Program Instructors

Bob Sass is the Director of the Labour Studies Program and a professor in the Department of Industrial Relations and Organizational Behaviour in the Edwards School of Business. He has a Masters of Science Degree specializing in labour law and collective bargaining. In the 1960s, Bob was active in the U.S. trade union movement in the areas of organization, negotiations, education and research. He came to Canada in 1969 to teach at the University of Saskatchewan, Regina Campus, and in 1973 he was appointed Consultant and Chief Conciliation Officer and, later, Assistant Deputy Minister. From the time of his dual appointment in January 1974 to mid-1982, he was Saskatchewan’s Associate Deputy Minister of Labour and the Director of the Occupational Health and Safety Branch. He presently teaches labour law, occupational health and safety and industrial relations.

Kurt Wetzel is a professor in the Department of Industrial Relations and Organizational Behaviour in the Edwards School of Business. He has a PhD in industrial relations and a BA and MA in history. Kurt has acted as an arbitrator and as a consultant to government, labour and management, and is a member of the executive of the faculty union. He has run a number of conferences and workshops for labour and management practitioners in the province and has conducted a number of studies on union-management relations in Saskatchewan and abroad. Kurt teaches collective bargaining and labour history.

Louise Clarke is an associate professor in the Department of Industrial Relations and Organizational Behaviour in the Edwards School of Business. She has a Masters degree in Environmental Studies and a PhD in Administrative Studies and a PhD in Administrative Studies from York University. Louise worked for several years as a consultant in the area of social housing, including the running of workshops and preparation of manuals for co-operative housing groups. She has done research on partnerships between labour, business and government for community economic development, technological change and workplace relations. Louise teaches organizational behaviour and Canadian and international industrial relations.

Michael Murphy is the Saskatchewan Animator for the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace (CCODP). He has worked in the area of international development for over thirty years, including eight years in Africa with CUSO, fifteen years with OXFAM-Canada and eight years with Development and Peace. He has visited some thirty countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, the Americas and the Caribbean. Michael is on the Executive of his union, the CSN-affiliated Union of Employees of Development and Peace. Prior to that he was active in CUPE and in international solidarity work.

Isobel Findlay is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Management and Marketing in the Edwards School of Business and a Scholar of the Centre for the Study of Co-operatives. After degrees in language and literature (M.A., Aberdeen and M.A. Saskatchewan), she completed an interdisciplinary PhD (McGill) on the working-class Chartist movement, industrialization, and the history of professionalization. While working at Oxford University Press, she also gained experience as a union organizer and secretary. Research and teaching interests include: inter-cultural communications; identities and institutions; economy, society, culture; co-operative membership and social cohesion; globalization, technology, and diversity issues in the workplace; and law and culture.