Ever wanted to try snow-shoes, cross-country skiing or winter fat-tire biking? You can try these activities for free with colleagues or friends during UM Winter Active. You may also want to join one or both of two winter walks at Fort Garry and Bannatyne campuses.

On Thursday, Feb. 9, plan to attend Winter-palooza at the Duckworth Quad, where you and friends or co-workers can nibble cookies and sip hot chocolate around the cozy fire pit and skate on the new rink, or sign out snow-shoes, all with music by UMFM, UM’s campus and community radio station.

Get a free ticket to cheer on the UM Bisons men’s hockey and volleyball teams as they compete in games on Feb. 10 and 11. (See more information below.)

Most UM Winter Active activities are drop-in, but RSVPs are encouraged (info below). Please note that staff should participate during their lunch hour as much as possible, confirming permission for any additional time with supervisors.

UM Winter Active is co-sponsored by the Office of the Vice-President (Administration), the Faculty of Kinesiology and Recreation Management and the Office of Sustainability, and UMSU.

Enjoy the season of snow with activities for UM community members

Peruse the full schedule of UM Winter Active events below and plan to participate in one or more activities. Please RSVP for UM Winter Active events here; drop-ins welcome on a first-come, first-serve basis.

Bannatyne students and staff can take a free shuttle to Fort Garry campus. Watch for pick up times and location to follow. By bus, 36 Northwest Super Express Transit Route is another quick ride of approximately 25 minutes to the Fort Garry campus.

The week coincides with the annual, province-wide Jack Frost Challenge from Feb. 5-11, celebrating outdoor winter activities. The challenge is to gather teams of one to five friends, co-workers or family members to complete 130 collective kilometres of outdoor activities such as walking, running, skiing, snowshoeing, skating and cycling.

Pull together a team to enter the Jack Frost Challenge using the additional information below.

UM Winter Active activities schedule

Monday, Feb. 6 to Friday, Feb. 10

Please RSVP for UM Winter Active events here; drop-ins welcome on a first-come, first-serve basis.

Please note that participation in the advertised activities is at your own risk.

Winter walk (Fort Garry)

Monday, Feb. 6, noon to 1 p.m.

Join fellow students, staff and faculty for a winter walk, and explore some hidden gems in and around Fort Garry campus. Meet outside of University Centre along Chancellor’s Circle. RSVP for events here; drop-ins welcome.

Ride a fat-tire bike

Tuesday, Feb. 7, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Sign out a fat-tire bike or winter-ready bike for a 15-minute ride around campus. Helmets are strongly encouraged and will be available along with the bikes outside of University Centre. RSVP for events here and sign up for a 15-minute time slot; first-come, first-serve drop-ins welcome.

Try cross-country skiing

Wednesday, Feb. 8, 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.

Bring your own skis or sign out a pair from the Winnipeg Trails Association’s Ski Lending Library, available for free on campus, to ski the trails through Southwood Lands. The ski trails and equipment library are located at the east end of Markham Road. RSVP for events here; drop-ins welcome.

Winter-palooza (Duckworth Quad)

Thursday, Feb. 9, 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.

Bring your skates to the Duckworth Quad, sign out some snowshoes, enjoy cookies and hot chocolate courtesy of UMSU around the fire pit to celebrate winter UM-style at this multi-activity event. To add to the celebratory vibe, UMFM, UM’s community radio station, will provide music! RSVP for events here; drop-ins welcome.

Winter Walk (Bannatyne)

Friday, Feb. 10, noon to 1 p.m.

Join fellow students, staff and faculty for a winter walk exploring Bannatyne campus and the surrounding area. Please note: Participants must pre-register for this event. 

Bisons Men’s Hockey and Volleyball games

Friday, Feb. 10 and Saturday, Feb. 11

Access game day tickets here: https://gobisons.ca/sports/2021/8/31/tickets

Use the promo code ‘UMWINTER’ on the review page to receive 1 free ticket.

• Bisons men’s hockey game vs Alberta Golden Bears
• Friday, Feb. 10 at 7 p.m. at the Wayne Fleming Arena, Fort Garry campus
• Bisons men’s volleyball games vs Fraser Valley Cascades
• Friday, Feb. 10 at 6 p.m., Investors Group Athletic Centre, Fort Garry campus
• Saturday, Feb. 11 at 5 p.m., Investors Group Athletic Centre, Fort Garry campus

Sign up for the Jack Frost Challenge, attend a UM Winter Active event with teammates to log kilometres

The annual, province-wide Jack Frost Challenge from Feb. 5-11 celebrates outdoor winter activities and encourages all Manitobans to get active outdoors and enjoy our wonderful winters.

Every year, Manitobans gather and register teams of one to five friends, co-workers or family members to take up the challenge and complete 130 collective kilometres, including walking, running, skiing, snowshoeing, skating and cycling.

Register your team and win prizes!

Register your team, log your kilometres and enter to win local prizes courtesy of the Jack Frost Challenge.

But wait — there’s more.

UM participants can add “UM” at the start of their team names for a chance to be entered to win UM prizes. (Example: “UM-team name”)

Register your team today.

We are excited to announce Terry MacLeod, the former host of the CBC’s Information Radio of Winnipeg, as the main host of the podcast. Terry, as the ‘voice of the community’, will render the podcast more accessible to a wider audience. His journalistic expertise will also contribute deeply in the programming and production of the episodes.

UMFM 101.5, the official campus and community radio station of the University of Manitoba, will collaborate in the distribution of the podcast. PDL’s weekly episodes will be featured through one of the regular programs of UMFM. Prairie Design Lab, performing as one of the main channels to platform the lecture series at the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Manitoba (Cultural Events) during the pandemic, will cover a range of conversations centered around design and ideas. It will aim to connect the regional (and the school’s) interests with the broader community and to reflect on the issues while conversing with the experts and audiences within the larger/global context. 

