Getting to know Preston and more

Things are starting to come together for the CUSP class as the term heads to a close. The students have spent the past few weeks learning the skills necessary to build a response to the Request for Proposals (RFP) from the City of Cambridge.

Bernhardt Block, Preston

On October 25, we had Eric Davis come in and speak to the students about the RFP and the process of adding buildings to a heritage register. He is a lawyer from Miller Thompson, LLP that specializes in municipal matters. He expressed that he thought this project was a huge undertaking for the students and gave them concrete advice on how best to streamline the process. Eric reminded the students to keep their audience in mind when presenting the information to ensure they have the most impact. The student came out with some valuable, real world knowledge on how to work best with municipalities.

In the November 1st class, the students had a workshop with Dana Lavoie, an Employment Equity and AODA Officer from the Laurier Diversity and Equity office. A requirement of the students deliverables this year are that the documents are Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) compliant. An example of what this entails is that the text of any documents prepared must be organized in a specific way so that devices like screen readers can access the document. The students not only learned this for their proposals and final deliverables, they also came out with a marketable skill for their CVs.

Preston Town Centre

The students have begun to think about their proposals and the research that they will need to do to help the City of Cambridge meet their needs. To build on this, we took another class field trip to Cambridge on November 8th.

The teams each picked an address along King St. in the community of Preston and started to complete a Heritage Inventory Form for the buildings, which is one of the deliverables asked of them. They got a good idea about the information needed for these as well as the time and effort it will take to complete.

In addition to exploring the streets, the students met at City Hall with April Souwand, the Manager of Policy Planning for Cambridge. She informed them of the current approach that the City takes to add commercial buildings to the heritage register and answered all of the teams’ questions. They only have a few weeks before their proposal presentations, where the representatives from the City of Cambridge will come and give feedback on their ideas. After this visit, the students feel much more prepared to take on this project and are excited to get their ideas to the City.