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Daily Bulletin
University of Waterloo | Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
Coming to the end of 2000
In the lane, snow is glist'ning, and we're just hours away from the long
Christmas and New Year's break that will close UW until
the new
millennium. Today -- thanks to the December 12 snow closing --
is the last day for fall term exams, and
the last day of work for staff this year. Then most people are
away until the winter term begins.
Of course "away" doesn't necessarily mean "not
working". Faculty members, in particular, will likely spend some of
the next few days marking papers and exams -- fall term marks are
due to the registrar's office on Tuesday, January 2. Marks
will be mailed to students the week of January 15 (or will be
available for pickup that week, for students who are back on campus
in the winter term).
Today's a normal business day on campus, except where it's not.
Some offices and services have already closed down, and others will
put up the shutters in the course of today. The research office,
for one, will close for lunch at 11:45 and not reopen today.
The libraries will be open (both Dana Porter and the Davis
Centre) until 7:00 this evening, the moment
the last exam begins, although circulation services will end at 6 p.m.
The residences are still open, and the Village I cafeteria will stay
in operation until 2:30 Saturday afternoon. Otherwise,
only a few food services outlets are open today.
Pastry Plus in Needles Hall and
Browsers in the Dana Porter Library will be open until
11:00. And Brubakers in the Student Life Centre, Tim Horton's in the
Davis Centre and Bookends in South Campus Hall will stay open until 2 p.m.
The Physical Activities Complex is open until 4 p.m. today, then
closed until the new year. And the Columbia Icefield is closed
already, except for recreational skating today (11:30 to 1:00) and
tomorrow (11:00 to 1:00).
Custodial staff, who usually work evenings or night shifts, will
begin today's shift at 4 p.m. and wind up at midnight.
UW closes until January 2
The winter term
Although the university reopens on January 2, the first day of classes
for the winter term will be Wednesday, January 3.
Class schedules for the winter term were being mailed up to the beginning
of this week. More recent schedules can be picked up (today, or starting
January 2) -- mostly in the registrar's office, except for students in
engineering, optometry, Renison or St. Jerome's, who get their documents
closer to home. Fee receipts and validation stickers are also available
for pickup if they didn't come by mail.
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And so we leave the campus to the few people who live here 366 days
a year, the essential staff who will be on duty over the break, and
visitors for various special events:
UW police will be on duty 24 hours a day throughout the
Christmas and New Year's period. The emergency phone number is
888-4911 (on campus, that's ext. 4911).
During the break, staff will be on duty in the central plant, and
emergency maintenance requests can be called in to ext. 3793. Snow
removal from December 22 through January 1 will be limited: "grounds
staff will respond to serious snow issues," the plant operations department
says, especially to clear priority areas such as the ring road.
The Student Life Centre (phone 888-4434) will be open 24 hours a
day as usual throughout the holiday. The turnkey desk can provide
not just coffee and hot chocolate but bus tickets, stamps, "some food",
lots of information and even sometimes an emergency pillow. Parking is
available between the SLC and the Physical Activities Complex, and it's
the door at the PAC end of the SLC that's sure to be open.
All parking lots, except lot D under Needles Hall and the
ECEC lot at the PAS building, will be open and free throughout the
holiday period. Gates to service roads will be kept closed during the
holiday break.
If you notice an outage of the campus network or any major
IST-maintained computing facility, you can leave a voice message with the
Information Systems and Technology Helpdesk at 888-4357 or send e-mail
to request@ist.uwaterloo.ca. Both will be checked daily.
The telephone switchboard will close at 4:30 tonight and reopen on
January 2. While it's closed, as always, it's possible to direct-dial to
UW extensions through the "automated attendant" at 888-4567.
Scheduled construction projects on campus during the break include
renovations to labs on the third floor of Math and Computer, in the kitchen
area of
South Campus Hall and in the Commissary building; air ventilation work on
the fourth floor of Psychology; carpet installation in Humanities and
Psychology; and, of course, the continuing work to build Mackenzie King
Village. Power and water will be shut down in Ron Eydt Village on
December 27 for electrical work related to the MKV construction.
