Daily Bulletin

Open meetings today The Federation of Students will hold public meetings today and tomorrow to discuss student support for a proposed $25-a-term increase in the co-op fee, to help pay for the planned co-operative education and career services building. Meetings are scheduled for Thursday at 11:30 in Arts Lecture Hall room 113, Thursday at 2:30 in Engineering Lecture room 101, and Friday at 1 p.m. in Davis Centre room 1351. The Feds are also inviting student comment on the issue through an on-line survey.

UW's presence in 'south Waterloo'

"I feel the way the founders must have felt," architecture director Rick Haldenby told the UW senate last month.

University historian Ken McLaughlin is reminding people that civic boosters in Cambridge played a role in the creation of UW in 1957, although it's taken more than four decades for them to see even a fragment of a university amid the limestone of Galt.

The towns of Galt, Preston and Hespeler, later to be united as "Cambridge", were known as "south Waterloo" in the mid-1950s, when Waterloo County business leaders were talking university. It was industrialists from Kitchener and Waterloo, led by Gerry Hagey and Ira Needles, who finally created UW, but business leaders in south Waterloo were exploring a similar idea at the same time, McLaughlin notes in his book Waterloo: The Unconventional Founding of an Unconventional University.

He tells how the south Waterloo group, headed by businessman Percy Hilborn, urged the Ontario government to create a technology institute that would meet the area's needs for skilled manpower. A grant was promised for that project, at the same time Hagey was coaxing money from Queen's Park to set up the "Waterloo College Associate Faculties" in the northern part of Waterloo County. Under Hilborn's leadership, the south Waterloo group agreed to have their funding diverted to Waterloo College instead. It was also Hilborn who introduced Hagey to Les Emery, the pioneer of co-operative education.

"During the Founders Lecture for the 40th anniversary," McLaughlin says now, "we gratefully acknowledged Cambridge's contribution to the creation of the university. Many of our first board members were from Cambridge, as were several of our first students." And UW's current chancellor, Val O'Donovan, is a Cambridge business leader and one of the key figures in the "consortium" that's raising funds to bring the architecture school to Cambridge.

Tonight's signing ceremony is to be held at Cambridge city hall on Dickson Street, with a reception starting at 6 p.m.

Water research network based here -- by Barbara Elve

"The quality and safety of our drinking water is a top priority for Canadians," says Gillham. "Our research will focus on the effects of global climate change, declining water levels, and land use and its impact on Canada's supply of clean water."

With funding of $14.9 million from the federal government for the fiscal years 2000-2001 to 2004-2005, the Canadian Water Network aims to: "ensure Canada's pre-eminent role in the management and sustainable use of water resources; preserve access to clean water; protect the health of Canada's people and ecosystems; and support the Canadian economy."

With the participation of 38 universities, 29 industries and 40 government departments and agencies, CWN will address six research areas: policy and governance, water resource management, drinking water and health, wastewater management, infrastructure, and groundwater and sediment protection.

Also conducting research for the network at UW will be theme leaders Peter Huck (civil engineering) and David Blowes (earth sciences), and project leaders/co-leaders Keith Hipel (systems design engineering), Sherry Schiff (earth sciences), George Dixon (biology), James Barker (earth sciences), Dave Rudolph (earth sciences), Jonathan Sykes (civil engineering), and Ed Sudicky (earth sciences). An additional 20 to 30 faculty members at Waterloo will be involved with CWN projects.

Other networks: UW researchers will also be involved in the other three new Networks of Centres of Excellence announced by industry minister Brian Tobin:

• the Automobile of the 21st Century, $23.1 million, based at the University of Windsor, with UW project leaders Roy Pick, Michael Worswick, and Norman Zhou, along with participants Hugh Kerr, Jan Paul Huissoon, and Fathy Ismail, all of mechanical engineering, and Tod Rutherford (geography);
• the Canadian Language and Literacy Research Network, $14.2 million, based at the University of Western Ontario, with UW participants Bill Bobier (optometry) and Kathleen Bloom (psychology);
• the Stem Cell Genomics and Therapeutics Network, $21.1 million, based at the University of Ottawa, with UW participant Eric Jervis (chemical engineering).

The goal of CLLRNet will be improving language and literacy skills by focusing on children, "so that improvements occur early in life and allow academic, social, economic and personal benefits to accrue over a lifetime."

STEMNet will "explore the social, ethical, legal and policy issues inherent in stem cell research and therapeutics, and develop new therapies for chronic diseases."

The Networks of Centres of Excellence program is jointly administered by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, in conjunction with Industry Canada.

Twinkle, little laptop Students can now access the campus computer network with their laptop in the Twinkle lab, Math and Computer room 2061, says Pat Lafranier of the information systems and technology department. "This lab, which also has Polaris workstations, is open 7 days a week, 24 hours a day. There is no fee for using this facility. The laptop must have an Ethernet card, and the student must have a UWdir userid and password for authentication. Information and instructions can be found in the lab and on the web. This public lab is the first of its kind on campus, but we expect more of these facilities to be available in the future."

