Janice is a professor in UBC’s Department of Physical Therapy. An accomplished researcher, she has had both significant administrative experience and has played a diversity of roles in graduate education. As director of the Rehabilitation Research Program within UBC’s Faculty of Medicine and the Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute, Dr. Eng’s group develops novel rehabilitation interventions to improve important aspects of functioning and health of individuals with chronic health conditions
With her appointment to Associate Dean, Funding, Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies, Dr. Eng will be responsible for providing academic leadership in the area of graduate student funding, working to promote equitable and competitive funding for students, overseeing policy, adjudication, and decision-making for centrally-administered awards and scholarships, liaising with external agencies and donors, promoting student success in award competitions, and supporting programs in their responsibilities related to student financial support.
As a professor in the Faculty of Medicine’s Department of Physical Therapy, Dr. Eng teaches in the Masters of Physical Therapy and Graduate Program in Rehabilitation Sciences (MSc/PhD). She has served as acting head of the department, as well as completed a 7-year term as Health Research Advisor for the UBC VP Research and International Office.
She has been highly committed to mentoring graduate students and faculty, and has supervised 30 graduate students (MSc/PhD) and postdoctoral fellows from around the world. She was a recipient of the Faculty of Medicine Award for Excellence in Mentoring Early Career Faculty. She developed the University of BC PhD Program in Rehabilitation Sciences, which commenced in 2004. She was a co-leader of a Canadian Institutes Health Research Strategic Training Program in Rehabilitation, which provided training to over 40 new doctoral students.
Her trainees research the area of neurological rehabilitation, developing and translating new interventions to optimize the recovery of patients who have had a stroke. Her research is broad, extending from mechanistic investigation, clinical trials and knowledge translation, and is currently supported from all three tri-councils. Her research has been honoured with a Jonas Salk Award for lifetime contributions to reducing disability, an induction as Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences and a Killam Research Prize.
Prior to joining UBC in 1997, she was a postdoctoral fellow at Simon Fraser University. She received her BSc (physical therapy/occupational therapy) from the University of British Columbia, a MSc (Biomedical Engineering) from the University of Toronto and PhD (Kinesiology) from the University of Waterloo.
We welcome Dr. Eng to this position, a critical part of the university’s renewed commitment to attracting the best students and ensuring their appropriate support.