December 3, 2002

Tuesday, December 3, 2002

And another one bites the dust
Winter non-credit courses listed
Staff member chairs agency's board

Editor:
Chris Redmond
credmond@uwaterloo.ca

'A great miracle happened here': it's Chanukah

Students consider village's future
Maryhill is a picturesque village (left) set in a rolling pastoral landscape halfway between Kitchener and Guelph. According to growth projections, it will triple in size by 2040. How might this growth be accommodated without eroding the essential character and picturesque qualities of the village? In September, students from the school of planning, led by professor Karen Hammond, set out to explore this question. Working in small teams, they examined the village's natural and cultural heritage, its current built form, and its social makeup. Based on their analysis and their understanding of "smart growth" principles, they developed nine future scenarios which are depicted in drawings and scale models. They will present their ideas at an open house to be held in the gym at St. Boniface School in Maryhill tonight from 7:00 to 9:00. Everyone is welcome.

And another one bites the dust

No more pencils, no more books, or something like that. It's the last day of classes for the fall term, and exams lie just ahead. . . . Meeting today: the senate research council at 9 a.m. and the senate graduate council at 10 a.m., both in Needles Hall room 3004. . . . The fine arts department's miniature art sale has its final day today, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. in East Campus Hall. . . .

A second round of presentations from "Greening the Campus" teams (students from Environment and Resource Studies 250) is scheduled for this 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.

Waterloo Region will hold a "public input meeting" tonight to talk about the planned extension of Westmount Road across UW's north campus. The project has been on the books for decades, and now is looking imminent. Hence tonight's meeting of the region's planning and works committee, which wants to hear comment on the "preliminary design". The meeting starts at 7 p.m. at the regional administration building, 150 Frederick Street in Kitchener.

Because there's a sizeable number of co-op students who don't have work for the winter term, the co-op and career services department will hold a "job finding support and advice fair" tomorrow, under the title "Mission Possible". It starts with a gathering at 10 a.m. in Rod Coutts Engineering Lecture Hall room 101, "where information about letters of introduction, more about the continuous phase registration form and other instructions for the rest of the day will be given". Then there will be a series of workshops and access to coordinators who can advise on resumés and help "work out a plan of action".

A free composting workshop is scheduled for tomorrow, arranged by waste management office and Waterloo Region. The workshop will run from 2 to 5 p.m. in the Student Life Centre. Anyone who wants to register -- or to order a composter as distributed by the region -- should notify Susanne Klopfer at the Waterloo Public Interest Research Group, susanne@pirg.

Tomorrow will bring the English Language Proficiency Exam, for students who haven't yet met their faculty's language requirement. It'll be written at 7 p.m. in the Physical Activities Complex. "Many faculties now block registration if the ELPE milestone has not been completed by a certain term, so procrastinators should take the time to write the exam," suggests Ann Barrett, manager of the English language proficiency program. And she adds, being strictly accurate: "I often get the complaint that ELPE is inconvenient in December because it is held during exam time. This is not true. Students should know that ELPE is held in the gap between the end of classes and the start of exams."

There will be a one-day blood donor clinic in the Student Life Centre on December 13 -- Friday of next week -- and to make things really easy, Sharron Cairns of Canadian Blood Services will be here this Thursday to book appointments and answer questions. She'll be in the SLC on Thursday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., and from then until the 13th, a sign-up list for donor appointments will be available at the turnkey desk.

A plan for after new year's: get involved in FASS. Auditions for this year's show, to be staged at the end of January, will be held on the evenings of January 8, 9 and 10. I presume the auditions will be on the traditional FASS system, that is, everybody who wants to be in the show gets a role of some kind.

[Fahidy]
Tom Fahidy, faculty member in chemical engineering since 1964, officially retired on December 1. A specialist in engineering mathematics, process control and electrochemical engineering, Fahidy was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in 1997. His writings range from a classic monograph, Principles of Electrochemical Reactor Analysis, to some 200 refereed journal articles -- plus countless letters to the Gazette and other publications.

Winter non-credit courses listed

The winter schedule of non-credit continuing education courses is out, with the usual range of offerings, from homicide to digital cameras.

"Whatever your goals, UW Continuing Education can help you reach them," says a note from Maureen Jones, manager of continuing education, in the blue-and-black calendar listing the coming term's courses. "Education is our business," it says. "Education that works for you is our goal."