Gay film festival opens tonight -- a news release from the Waterloo Public Interest Research Group

"Queer themed movies are certainly screened in area cinemas, but I think this is the first time that numerous films are being screened together, covering a range of issues, and as a mini-festival," says Daryl Novak, a staff person with WPIRG.

The festival will be taking place from Thursday, March 15, to Sunday, March 18, in Davis Centre room 1302, which features raised seating and excellent video and sound quality.

"We picked a range of films that illustrate the diversity within the queer community because it's definitely not homogeneous," quips volunteer Mark Schann. "We chose to describe it as simply 'queer' to include everybody who lives an alternative lifestyle, whether gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered and including open-minded heterosexual."

Themes covered in the festival range from sexual identity and HIV/AIDS to relationships, sex, and coming out, to name just a few. Audiences will recognize some titles like "Boys Don't Cry" starring Hilary Swank, while other titles, like "Chocolate Babies" about an underground band of HIV-positive, queer, urban,transvestite, activists of color in NYC, will be new to local audiences -- but all of the feature films are award-winning. A number of short films will be shown on the Sunday evening. A complete description of the films is available on the WPIRG web site.

Admission to the festival is by donation, with the proceeds going to the Aids Committee of Cambridge-Kitchener-Waterloo Area (ACCKWA).

The event is also in celebration of the 30 year anniversary of Gays and Lesbians of Waterloo (GLOW), a cosponsor of the event, along with the Math Society and Generation X Alternative Video and Media. Festival attendees will receive 2-for-1 movie rental coupons courtesy of Generation X and coupons for free entrance to downtown Kitchener's Club Renaissance on Saturday night. Socializing will also happen Friday night at the Bombshelter "Boys & Boyz and Girls & Grrlz" night and the festival's wine and cheese on Sunday night.

"We're really excited about this first festival and we're already thinking about next year," says Novak. "The Princess Cinema has already offered to be one of our future venues and it looks like we'll have an even bigger event next time."

Notes at the end of winter

Waterloo showed their rust from a 12-day break in the first period while Guelph carried the play perhaps since they had played the night before. The only goal of the period was scored by the Gryphons on a rebound that hopped back to the original shooter's stick. Waterloo picked up the pace in the second period but couldn't convert its chances. Guelph scored on the power play and then added another just before the buzzer sounded. . . . Guelph, whether from fatigue or just attempting to protect the lead, played very cautious in the final period. Waterloo pressed throughout the period and even when killing a penalty were able to generate good scoring chances. Unfortunately they just couldn't beat the Guelph goalie. Finally with 3 minutes remaining, Waterloo turned on the red light with some strong cycling in the offensive end. They continued to press and were able to score a second goal with a man advantage. The Warriors started very slowly but were the best team for the final 40 minutes but missed too many good scoring opportunities.

A seminar is planned for noontime today on "What Watching Coral Reef Fishes Tells Us about Ecology". The speaker is Peter Sale of the University of Windsor, who's here for the 14th annual Great Lakes Research Consortium Seminar Series. His talk will start at 12:30 in the earth sciences museum, Biology I room 370.

Architecture students will get the results of their spring term co-op job matches today -- they'll be posted at 11:00. Students in other programs who were matched with jobs earlier in the week are holding meetings with coordinators and signing their contracts, and those who weren't matched are checking the bulletin boards. "Continuous phase" posting #2 is on the system today.

The Entrepreneurs Association presents a talk by Jim Tobin of Itemus, today at 5:30 in Davis Centre room 1302.

Tomorrow . . . it's the third annual econometrics conference hosted by the Centre for Advanced Studies in Finance, a one-day event in the Davis Centre. Speakers are coming from as far afield as Houston and British Columbia, though Tony Wirjanto and Ranjini Sivakumar of UW are also on the program. All are welcome to register for the conference (phone ext. 5728).

How are you feeling about yourself? Two events in the next few days may be of interest:

• "Self-Esteem and Self-Confidence", a session by Tom Ruttan of counselling services, sponsored by the Women's Association of UW and to be held Friday at 12 noon in Humanities room 373.
• "Stress Management and Relaxation Training", a two-session workshop by Paula Dimeck of applied health sciences, sponsored by the Employee Assistance Program and to be held March 21 and 28 at noon hour. (Reservations go to Johan Reis at health services.)

Advance note: next week brings class enrolment, the process that was formerly called "preregistration". (The Student Information System, being implemented this year, maketh all things new.) The week gives undergraduate students a chance to sign up for fall term courses -- I'll say more about the process in Monday's Bulletin.

Also next week: the drama department's final production of the season, "The Club" by Eve Merriam, March 21-24 in the Theatre of the Arts.

In yesterday's Bulletin I mentioned the availability of a draft revision of Policy 3, about sabbaticals and other leaves of absence for faculty. I even mentioned that comments are invited "this week". To elaborate: "Comments should be directed to John Bullen in the Secretariat not later than March 16," says a memo from the co-chairs of the Faculty Relations Committee.

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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