Waterloo Daily Bulletin, October 17, 2011

'Mining tunnel' links science buildings

by Joanna Magee, faculty of science

The tunnel between the Earth Sciences and Chemistry building and the Centre for Environmental and Information Technology should be reopening shortly after construction on an interactive mining tunnel.

With the donation of mucking carts from Cobalt, Ontario, and suitable space in the Earth Sciences Museum layout, there was an opportunity to develop an educational simulation mining tunnel with the theme “Exploration, Extraction, and Remediation: the Life Cycle of a Mine.”

“The Museum is enhancing our current programming to encourage, educate and engage youth on the importance of sustainable mining techniques,” said Peter Russell, curator for the Earth Sciences Museum. “The new addition will bring the feel and mood of mining from the Precambrian Shield to Southwestern Ontario, allowing visitors to feel like they are in a historic mining tunnel.” The tunnel will also include information on the history of Ontario’s mining industry, new mineral specimens, and interactive computer modules.

The tunnel project has been made possible by Waterloo alumni and friends whose donations have supported this initiative. (Photo: John Motz, a Waterloo graduate and volunteer with the Earth Sciences Museum, shows off the project.)

“The Museum relies solely on financial contributions and personal donations,” said Rosie Triebner, senior development officer for the science faculty. “The mining tunnel is the Museum’s most ambitious project to date, and it is remarkable how strong our alumni and friends feel about the Museum’s role in getting kids excited about science.”

The tunnel will be showcased at an Earth Sciences Alumni Reunion in mid-October and will also be open to the public during Science Open House on October 29.

Details of Waterloo's ranking from Times

Numbers provided by the university itself — lots of them — are the raw material for international rankings, says Jennifer Kieffer of the institutional analysis and planning office, reporting on last week’s Times Higher Education World University Rankings for 2011.

THE put Waterloo (as well as the University of Western Ontario) in a “201-225” grouping, just behind its top 200 universities around the world. Caltech was at the very top of the list, followed by Harvard and Stanford; Toronto placed 19th.

In 2011, THE requested data from our 2008/09 fiscal year,” Kieffer says in a memo summing up the exercise. She cites some of the data provided by IAP: “total FTE of academic staff”, 1,237.8 (“includes College Faculty, excludes Researchers”); total FTE student enrolment, 25,424.7; undergraduate student intake, 5,995.3; bachelor’s degrees awarded, 4,750; PhDs awarded, 214; total institutional income, $753,968,000.

Last year, she notes, THE only published a ranking of the top 200 universities, “but this year they decided to publish complete rankings on the top 200 and to group the next 200 institutions into ranking groupings. Last year Waterloo did not make the list of the top 200 ranked institutions.”

The top 200 includes nine Canadian universities this year: Toronto, UBC (in 22nd place), McGill, McMaster, Alberta, Montréal, Queen’s, Victoria, and Ottawa.

Says Kieffer: “The THE ranking consists of 12 indicators which are grouped into five categories. We won’t have data on our performance of the 12 indicators until we receive our profile from THE, but we were able to see our performance on the five categories relative to our Canadian peers.” They are “teaching — the learning environment”; “research — volume, income and reputation”; “citations — research influence”; “industry income — innovation”; and “international outlook — staff and students”. Toronto came highest in Canada on the first three categories, McMaster was highest in industry income and innovation, and British Columbia is shown leading the country in international outlook.

THE also publishes discipline-specific rankings which are to be released over the next six weeks, starting with Engineering & Technology, which was due out at the end of last week. Arts and Humanities, Clinical, Pre-clinical & Health, Life Sciences, Physical Sciences, and Social Sciences will follow.

Senate will hear statistics and brain talk

The university senate holds its monthly meeting this afternoon (3:30, Needles Hall room 3001) and will get a briefing from president Feridun Hamdullahpur about the newest "Annual Performance Indicators" report for the university. The performance indicators document, now in its seventh year, is prepared by the institutional analysis and planning office, and provides 100-plus pages of data on everything from enrolment and the number of faculty and staff to PhD completion rates, research income, and square footage.

Hamdullahpur, who chairs the senate, will touch on other topics in his monthly report as well, likely including the "mid-cycle review" of the Sixth Decade plan that's now in progress, and will answer questions from senators.

Provost Geoff McBoyle will report as well, and ask senate to approve the list of students who are slated to receive degrees and diplomas at next weekend's Convocation.

Committee reports on the senate agenda this month are mostly routine, and include an academic review of the graduate program in religious studies, offered jointly by Waterloo and Wilfrid Laurier University, plus undergraduate program reviews on computational mathematics, drama and speech communication, English, history, the sexuality, marriage and family studies program, environment and resource studies, and sociology and legal studies.

Senate will get a briefing on plans for the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, the big national gathering of researchers in those fields, scheduled to be held at Waterloo and Laurier in late May and early June next year.

And in the second in a new series of briefings by prominent researchers on campus, senate will hear from Rich Hughson of the kinesiology department, who holds the Schlegel Research Chair in Vascular Aging and Brain Health.

CAR

Monday, October 17, 2011

'Mining tunnel' links science buildings

Details of Waterloo's ranking from Times

Senate will hear statistics and brain talk

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