2. One indeterminate professor has left MPL after only 1 year to go to the Université de Montréal. She will serve as an adjunct faculty and will co-supervise 2 honours students for AY 24/25.
   3. Faculty are being encouraged to work together to publish material. This has been achieved and is in progress (more collaborations in conducting research)
   4. The Resilience Plus initiative under the leadership of Dr. Chérif is collaborating on numerous research projects with Dr. Ryan Niemiec – renowned international researcher- and the le VIA Institute on Character (international research collaboration).
   5. Members of Resilience Plus, under the leadership of Dr. Chérif were invited to publish a series of research articles in the peer-reviewed Canadian Military Journal.
   6. Cadets conducting honours research are being encouraged to work on their supervisor’s research to facilitate publication by collecting data more quickly and hopefully getting cadets published, as welll.
   7. Cadets are being encouraged to present their research at conferences (see point 8 below).4.
   8. The first pages of 3 faculty members’ published work are framed and mounted in Hewett to showcase MPL research to cadets and peers. These works are updated two times a year:
   9. In monthly meetings, faculty are encouraged to highlight the positive
      changes/outcomes of their research In monthly meetings, faculty are encouraged to highlight the positive changes/outcomes of their  research.
   10. Brownbag sessions have been utilized successfully in MPL, particularly because 3 job competitions have been held in recent years. Two of the 3 hired faculty have left for other institutions, resulting in the ongoing need for hiring and selection processes.

The department head holds monthly meetings. She also seeks input from members outside those meetings, when required. Almost all decisions
(e.g., development of new courses, changes of courses, program issues, hiring issues) are now discussed at the department level and consensus
on decisions are obtained.

The basement has been renovated and can be used to test 1-2 participants

Ongoing. The timetable committee, which includes a member of the MPL Department, is very engaged in finding ways to improve the timetable structure.

Pre-registration has resulted in more work for faculty who now must deal with student pre- registrations over several weeks each February (note, registrations, add/drops, academic advising are not dealt with at the Registrar’s office, but by faculty within the department. Our faculty would prefer not to do this task but we have no choice). Errors can arise when transferring pre- registration teaching plot to the format used by the timetable rep (duplication of efforts).

Finally, the timetable rep requires grouping of courses after pre-registration. Which is to say that when students are registered in multiple electives, our department becomes responsible for overseeing the process of grouping electives and attempting to create as few conflicts as possible. At times it is impossible for a student to obtain the number of psychology electives required because courses are being offered simultaneously.

Completed

2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025:

a) The 3rd year Honours student with the top grade gets identified as the Canadian Psychological Association Campus rep. This provides the cadet with leadership  opportunities to encourage students to embrace research and to co-ordinate faculty - student events. They are involved, along with an MPL subcommittee, in the review of Honours’ students theses, to identify the best theses for CPA Programme of Certificates of Academic Excellence that acknowledges our department’s top thesis students at the Honours level. This exposes them to 4th year research projects.

b) 2022, 2023, 2025:

The department head, along with the executive of the Military Psychology section of the Canadian Psychological Association developed an online conference for students who have conducted research relevant to the military. This was hosted for the first time in April 2022. There were 10 presenters, 4 students presented their research conducted at RMC. A total of 40 individuals wereat the virtual event. Similarly, in 2023, 9 students from across  Canada presented their work, 2 of those students were from RMC.

In 2025, 6 students presented their research and 3 were from RMC.

Ongoing

A professor in the psychology department has been offering a resilience plus program :

• The education component (workshops and webinars), Resilience Plus program resources and its 10 initiatives and coaching have been offered to RMC and RMC Saint- Jean staff, faculty and Cadet members since 2019.
• A customized Resiliency Plus education program was offered in 2021 and 2022 to Cadets enrolled in ILOY.
• A customized Resilience Plus education program will be offered to the College's Cadet Sentinels in 2022-2023 (FAC collaboration).
• Other faculty members of the MPL department are involved in the various Resilience Plus initiatives (intra- departmental collaboration: research + mentoring of cadet program of ambassadors).
• CAF Alumni are involved in Resilience Plus (external collaboration).
• Resilience Plus has received internal funding (RBF) and external funding (Bell Let's Talk + College Alumni Association) and they intend to continue their efforts to apply for external funding.

Most Milfac have been involved in the Athena network

MPL’s senior Mil Fac coordinated with the training wing to have MPL offer guidance/training/workshops for the cadet wing and training wing since August 2021.

• Drs. Lagacé-Roy, MacIntyre, Suurd Ralph, O’Keefe and Sutcliffe have been offering the 360 leadership development for the Canadian Forces College. This program has been ongoing for approximately 20 years.
• Brownbags hosting external faculty presenting their research (entire college is invited) are offered by MPL
• Interdepartmental collaborations (see point 2 above)

Ongoing

We added three new graduate courses to War Studies to gain experience teaching graduate level courses online. The courses are ongoing since 2022 with generally one being taught each AY: WS 557 Psychology of Peace and Conflict, WS 557 Leadership principles and Theories, and the third one, WS514 Emotional Systems Involved in Warfare.

A professor in the psychology department was tasked with writing the IQAP for the new Master’s in Military Psychology. Although MPL remains committed to providing courses to the War Studies program, we are currently too short staffed to entertain the idea of a graduate program. We are only capable of delivering the undergraduate program with several terms (four) and one professor on assignment from another organization.

Completed

We have conducted a review of our stats and research methods courses and have incorporated changes to ensure more diverse research-related experiences.

PSE211 will ensure diverse laboratory experiences as this is included in the course description.

PSE 211 and 213 ensures learning APA format for writing the results of experiments. We will be including excel in PSE 213 as this is a useful tool in the CAF and civilian domain.

PSE352 will incorporate more advanced stats.

PSE350 course description reflects more laboratory work

Further improvements:

We have included more courses that will provide a broader scope of psychology for cadets, relevant material specific to the CAF, and additional laboratory experiences in PSE416, PSE422, and PSE493.

In progress

In AY 24/25 MPL successfully graduated 21 Honours students who each completed a research project. MPL faculty were involved in up to 8 projects each in this year alone. All indeterminate civilian faculty now have experience supervising honours theses.

Milfac and term hires are being encouraged to supervise or co- supervise honours theses if they feel uncomfortable supervising on their own.

See also point 10 above.

Completed

The department head holds a meeting once a month for the department.