The last day of exams for this term will be Friday, April 21 (there's no such day as Friday, April 12).
The UW libraries will be open -- though with no service -- on Good Friday. To be specific, Dana Porter will be open from 11:30 a.m. to 6 p.m., and the Davis Centre from 11:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. We had said they'd be closed. (Saturday and Sunday, the libraries are open for their regular hours.)
Mathematics and engineering convocation will take place on Saturday, May 27 (there's no such day as Saturday, May 26).
Apologies for hitting so many wrong keys, and missing on so many brain cells.
A LONG WEEKEND draws nigh. Tomorrow is Good Friday and a holiday: UW offices and most services will be closed (but the libraries open, without circulation or reference service). Graphics Express, usually open on the weekends, will be closed Friday through Sunday, and so will the Graduate House.
The Customer Support Centre in the department of computing services will be closed Friday, but open on Saturday and Sunday (9 a.m. to 8 p.m.). If you notice an outage of the campus computer network or any major DCS computing facility during the weekend, you can report it by telephone to 888-4839; failures with major impact will be repaired during the weekend if possible.
UW police will be on duty as usual over the weekend, and can be reached at 888-4911 (that's 4911 from UW extension phones). Maintenance emergencies can be reported, 24 hours a day, to ext. 3793.
As Christians observe the gloom of Good Friday and the glory of Easter, there will be services at a couple of the church colleges. At St. Jerome's College, Roman Catholic services are at 1 and 3 p.m. Friday, 8 p.m. Saturday, 9:30 and 11:30 a.m. Sunday. At Renison College, Anglican services are at 10:30 a.m. Friday, 7 p.m. Saturday, 10:30 a.m. Sunday.
Passover also comes this weekend; Jews around the world celebrate the escape out of Egypt and into freedom. As far as I know, there will be no seder meal on campus, no singing of "Dayenu" here; most Jewish students will head to homes and families for the occasion.
Nor do I know of any on-campus activities marking the Sikh and Hindu festival of Vaisakhi, which also begins tomorrow.
LEAVING TOWN: The architecture school's "New Grand Tour", a two-week tour of the cities and buildings of Italy, led by Rick Haldenby, takes off tomorrow for Rome. It's Venice on Saturday, and then Verona, Mantova and so on. Back to Waterloo on April 28.
Heading in the opposite direction are UW's president, James Downey, and vice-president (university relations), Roger Downer. On Saturday they leave for a two-week trip to Japan, Hong Kong and Malaysia, returning May 1. "In each country," Downey told UW's board of governors the other day, "we will be meeting with government and business leaders to inform them about the University of Waterloo, to identify the strengths of our teaching and research programs and to indicate our interest in working with them. We will also be attending alumni dinners or receptions in each country."
THE COMMISSION on Institutional Planning has announced creation of two new working groups:
One on "quality of life for faculty, staff and students", chaired by Peter Naus of St. Jerome's College.
One on "governance and decision processes", chaired by Ken McLaughlin, also of St. Jerome's.
I'll have more about their terms of reference in the Bulletin some time next week, since the Gazette won't be appearing again until May 3, but in the meantime information is available on UWinfo -- at least the Web version of UWinfo, which will soon be the only version of UWinfo.
SEMINAR AT WLU: Wilfrid Laurier University today hosts a public seminar on municipal affairs, "Education and the New Economy". Its organizer is Richard Christy, who has the two hats of sociology professor at WLU and mayor of Kitchener. The day-long event, in the Paul Martin Centre, is open to the public at no charge.
Chris Redmond
Information and Public Affairs, University of Waterloo
(519) 888-4567 ext. 3004
credmond@watserv1.uwaterloo.ca