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It’s a high school experience like no other — Welcome to Oasis Skateboard Factory in Toronto, Canada where students make, design, and sell custom boards for real clients all while receiving high school credits. 

This alternative school flips the script on what it means to learn and teach in high school, removing artificial boundaries between “school” and “the outside world”. Themes of equity, access, and cultivating community connections are explored. Guest and teacher, Lauren Hortie, shares how she and her colleagues work to cultivate an environment of experimentation and risk taking, helping to sabotage self-sabotage. If you’re an educator, listen in, but this conversation is also for students and anyone who works in education systems of any kind. 

A quick disclaimer: the opinions and ideas expressed are solely that of this alternative school, Oasis Skateboard Factory, and not necessarily reflective or representative of the TDSB as a whole.

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Today’s guest is registered psychotherapist and author, Kate Robson, exploring her new book, Something to Hold Onto: Simple Images, Metaphors, and Practical Tools to Transform Your Life.

Her book is an incredible resource where she shares her ideas about complex human problems through a therapeutic lens to help make challenging moments a little less challenging. You’ll hear about the power of metaphor, through metaphors, to get out of thought ruts. We explore ideas including: failure, happiness, metal flexibility, choice, avoidance, teamwork, identity, creativity, and connection. It’s deep, it’s gentle, it’s eye, mind and heart opening.

This episode is co-hosted by Diana’s friend and colleague, Donna Cormier.

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From the middle ages to the Middle East, From Futura to Freight, join us on a journey across the type universe and go where no designer has gone before...Welcome to An Incomplete History of Type (Part 6!)

This episode is guest hosted by Jordan Grey.

Name: Clarendon

Release Date: 1845

Designer: Robert Besley

Classification: Slab Serif (Egyptian)

Owned By: Today its multiple versions are owned by multiple foundries.

Claim to Fame: This is the first first-ever registered and patented typeface.

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From the middle ages to the Middle East, From Futura to Freight, join us on a journey across the type universe and go where no designer has gone before...Welcome to An Incomplete History of Type (Part 6!)

This episode is guest hosted by Sheilae Siagian.

Name: San Francisco

Release Date: 2014

Designer: Apple’s Team (based on Helvetica and FF DIN)

Classification: Neo-Grotesque Sans Serif

Owned By: Apple

Claim to Fame: This is the first new typeface designed by Apple in nearly 20 years, it’s the UI font for Apple’s software.

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From the middle ages to the Middle East, From Futura to Freight, join us on a journey across the type universe and go where no designer has gone before...Welcome to An Incomplete History of Type (Part 6!)

This episode is guest hosted by Sol Riquero.

Name: Verdana

Release Date: 1996

Designer: Matthew Carter and Thomas Rickner

Classification: Humanist Sans Serif

Owned By: Microsoft

Claim to Fame: A typeface that was designed not for print, but for the screen, changing the way digital text looked and felt.

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From the middle ages to the Middle East, From Futura to Freight, join us on a journey across the type universe and go where no designer has gone before...Welcome to An Incomplete History of Type (Part 6!)

This episode is guest hosted by Lilly Clements.

Name: Garamond

Release Date: Mid 16th Century

Designer: Claude Garamond

Classification: Old Style Serif Typeface

Owned By: Not owned by one single person, but digital variations are owned by multiple different companies: Adobe Garamond, Monotype Garamond, Stempel Garamond, and EB Garamond

Claim to Fame: Garamond is the most legible text typeface for publishing for centuries. 

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From the middle ages to the Middle East, From Futura to Freight, join us on a journey across the type universe and go where no designer has gone before...Welcome to An Incomplete History of Type (Part 6!)

This episode is guest hosted by Emma Pereira.

Name: Calibri

Release Date: 2007

Designer: Lucas de Groot

Classification: Sans Serif

Owned By: Microsoft Corporation

Claim to Fame: Calibri made history by dethroning Times New Roman as the default font of the MS Office Suite.

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Meet our guest, Marci Stepak, who grew up using Toronto public libraries in the late 1970s and early 80s. In this conversation, you’ll hear about Marci’s journey, walking 300 km to visit all 100 Toronto Public Library branches on foot over 10 days. She’s calling it Every Library TO and the walk starts today, April 7, 2026. This walk is both a tribute to her Mom (today marks 1 year of her passing) and also to raise to raise funds for the Toronto Public Library Foundation.

You’ll hear a beautiful story of love, grief, and why libraries are more necessary than ever in an age of disconnection, loneliness, and algorithmic filter bubbles designed to reinforce existing beliefs. You’ll hear about the magic of curiosity while engaging in a library environment and why the library might become your new favourite hub for dating. This episode has something for every book and library lover.

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Lights! Microphone! Podcast -- Episode 6

How do you wrap up a massive, semester-long creative project? Join Instructor Diana, alongside student hosts Shana and Alex, for the MDM class's final reflection and listening party. This episode is a behind-the-scenes look at the creative journey, covering everything the students learned about audience, structure, and distribution while launching their first podcasts.

The conversation explores powerful themes of accountability and class citizenship, celebrating the collective energy and responsibility the students brought to the course. It highlights the real-world utility of their projects, noting the successful strategies and cross-promotion opportunities between different student shows like Big Bets and The Client Said What. If you've ever managed a collaborative project from concept to completion, this episode offers a motivating and honest look at the moment when all the creative, technical, and marketing pieces finally come together.

Created inside a podcasting special topics course (DG 8010: MDM Podcast Lab) within the Master of Digital Media program at The Creative School at Toronto Metropolitan University, this six-part series explores what it really takes to start and grow a podcast. 

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Lights! Microphone! Podcast -- Episode 5

What happens when your audience demands a language shift? Multilingual creator Winnie Liao joins host Alex to discuss the reality of launching a content project outside the default English market. Winnie shares the unexpected journey of her show, which started in Mandarin in Taiwan and quickly grew into a bilingual platform driven by listeners who wanted to learn English.

Winnie reveals the core lessons learned from her background in acting and comedy: success in podcasting requires authenticity, patience, and a willingness to be imperfect. She explains why being a "live wire" and simply being yourself on the mic is more effective than trying to adhere to a rigid structure. The conversation covers how she navigated the shift from corporate content creation to successful entrepreneurship, leveraging her show as a self-promotion tool that attracts new opportunities in Canada and beyond.

Created inside a podcasting special topics course (DG 8010: MDM Podcast Lab) within the Master of Digital Media program at The Creative School at Toronto Metropolitan University, this six-part series explores what it really takes to start and grow a podcast. 

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Lights! Microphone! Podcast -- Episode 4

Are you optimizing your podcast for the right platforms? Jordan Blair, Podcast Producer at Buzzsprout, breaks down the current reality of podcast growth. Jordan explains why you must stop treating platforms like TikTok or Instagram and start treating them like libraries. You will learn the single most important rule for discoverability: use keyword-rich show and episode titles for SEO, or risk not being found at all.

This episode is packed with practical tips, including how to use the Episode Consumption graph to pinpoint audience drop-off and fix consistency issues. Jordan confirms that listener support (donations and subscriptions) is the only monetization strategy that provides reliable, constant revenue, unlike volatile ad income. He also debunks the myth that asking for ratings and reviews helps your show grow. Learn the true mechanics of growth and how to avoid the "burnout" and "insecurity wall" that stops most podcasts before episode ten.

Created inside a podcasting special topics course (DG 8010: MDM Podcast Lab) within the Master of Digital Media program at The Creative School at Toronto Metropolitan University, this six-part series explores what it really takes to start and grow a podcast. 

I'm all about interesting projects with interesting people!
Let's Connect on the web or via Instagram. :)