Hi Scott. If you're teaching at Vanier, you may be fortunate enough to have my niece in one of your classes! She's an awesome young woman, if I do say so myself.
I have no suggestions for crossing over the 40 safely, but if you go to the STM website, you can figure out where the 17 bus connects with the 16, and create a route accordingly. I'd take Decarie Boulevard from NDG till about Wal-Mart (Jean Talon) anyway, because of the pedestrian underpass, so you can avoid the tracks.