Daily Bulletin

University of Waterloo -- Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

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Friday, October 25, 1996

Yankees win; protest shuts TTC

And those are the big news headlines of the day, except in the cyberworld, where people are still talking about the hundreds of thousands of e-mail messages that went out early this week advertising child pornography. The FBI is investigating, and the whole thing begins to look like a hoax -- one that startled and offended the people (including many at UW) who received the XXX messages.

Tomorrow is convocation day

UW's 73rd convocation tomorrow will mark the graduation of 1,253 students, as well as awarding three honorary degrees. Ceremonies begin at 10 a.m. in the Physical Activities Complex for 409 undergraduates and 189 graduate students in applied health sciences and arts, and at 2 p.m. for 429 undergrads and 226 grads in engineering, environmental studies, independent studies, mathematics and science.

Some convocation highlights:

"Honorary members of the university" distinctions to Lynn Watt and Sister Leon White in the morning, J. W. G. Sloan and Florence Thomlison in the afternoon.
A Distinguished Teacher Award to Bruce Mitchell of the geography department.
"Distinguished professor emeritus" status to John Brzozowski (computer science), Mircea Cohn (civil engineering), Ron Mullin (combinatorics and optimization), and Ken O'Driscoll (chemical engineering).
The James D. Leslie Prize for top academic achievement in the distance education program will go to Valarie Jane Wallace, of Englehart, Ontario, who earned a general BA in psychology.
Winners of the Alumni Gold Medals for academic excellence are: Paul Rusnock, PhD in philosophy, and Kevin Levy, master of science in systems design engineering.

At the morning ceremony, UW will present a Doctor of Laws degree to Dorothy Duncan, a former museums adviser for the Ontario government and executive director of the Ontario Historical Society. Duncan will address convocation. As well, Thomas Pashby, a practising ophthalmologist who treats eye injuries of professional hockey players, will receive a Doctor of Science degree. In the afternoon, Ivan Kuscer, the foremost theoretical physicist in Slovenia, will receive a Doctor of Science. He will address convocation.

Science faculty invites visitors

Here's how the UW news bureau is describing tomorrow's other big event:

Picture Yourself as a Scientist is the theme of this year's University of Waterloo Science Open House on Saturday (Oct. 26) from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. The annual open house is an opportunity for primary school children and their families to experience science for a few hours. Hands-on chemistry experiments include turning copper into gold, making nylon and manipulating the atoms of aspirin on the computer screen. Children can win a T-shirt with their color photo taken as they work as a scientist. The Chemistry Magic Show, with colors, smoke and other delights, explodes at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. . . .
"Children can be a paleontologist in the Earth Science Museum, visit the dinosaurs, dig for shark's teeth and pick up the paleo game ZOIC where you only need 500-million points to win," says curator Peter Russell. . . . Visitors can drop by the UW greenhouse to view tropical palms and hibiscus, or take part in the aeronautical design of a space pop bottle and watch it fly.
"Oh, by the way, watch for Prof. Howard Helium who was last seen wandering aimlessly through the halls," Russell says. . . .
Hungry? Members of the Science Society will be cooking hot dogs and serving soft drinks while visitors instantly whip up their own microcrystalline ice cream for dessert.

Programmers head for Indiana

Two UW student teams will be competing this weekend in the regional round of the world's largest computer programming competition. Six computer science students will be testing their skills against other teams from Canada and the United States in the Association for Computer Machinery's East Central Regional Programming Contest, to be held tomorrow at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana.

On the Waterloo A team, members are Chris Hendrie, Nikita Borisov, and Carl Gonsalves (with Ondrej Lhotak as the alternate). On the Waterloo B team, members are Viet-Trung Luu, Derek Kisman and Wai Min Yee (with Michael Van Biesbrouck as the alternate). Team coach Gordon Cormack, a professor of computer science, said: "Waterloo is sending two strong teams to Notre Dame, either of which is capable of winning or placing second, as required to proceed to the 1997 finals in San Jose."

He said: "Interest in the competition has increased in the last few years, at Waterloo and elsewhere. We expect tough competition from other universities in the region, including Notre Dame, Toronto, Carnegie Mellon, and many others." In 1994, UW's team won the world championship. Last year, UW was 3rd, and 10th in 1995.

The teams will have to solve six to eight programming problems in a period of five hours. The team with the most questions solved in the least amount of time wins. Results can be monitored live via the World Wide Web at http://www.cse.nd.edu/contest/.

Course listing is available

The "course offerings list" for the spring term is now available on the Web, the registrar's office has announced. It can be found through UWinfo -- look under "Courses, calendars and examinations" -- or directly at http://www.adm.uwaterloo.ca/infosche/.

What's happening, what's not

The teaching resource office sponsors a workshop on "Issues in Grading", aimed at teaching assistants, at 2:30 today in Engineering I room 3516. Information: ext. 3132.

Michael A. Fahey, theology professor at St. Michael's College of the University of Toronto, speaks tonight at St. Jerome's College (7:30 p.m., Siegfried Hall). His topic: "Whither the Catholic Church? Pre-Millennial Dreams".

"The Tamburitzans", a company based at Duquesne University that performs Eastern European folk music and dance, performs tonight in the Humanities Theatre. Tickets are $15 (students and seniors $12) from the Humanities box office. Cancelled, however, is the performance that was scheduled for tomorrow night in Humanities, the Desrosiers Dance Theatre.

Being payday, it's pub night at the University Club, with "Blue Stew" performing (and brown stew. a.k.a. beef stroganoff, being eaten).

Conrad Grebel College holds Family Day on Sunday, with an art display, a 3:30 worship service, a buffet supper, "and mini-concerts at 4:30 and 5:30 p.m."

Sports this weekend: the football Warriors at York University tomorrow afternoon, if the Days of Action in Toronto don't interfere; the basketball Athenas in a tournament at Western; the basketball Warriors at Ottawa; the men's and women's cross-country teams at the league finals at Queen's University; the field hockey Athenas in the league finals in Toronto; the hockey Warriors at Western tonight and Windsor on Sunday afternoon; the rugby Warriors in the league semi-finals tomorrow (sorry, don't know where); the soccer Athenas at Queen's for league finals, and the soccer Warriors in the division semi-finals at an undisclosed location; the squash Warriors opening their season with a tournament at McMaster; the swimmers, of both sexes, in competition at Queen's, McGill and Ottawa; the tennis Athenas and Warriors at York for their finals; the volleyball Athenas and Warriors at the Queen's Invitational.

CAR

Editor of the Daily Bulletin: Chris Redmond
Information and Public Affairs, University of Waterloo
credmond@watserv1.uwaterloo.ca -- (519) 888-4567 ext. 3004
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Copyright 1996 University of Waterloo