Daily Bulletin, Wednesday, September 21, 1994

PROVOST'S MEMO:  Here's the full text of the memo sent out by the
provost, Jim Kalbfleisch, earlier this week, on the subject of university
funding in Ontario:
     
     In November, 1993, the Minister of Education and Training asked the
     OCUA to review the current funding mechanism for universities in the
     province.  Following consultations with universities, faculty, student,
     staff, community, business and other groups in the first half of 1994,
     the OCUA issued a discussion paper in early August -- "Sustaining
     Quality in Changing Times - Funding Ontario Universities". The Gazette
     of September 7 & 14, 1994 highlighted aspects of the report. The OCUA
     offered newsprint copies of the report and asked that we make copies of
     the discussion paper available to every full-time and part-time faculty
     and staff member. Rather than ask for more than 4,000 copies, we opted
     for making the document available electronically on UWinfo, setting up
     a mechanism for communication about the document, and making a limited
     number of copies of the newsprint form available on request.
     
     The outcome of the funding review is of critical importance to UW and
     parts of the discussion paper greatly concern us. I ask that you read
     the discussion paper and send your comments to us as we prepare a
     university response. The University of Waterloo will be meeting with
     the OCUA on October 13, 1994 to discuss our response. Since we have to
     submit our response by September 29th, we invite your comments before
     September 26th.
     
     The discussion paper has been divided into chapters and made available
     on UWinfo in the section under DAILY BULLETIN. Copies of the complete
     discussion paper can be obtained by printing the postscript document
     discuss.ps found in UWinfo. Newsprint copies of the complete document
     are available on request from Operations Analysis.
     
     You can send your comments to Bob Truman, Director of Operations
     Analysis, Needles Hall (truman@provost-admin).  A Listserve has been
     set up for this discussion. To subscribe to the listserve, send a note
     to LISTSERV@DCS1.UWATERLOO.CA with no subject line but the first and
     only line of text of the note should read as follows: SUBSCRIBE
     OCUAFUND .
     
     At any time, you can send an e-mail note to OCUAFUND and your comments
     will be sent to all subscribers. You do NOT have to subscribe if you
     only want to send comments, but you must subscribe if you wish to see
     everybody else's comments.
     
STAFF POLICY:  An open meeting is to be held at 12 noon today (Needles
Hall room 3001) about the proposed changes to UW Policy 18.  The front page
of today's Gazette has a detailed report on what's proposed: a change in
how staff members would be handled if jobs are to be eliminated.  The
current arrangement is for a period of notice -- from a month to a year,
depending on length of service -- during which the staff member gets
"preferential treatment" in hiring for other UW jobs that come open.  But
these days not a lot of jobs are coming open, and the staff relations
committee has proposed a change.  A staff member whose job was being
eliminated would leave within a month, and receive termination pay based
on the same calculation of length of service.  Add in the "severance pay"
required by law, and the total could be as much as 18 months' pay in a
lump sum.

BLOOD PRESSURE screening is being offered to staff and faculty members
as part of a research project in the health studies and gerontology
department.  Flyers are going across campus today, inviting people to sign
up for a test October 18, 19 or 21.  The project (headed by Roy Cameron)
is looking for people with blood pressure "in the high end of the normal
range", who will then be invited to take part in the project, possibly
receiving a $100 honorarium at the end.  Next week's Gazette will have
more about the project, which is an extension of a study already going on
with selected employees of two big Kitchener-Waterloo companies.

CONGRATULATIONS to the the athletics department's athletes of the week --
oh, sorry: the "McGinnis Front Row Sports Bar and Grill Athletes of the
Week", as sponsored by the new incarnation of a popular restaurant just
across the railway tracks from campus.

This week's winners are Rachelle Brohman of the field hockey Athenas
and Marc Blake of the soccer Warriors.  Both teams play this week; see
Jennifer McCormick's sports report in today's Gazette for details.

Chris Redmond
Information and Public Affairs, University of Waterloo
888-4567 ext. 3004      credmond@watserv1.uwaterloo.ca