Prairie Design Lab is supported by the Endowment Fund of the Faculty of Architecture University of Manitoba, the Partner’s Program, and the student and faculty volunteers and is available on Spotify and Apple iTunes.

Third Thursdays, a new monthly event from 101.5 UMFM, will provide an insider’s view into permanent art collections, current exhibitions and works in progress from various campus groups.

This month, the Gallery of Student Art (GoSA) will be hosting a reception for their current exhibition; the School of Art Gallery will have tours of the current exhibition; the Manitoban will be showing folks what it takes to make a paper – from storyboard to print; the ceramics club will open doors to their studio; and UMFM will be offering What It Takes to Make Great Radio workshops.

“Third Thursdays gives those who are not involved in the campus arts community a way to access the top quality work being done on campus,” said Sara Wray Enns, UMFM marketing coordinator. “It makes the art, music and performances more accessible. My hope is that it will provide a richer understanding of what the U of M has to offer and provide a deeper sense of campus community.”

Wray Enns says the idea for Third Thursdays came partly from an experience while in Los Angeles.

“The Museum of Contemporary Art’s gift shop had a set of Marcel Dzama art cards,” said Wray Enns. “Marcel Dzama is a U of M graduate, and is a well-known contemporary artist in the global community. This doesn’t get talked about enough. The art in the collections across campus is inspiring. The music is exciting. At UMFM, we produce almost two live sessions a week of local and touring artists. We have Grammy winners coming out of the U of M. When you’re in the know these things don’t surprise you, and I want more people to be in the know.”

Wray Enns says getting to hear what the rest of the creative community is up to is what fuels them to provide an event like this.
“There’s nothing like sitting in a room full of people excited about the arts and sharing ideas. It’s getting me really excited about the project, and the potential it has to grow,” said Wray Enns.

UMFM encourages anyone who wants to be involved with Third Thursdays to contact them at sara@umfm.com.

Maps will be available on their site to show you where Third Thursday events are taking place each month.

Since hitting the airwaves in 1998, UMFM has provided a diverse range of music and talk programming to Winnipeg, with a specific focus of serving the students here at the University of Manitoba. Though our sound has evolved over these past two decades, at its core UMFM has consistently provided our listeners a forum for music and voices that may otherwise go unheard.

From day one, UMFM has been an extremely strong supporter of all student interests across campus.  Students from all corners of the campus have programmed shows spanning many different genres, and a significant number have gone on to work in media using skills that they developed right here at UMFM.  The station has run thousands of public service announcements for student groups on campus; advertising everything from bake sales and career fairs to promoting important student rallies, exam schedules and opt-out dates.  Over the last few years, a number of  the U of M’s notable faculties including Aboriginal Studies, Nursing, City Planning, Environmental Science and Music have all utilized UMFM’s vast production facilities to help enhance their coursework through the use of field recording, sound editing and musical & audio production.  We are also the home of Bison Sports, proudly broadcasting football games for more than 17 years, men’s and women’s hockey games for over a decade, as well as producing weekly programming that proudly spotlights the success of student athletes.  Finally our state of the art recording studio has become a favorite of students from the Faculty of Music, and student musicians at large here on campus – we provide free recording time for any students looking to produce recordings!

Why are we asking you for this increase?

While UMFM has been able to operate successfully on a shoestring operating budget for almost 20 years we are at a point where we want to grow on the already impressive foundation that has been built.  The three motivating factors why we are pursuing a referendum campaign in the upcoming election are as follows:

1. We haven’t seen an increase in funding since our fee was introduced back in 1996.  Based on the rate of inflation as per the consumer price index, this means our funding is now worth 72 per cent of its original value!  In the 18 years that UMFM has been on the air, the cost of running the station has steadily increased to the point where it’s now almost doubled. UMFM has the lowest student levy of any campus station in the province and is the bottom 10 per cent of stations across the country.  Approving our increase of $1.50 per term puts us where would have already been if the fee had been indexed to the CPI back in 1998 and guarantees a measure of financial security that ensures UMFM will continue to grow and thrive for many years to come.

2. We need to replace our transmitter.  Though the situation has not yet reached critical status yet, our broadcast tower is 18 years into its 20 year lifespan.  The number of repairs that have been done to the existing equipment increases each year and we want to be proactive in our approach to this situation.  We also want to increase our broadcast range by up to five times its current power, which means that all of the great programming originating at our campus would be heard further than ever before!

3. We want to increase our staffing.  By adding new part-time staff positions to further coordinate our team of volunteers and enhance our marketing efforts, we’ll be creating more great opportunities for students that will translate into the development of lifelong skills and will expand the capacity of UMFM’s reach here on our campus!  Producing top quality, student focused content has always been our aim and with this small increase in fees we’ll also be able to continue to enhance our online presence, delivering UMFM to students in the mobile, on-demand fashion that they crave!

UMFM understands that U of M students are constantly being barraged with increases to their fees and we certainly don’t want to be perceived as yet another group asking for a handout.  However we feel that the station has an established history as a valued service here on campus, and while we realize that a $1.50 fee increase per term may not be a huge difference for each individual student (it’s less than a cup of coffee per semester!), it gives UMFM a major opportunity to improve the quality of our services and our programming. Now more than ever there is a need for independent, alternative media forms and UMFM is already here providing diverse local content produced by members of our campus community.  It is our hope that students understand that even if you aren’t a regular listener of UMFM, chances are you or someone you know has seen a positive impact from the station – maybe it’s even time that you got involved yourself. Together we can build a stronger station that is a voice for students at the University of Manitoba for years to come!

Advance poll runs on Feb. 25 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at University Centre. Regular voting in referendum runs March 2, March 3 and March 4