There are just a few new courses this time round, including a couple taught by Patsy Marshall, who "has led numerous training programs at UW, WLU and the University of Guelph" and "is currently president of her own training and development company":

"Making the Most of Your Meetings", a one-day session on March 31 for a maximum of 16 people.
"Put Laughter in Your Life", a one-day session on February 10.

Also new for the winter are such courses as "Building Bridges to Understanding" ("helps people unlock the door to productive communications, positive relationships and improved performance") and several online courses, from "Advanced Web Pages" to "Managing Technical Professionals".

The online courses now outnumber the face-to-face sessions. They're mostly in the areas of computing, writing, and management. Each runs for six weeks, with two lessons each week: "Assignments, quizzes, discussion groups and the final exam are all online." The online courses "are offered in partnership" with the American training firm Education To Go Inc.

Face-to-face courses, offered on campus, are taught either by UW staff and faculty or by experts brought in for the purpose. Among the instructors in the winter term are Akiko Maruoka and Fumi Ricketts of Renison College, teaching introductory Japanese, and Brad Miller of the distance education office, teaching the Macromedia Flash animation software.

Several staff from information systems and technology -- Bob Hicks, Glenn Anderson, Stephen Markan and Jan Willwerth -- are listed to teach various computing courses. The program is even using a UW student, Kaye Hope (math and business), to teach the one children's courses offered this term, an introduction to PowerPoint.

UW faculty and students get a 25 per cent discount on fees for the face-to-face courses; staff get a 50 per cent discount. There's no discount on fees for the online courses.

[Architect's drawing]
New space: A 44,000-square-foot addition to Engineering III, to be completed next summer, will provide teaching and lab space for the new mechatronics engineering undergraduate program as well as labs for faculty members' research. The first 100 mechatronics students will start in September 2003. The Giga-to-Nano Electronics group led by electrical and computer engineering professor Arokia Nathan will occupy about a third of the new wing, with a clean room for fabricating microelectronics filling the entire first floor of the addition and smaller testing labs on the second floor. Elsewhere in the addition will be lab space for other researchers, including Farid Golnaraghi, mechanical engineering, who recently was awarded a Canada Research Chair in Mechatronics.

Staff member chairs agency's board -- by Barbara Elve, from the Gazette

When Brent Charette was young, idealistic and a student at St. Jerome's University, he dreamed of changing the world. After he graduated, his focus shifted to building a career -- working for UW's office of development. There, his supervisor suggested Charette could broaden his horizons by using his fundraising skills to help a volunteer agency.

"I enjoy fundraising," says Charette, and Community Justice Initiatives in Kitchener was looking for someone with just his skills. He agreed to join the fundraising committee, and when retired UW dean of arts Robin Banks stepped down as chair of the CJI board, he encouraged Charette to take his place.

[Charette] "I don't have much wisdom at all," he remembers telling Banks at the time. Despite the big shoes he had to fill, Charette (left) is now in his second year as CJI board chair, and feels as if he really is helping to "make the world a better place".

Founded in Kitchener in 1974, CJI puts into practice many of the concepts Charette learned about in his peace and conflict studies courses. The agency's mediation programs -- which attempt to heal the damage between victims and offenders in criminal cases, as well as between neighbours feuding over a backyard fence -- is "built on the Mennonite passion for peace and justice, tolerance, understanding and forgiveness.

"The restorative justice model guides what we do in several programs," he adds, including Providing Alternative Choices for Women, in which CJI volunteers assist federally sentenced women to reintegrate into their communities. Started when the Grand Valley Institution was built in Kitchener, the program gives women support in rebuilding their lives after prison. "Community circles" of CJI volunteers help locate housing and jobs, provide information about community resources, and offer emotional support.

"Most women are in prison as a result of drug or alcohol abuse," explains Charette. "If they go back to the same environment, they're likely to re-offend."

Through the alternative choices program and other CJI services, "you can see direct benefits. It's remarkable. We have hundreds of volunteers, many who were clients. They were so impressed by what we do they became volunteers."

In spite of the success of CJI -- which assists more than 3,500 people each year -- the agency has "directly suffered from government cutbacks", says Charette, and depends increasingly on the support of the community through churches, service clubs and the United Way.

Now at St. Paul's United College as director of development, Charette feels privileged to work in an environment so supportive of his volunteer commitment. UW students also play a key role as volunteers at CJI, with many participating from the Renison College social work program.

CAR

TODAY IN UW HISTORY
December 3, 1958: The Chemistry and Chemical Engineering Building, later to be called Engineering I, is opened by premier Leslie Frost.