The chief sports news over the holiday is the
Christmas Shoot-Out
women's basketball tournament. The Warriors will host McMaster,
Bishop's, Saskatchewan, Queen's, Guelph, Brandon, York and Concordia for
games December 28, 29 and 30 in the Physical Activities
Complex. Tickets for each "session", usually two
games, are $7, teens $4, UW students free.
(Waterloo will be playing Concordia at 7 p.m. on the 28th, and
either Brandon or York at 7 p.m. on the 29th; game time on the Sunday
depends on the previous days' results.)
The men's basketball Warriors will host the York Yeomen, also in
the PAC, at 2 p.m. on Sunday, December 31.
There are still some tickets for a black-tie New Year's Eve event at
Federation Hall (for sale today at the Federation of Students office,
or call ext. 4090 for information).
The University Club will be closed after tonight until Monday,
January 8, except for its New Year's Eve party.
Worship services held by the University Catholic Community
continue as usual at St. Jerome's University. A summary schedule:
tomorrow at 5 p.m.; Sunday at 10 a.m., 7 p.m., and midnight; Christmas
morning at 10 a.m.; Saturday, December 30, at 5 p.m.; Sunday,
December 31, at 9:30 and 11:30 a.m.; New Year's Day at 10 a.m.
Renison College will hold an Anglican communion service at
10:30 p.m. Christmas Eve, in St. Bede's chapel. The usual Sunday
morning service will be held (at 10:30) on December 24, but is
cancelled for December 31.
A note about Monday's eclipse
Christmas morning will bring an
eclipse of the sun -- not total, but
enough to be worth looking at carefully.
That's "carefully" meaning "with care", says UW optometry professor
Ralph Chou, a
widely-quoted
expert on eye safety and himself an
amateur astronomer, who expects to be checking out the solar phenomenon
on Monday if he can. "I will probably set up my telescope on my
back deck with a solar filter and camera," says Chou, "and do some
photography if I have a
hole in the clouds."
He says that in southern Ontario the eclipse will begin at
about 10:50 a.m. and end about 2:30 p.m.
"At maximum eclipse around 12:30 p.m.
the moon will cover about 60 per cent of the solar diameter."
Now about the "carefully" part of things: "At
no time during this eclipse," says
Chou, "is it safe to look at the sun without
special
protective filters. These safe filters include shade number 14
welder's filter, special aluminized polyester filters,
and dark polymer filters in 'eclipse glasses'."
An alternative to those precautions: look only indirectly, with
pinhole
projection.
Wise words as we scatter
Some parting advice from the plant operations department:
Heat and
ventilation will be kept at night settings from December 22 through
January 1. Anyone coming to campus during that time can expect to find
cool buildings. It will save additional energy expense if
coffee-makers, computers, office equipment and unused fumehoods are
turned off during the break. And please make very sure all windows are
closed before you leave.
From the safety office:
Shut down all processes vulnerable to failure of utilities. . . . Store
hazardous materials properly and in
containment areas and ensure that containers are
closed or sealed. Shut off compressed gases and gas supply lines to equipment.
Turn off and unplug, where possible, electrical devices such as hot plates,
computers and, if not containing hazardous materials, fumehoods and
environmental chambers. This prevents damage to equipment due to power
surges while reducing energy waste and pollution. Ensure lab contact
information is updated with names, phone numbers and addresses in a
location accessible to emergency response personnel.
And from
the UW police:
Do not leave any personal valuables or smaller
"attractive" items, such as laptop computers, radios and cameras, in the
office or workplaces. These items should be secured in a cabinet or
removed to home for safekeeping over the holidays. . . .
The local police
services will be out in full force with the RIDE program over the
holidays, so if you drink, do not drive.
"Have a joyous holiday season," adds police sergeant Wayne Shortt --
and so say we all.
![[Candle]](/images/2000/1222candle1.gif)
. . . So some of us go now to church,
and some to feast, and some to skis,
and some to bed -- and most of us
to loving friends and families --
though some must study or must work:
a dozen faiths, a thousand ways
to live in harmony with truth
through cold and dark December days.
We pause from labours, when we can,
and hear the season's whispered call
to burn the candles of our lives
for Peace on earth, good will to all.
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The Daily Bulletin will return Tuesday, January 2. Any emergency
announcements before that date will be made through a Flash on the UWinfo
home page. The next Gazette will be published January 3.
CAR
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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