December 2, 2002

Monday, December 2, 2002

New building will open December 16
'Longest serving prof' has retired
Some notes as classes wind down

Editor:
Chris Redmond
credmond@uwaterloo.ca

International Day for the Abolition of Slavery

[Trees and grass still green]
The new building under construction in September, as seen from the top of the Dana Porter Library. South Campus Hall is at left.

New building will open December 16

The long-awaited co-operative education and career services building is going to be called -- wait for it -- Co-operative Education & Career Services.

At least, that's the temporary label. "The official name of the new building has not yet been announced," a memo from the CECS department notes. It does say the opening ceremonies for the building will be next spring -- on Wednesday, May 8. Details are to come.

But the department, and the thousands of co-op students who use its services, will be in the building a lot sooner than that. Moving day from the department's current home in Needles Hall is to be Saturday, December 14, and the department "will be open for business, but on a much reduced basis", in the new building on Monday, December 16.

The building code for the new building -- at least for now -- will be CEC, says the memo, issued by Olaf Naese of the CECS department. Phone extensions for staff in CECS will not change.

Naese notes that CECS staff "will be using the remaining December business days to become familiar with the new building and learning how to use it. We will likely not be prepared to handle a lot of interested visitors just quite yet." Public tours are planned in January, he said.

[Roe]

'Longest serving prof' has retired

This week's Gazette featured a full-page interview with systems design engineering professor Peter Roe (left), who retired October 1 and who believes he may be UW's longest-serving faculty member, if you count the teaching he did as a graduate student 43 years ago.

Says writer Bob Whitton: "Roe joined the university September 15, 1959, after completing an undergraduate engineering physics degree at the University of Toronto. He came to Waterloo to enter a master's program in engineering, and taught and studied in the first building on campus -- the chemical engineering and chemistry building, now known as the Douglas Wright Engineering Building."

The interview includes Roe's recollection of life in Waterloo's early, muddy days, when Dearborn Street -- now University Avenue -- stopped at the railway track. "Things were hectic, but the student body kept doubling each year."

In 1960 Roe received his master's degree, becoming UW's fifth alumnus. He completed his doctoral work two years later to become the first PhD in the university's history. He was appointed assistant professor in UW's electrical engineering department immediately after finishing his PhD, becoming one of 45 engineering faculty members. (At last count, there are 179 now.)

An early objective was to make UW a leader in computing, and Roe became a member of the committee, led by the late Wes Graham, that purchased the first computer, an IBM 610.

"The decision to focus on computers, along with the co-op system, were what attracted people to Waterloo from the outset, and this resulted in very rapid growth," Roe says. "We not only had strength in digital computers, we also, for a short time, had one of the largest analog computers in the country. This made it possible for engineering to emphasize fundamental research."

Soon Roe became interested in engineering design, "another field in which we pretty well lead the country today, and perhaps the whole of North America", he adds. In the early 1960s, planning began for the enormously popular Expo 67 world's fair in Montréal, and UW's team of engineering designers designed many of the theme buildings. The work earned some money for the university, and led to the formation of a department of design, which in 1968 became systems design engineering. It also led to the formation of the school of architecture, originally part of engineering and now in the faculty of environmental studies.

Roe became a full professor four years after completing his doctorate, and an associate dean by the late 1970s. In that position, he played a leading role in the development of a pioneering local area (computer) network, or LAN. The initial network was named Watstar, becoming a highly successful local area network; it was followed by Polaris and now Nexus.

In recent years Roe has served as the director of UW's engineering (student) exchange programs.

Though retired, he still has one PhD student, and is still writing research papers. (He has published more than 100, as well as three books.) He says he plans to continue teaching on a sessional basis.

Some notes as classes wind down

The fall term is just about over -- tomorrow's the last day of classes, and exams begin Friday (with some biggies such as Math 117). Other things are also ending for this term and this year. The basketball Warriors, for instance, have played their last game of 2002. Saturday afternoon, they suffered a close loss to Guelph 73-71, leaving their overall records at 9-8, with a 2-6 record in OUA league play. They'll be in action next January 3-5 at Dalhousie.

"With all the buzz around the release of the Romanow Commission's report on the future of health care in Canada," writes Paul McDonald of the department of health studies and gerontology department, "there is a UW connection. John Hirdes and I provided the Commission with extensive consultations with respect to home care and disease prevention/health promotion. We were two of approximately 40 people who provided special advice to Mr. Romanow."

And speaking of the Romanow report, the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada says it's "pleased that, in recommending a new and increased federal transfer for health care, the Romanow report also stresses the need to ensure that postsecondary education receive sufficient funding. The report points out that deficits in health care funding should not be addressed at the expense of postsecondary education, and recognizes that investments that improve the level of education and reduce income disparities 'can often have a significant long-term impact on the health of the population, thereby ultimately reducing health care costs.'"

The information systems and technology department (IST) is offering three computing courses in December to UW faculty, grad students, and staff with instructional responsibilities: Lecturing with PowerPoint, Concept Mapping with Cmap, and Using the Campus e-Classrooms. Information about the courses, along with a registration form, can be found on the web.

Here's a reminder, before people leave campus at term's end, that nominations will be collected in the winter for the annual Distinguished Teacher Awards and the award for Distinguished Teaching by a Registered Student. If you've experienced an out-of-the-ordinary professor, lecturer or teaching assistant, now could be the time to prepare a nomination. Details can be found on the teaching resource office web site.

The executive committee of UW's senate will meet today -- 3:30 p.m., Needles Hall room 3004 -- to prepare the agenda for this month's meeting of the full senate. The December senate meeting often gets cancelled, but not this year, when the torrent of business just doesn't stop. Major items coming along for this month include the recent review of the library, the latest version of UW's "innovation" plan, the report of the task force on female faculty recruitment, and whatever's new about finances and government relations.

A second round of presentations from "Greening the Campus" teams (students from Environment and Resource Studies 250) is scheduled for tomorrow morning in Arts Lecture Hall room 116. Topics, to be aired between 9:30 and 11:30, include "green building materials", the proposed bus pass, the West Nile virus, back yard composting, and recycling.

Vietnamese cuisine is featured at lunch and dinner time today through Thursday at Bon Appetit in the Davis Centre. . . . The fine arts department's miniature art sale continues today and tomorrow, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., in East Campus Hall. . . . Instrumental chamber ensembles from UW's music department will perform tonight at 7:00 in the Conrad Grebel University College chapel (admission is free). . . .

Gas will be shut off in Engineering III for half an hour tomorrow morning, starting at 7 a.m. . . . The faculty association will hold its fall general meeting Wednesday at 2 p.m. in Math and Computer room 2066. . . . The annual noontime concert in the Davis Centre great hall is scheduled for Thursday. . . . Historian Ken McLaughlin will speak Friday night (7:30, Siegfried Hall) about the new history of St. Jerome's University of which he's co-author. . . . The traditional noon-hour carolling in Modern Languages is set for Thursday, December 12. . . .

CAR

TODAY IN UW HISTORY
December 2, 1968: The Church College Road is closed as a through street, to make separate driveways for St. Jerome's and Renison at the north, Conrad Grebel and St. Paul's at the south.