The Centre of Crisis & Risk Communications values input, guidance, and advice from academic and communications professionals. Our Advisory Board helps shape the future of CCRC, promotes relevance, and informs our consultation practices. We are extremely grateful for the participation and support of our Advisory Board.
Advisory Board
Dr. Vincent Covello
Dr. Covello is the founder and Director of the Center for Risk Communication in New York, NY. He is nationally and internationally recognized trainer, researcher, consultant and expert in crisis, conflict, change and risk communications. He has held numerous positions in academia and government, including Associate Professor of Environmental Sciences and Clinical Medicine at Columbia University. Prior to his joining the faculty at Columbia, Dr. Covello was a senior scientist at the White House Council on Environmental Quality in Washington, D.C., a Study Director at the National Research Council/National Academy of Sciences and the Director of the Risk Assessment Program at the National Science Foundation.
Dr. Covello received his doctorate from Columbia University and his B.A. with honors and M.A. from Cambridge University in England. He is on the editorial board of several journals and is the Past President of the Society for Risk analysis, a professional association with over 2,500 members. Dr. Covello has authored or edited over 25 books and over 75 published articles on risk assessment, management, and communication.
Mr. David DeGagne
Mr. DeGagne was the Executive Director of the Centre for Risk Management, Calgary Alberta, and has worked with many Government, University, First Nations, and Industry clients in Canada, United States, Mexico, and Europe providing services on managing and communicating about public safety and environmental risk.
Mr. DeGagne started his career with the Alberta Energy Resources Conservation Board (ERCB) and later as Vice President Corporate Development for a Calgary based environmental engineering company. Over his working life he focused primarily in the areas of stakeholder consultation, public safety, environmental protection, acoustical engineering, and risk management and has published over three dozen technical papers in these areas.
Mr. DeGagne holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Environmental Sciences and a Diploma in Hydrocarbon Engineering Technology from the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology.
The Centre for Crisis & Risk Communication is extremely grateful to Mr. Degagne for the dedication he has demonstrated to the work of Dr. Vincent Covello and the Center for Risk Communication. We are humbled to carry on his legacy.
Mr. David DeGagne
Mr. DeGagne was the Executive Director of the Centre for Risk Management, Calgary Alberta, and has worked with many Government, University, First Nations, and Industry clients in Canada, United States, Mexico, and Europe providing services on managing and communicating about public safety and environmental risk.
Mr. DeGagne started his career with the Alberta Energy Resources Conservation Board (ERCB) and later as Vice President Corporate Development for a Calgary based environmental engineering company. Over his working life he focused primarily in the areas of stakeholder consultation, public safety, environmental protection, acoustical engineering, and risk management and has published over three dozen technical papers in these areas.
Mr. DeGagne holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Environmental Sciences and a Diploma in Hydrocarbon Engineering Technology from the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology.
The Centre for Crisis & Risk Communication is extremely grateful to Mr. Degagne for the dedication he has demonstrated to the work of Dr. Vincent Covello and the Center for Risk Communication. We are humbled to carry on his legacy.
Dr. Peter Ryan
Peter completed both his BA and MA at the University of Alberta, before moving to Toronto to accept a Rogers PhD Fellowship in the joint Ryerson/York Universities’ Communication and Culture Programme. While completing his PhD, he taught for the Department of Politics and Public Administration at Ryerson for five years until 2010. He then moved to MacEwan University in Edmonton to work as an instructional designer in their eLearning Office, while also teaching for their Department of Communication.
His research interests include Canadian political communication, government public relations, digital research methods, and social media issues management. His co-authored research with Patrice Dutil earned the J.E. Hodgetts’ award from the Institute of Public Administration (IPAC) for article of the year in 2013, and an innovative collaborative online project with CBC News’ Susan Ormiston Online and Greg Elmer’s Infoscape Research Lab earned the “Best Cross Platform Project” Gemini Award for their coverage of the 2008 Canadian federal election (note: the Gemini Awards are now known as the “Canada Screen Awards”, since 2013). You can follow Peter on Twitter @prnetworks. In Fall 2016, Peter began teaching Financial Public Relations, Government Public Relations and Issues Management, Risk and Crisis Communication.
Dr. Chaseten Remillard
Chaseten Remillard is a communications scholar interested in questions of social and environmental justice. With expertise in visual and professional communications, Remillard’s research includes topics as varied as homelessness, Canadian artist Bill Reid, hockey art, the Alberta Oil Sands, and shark films. Despite this eclecticism, he consistently interrogates how images gain and transmit meaning and how these meanings serve to reinforce particular “ways of seeing” ourselves and the world around us. Currently, Remillard is completing a book on the visual communication of homelessness in the Canadian press. He is happily married to his wife Tanya and is a proud father of three.
Remillard teaches communications at Royal Roads University, University of Calgary and Mount Royal University. He was nominated for a University of Calgary teaching award in 2009. He has also instructed at international colleges in India and Costa Rica, as well as designed and ran a conflict resolution course in Montenegro. He and his wife have started a small communications consultancy, which specializes at coaching applicants into professional medical programs.
Remillard earned a joint honours BA in History and English Literature from McGill University, and subsequently completed his MA and PhD in Communications Studies at the University of Calgary. For both graduate degrees, Remillard was the recipient of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Canadian Graduate Scholarship and was a nominee for the Governor General’s Academic Gold Medal Award.
Dr. Chaseten Remillard
Chaseten Remillard is a communications scholar interested in questions of social and environmental justice. With expertise in visual and professional communications, Remillard’s research includes topics as varied as homelessness, Canadian artist Bill Reid, hockey art, the Alberta Oil Sands, and shark films. Despite this eclecticism, he consistently interrogates how images gain and transmit meaning and how these meanings serve to reinforce particular “ways of seeing” ourselves and the world around us. Currently, Remillard is completing a book on the visual communication of homelessness in the Canadian press. He is happily married to his wife Tanya and is a proud father of three.
Remillard teaches communications at Royal Roads University, University of Calgary and Mount Royal University. He was nominated for a University of Calgary teaching award in 2009. He has also instructed at international colleges in India and Costa Rica, as well as designed and ran a conflict resolution course in Montenegro. He and his wife have started a small communications consultancy, which specializes at coaching applicants into professional medical programs.
Remillard earned a joint honours BA in History and English Literature from McGill University, and subsequently completed his MA and PhD in Communications Studies at the University of Calgary. For both graduate degrees, Remillard was the recipient of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Canadian Graduate Scholarship and was a nominee for the Governor General’s Academic Gold Medal Award.