Daily Bulletin

Friday, December 5, 1997

Fourteen still not forgotten

The events of that Wednesday afternoon were mourned across Canada. The flag at the main entrance to UW was lowered as part of the national grief, and a memorial service was held in Federation Hall. Eight years later, the grief is still felt, and the incident is the focus for strong feelings about violence, feminism, gun control, tragedy and evil.

Today's memorial service at UW will start at 5:30 in Siegfried Hall, St. Jerome's College, and is jointly organized by the Federation of Students, the women's centre and the Engineering Society. "We will light candles in memory of the women," says Heather Calder of the Federation, "and hear reflections on the Massacre from members of the UW community. . . . We encourage all members of the student body, staff and faculty to attend."

Elsewhere, the anniversary is the occasion for such observations as "the second annual Candlelight Vigil Across the Internet".

Most of those killed were engineering students, and the day has also become an opportunity to note the progress of women in becoming accepted in a field where once they were almost nonexistent. The Canadian Council of Professional Engineers, which keeps statistics on engineering enrolment across Canada, says the percentage of women students in the country's 33 schools of engineering has been going up steadily for the past decade. In 1989, the year of the Massacre, women made up 13.0 per cent of all engineering students (4,276 out of 32,817). In 1996, women made up 18.9 per cent (7,909 out of 41,746). Figures for 1997 are expected shortly from the CCPE's human resources committee, which is currently chaired by the UW dean of engineering, David Burns.

A 1996 task force reporting to the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council had this to say:

In some countries women make up a high proportion of the science and engineering community. In Canada the proportion of women physical scientists and engineers has historically been low. However, participation by women has been increasing in recent years. In the Sciences, women now make up approximately half of the entering undergraduate classes, although women are better represented in the biological and health sciences than in the physical or applied sciences. . . .

In 1988, the average enrolment of women in engineering undergraduate programs, across Canada, was around 12%. The enrolments in 1994-95 were just under 20% for first year students, and 18.2% overall. The number of women graduate students has also increased dramatically in the same period, with 19.4% in 1994-95 enrolments in Master's programs and 10.4% at the doctoral level, up from under 10% and 5% respectively. The number of women faculty remains low: an average of 4.6% in two-thirds of engineering schools and faculties and none in the remaining third. . . .

Although the rise in enrolments is encouraging, examples in other countries and in Canada warn us that the rate of participation of women may reach a plateau or may even decrease in the future, unless we continue to remove obstacles, not only to their recruitment, but also to their retention and satisfaction in such non-traditional careers.

Press launches two poetry books

The new books are lamentations by Charlene Diehl-Jones, a member of the English faculty at St. Jerome's, and The Weight of Wings by April Bulmer, a writer living in Cambridge. Copies of the books will be for sale, but all are invited to attend "just for the pleasure of hearing readings from these splendid new books", says St. Jerome's librarian Gary Draper, publisher and editor for Trout Lily. "These books live up to the astonishing reputation for high class writing and bookmaking associated with the name 'Trout Lily'," he says. "They fulfill our motto -- 'Meeting the poetry chapbook needs of Perth County and Waterloo Region since 1996'."

Books already published by Trout Lily include Dead Letters, poems by Tom Eadie; You Are Here, stories by Linda Kenyon; and Ledger Domain: An Anthology for Robert Kroetsch.

And, as fall term exams begin

The 58th William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition will be held tomorrow. At UW, all registered undergraduate students are eligible to write the exam (except anybody who's already taken it four times). "Students who did not register can register on the day of the competition provided that extra exam envelopes are available," says local organizer Chris Small of the statistics department. The Putnam exam will be offered from 9:45 to 1 p.m. tomorrow ("A session") and from 2:45 to 6:00 ("B session") in Math and Computer room 4021.

Canadian Union of Public Employees local 793 will hold its Christmas dance on Saturday evening in South Campus Hall.

The staff association holds its Winterfest event on Sunday from 2 to 5 p.m. at the Columbia Icefield, and I understand that Santa and his elves will be putting in an appearance.

The talk of the campus

The St. Jerome's College student union is still accepting "loonie and toonie donations" for its participation in the Angel Tree toy drive. Contributions can be dropped off in the student union office or at the Spirit Shop in the college -- but today's the deadline.

The Globe and Mail says in its headline story this morning that the federal government's Millennium Fund for scholarships, announced early this fall, is likely to be even bigger than was expected. The Globe, quoting "sources" in Ottawa, says the fund could be as big as $3 billion to $4 billion and could be a "sinking fund" to be used up over ten years, capital as well as interest, meaning that hundreds of millions of dollars a year could be spent on scholarships.

The staff association is looking for three members for its nominating committee -- the group that helps choose staff representatives for committees across campus. Anyone interested can submit an application (by December 12) to Mark Walker in the biology department; he's at mwalker@sciborg and can provide more information.

CAR

December 6, 1980: The department of recreation and leisure studies begins its move to the Administrative Services Building (not yet renamed Matthews Hall), after years of exile from campus at 415 Phillip Street.

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