![[University of Waterloo]](/goldbar.gif)
| Yesterday |
Thursday, November 6, 2003
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Editor: Chris Redmond credmond@uwaterloo.ca |
![[A girl and a boy]](/images/2003/1106asyou.gif)
In character
as Phebe and Silvius are Kara Harun and Jeff de Schiffert. They'll hit the
Theatre of the Arts stage November 12-15 in the drama department's production
of "As You Like It" -- tickets at the Humanities box office.
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WatITis is a "conference to promote collaboration among IT staff at Waterloo", says a release from the organizers, headed by Ian Howard and Martin Timmerman of the information systems and technology department.
IST is the biggest concentration of computing people at UW, but by no means the only one. The organizing committee already represents 12 departments across campus, and they're estimating that as many as 350 people could attend the December 2 event.
Says their release: "There is not a shortage of brilliant minds or interesting projects in information technology (IT) at the University of Waterloo; this fact is well known in the global IT community. Opportunities to share this work among people working on technology at Waterloo are however, not so abundant. To address this need a group of IT staff from 12 different departments have borrowed an idea from the University of Toronto. Following U of T's lead, this group has organized a one day conference to promote collaboration in IT.
"UW boasts 200 to 300 staff with some role in supporting information technology on campus. These staff are challenged by similar problems, though often work independent to their counterparts across campus. The Waterloo Information Technology and Information Systems Conference, or 'WatITis', will bring them together for one day to discuss common techniques and approaches to these problems."
Timmerman adds that the event "will also allow us to put faces to usernames, something that otherwise can take many years."
According to a schedule posted on the web, WatITis -- to be held in Rod Coutts Hall -- will offer sessions that address end-user, infrastructure and academic computing issues. Two notable sessions from the 15 sessions offered are "Batten down the Hatches: approaches to securing workstations and servers on today's internet", and "Classroom Technologies Evaluated: information about technologies used in UW's classrooms and labs".
There is no conference fee for staff, faculty and students involved in IT on campus. Registration is on the web, and organizers are encouraging those interested to register early, "as capacity is limited."
Two UW teams will participate Saturday at the East Central North America regional competition of the ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest. The East Central competition is hosted concurrently at four sites; Waterloo's teams will travel to Sheridan College in Oakville to participate.
Both UW teams will compete in a field of 128 teams from 71 universities, including Toronto, McMaster, Carnegie Mellon and Case Western Reserve. Two or three top teams from the regional competition will advance to the ACM World Finals, to be held March 28 through April 1 in Prague, Czech Republic. The ACM contest is sponsored by IBM.
Each of UW's teams has three members. Waterloo Black comprises first-year students Ralph Furmaniak (pure mathematics and computer science) and Matei Zaharia (computer science), and graduate student Lars Hellsten (computer science). Waterloo Gold consists of undergraduates Tor Myklebust (pure mathematics), Jonathan Lee (pure mathematics and computer science), and William Slofstra (computer science).
UW has a strong reputation to defend at the ACM contest, taking the North American Championship four times and the World Championship twice. UW teams have qualified for World Finals in each of the last 11 years.
"In practice, this year's teams have performed as well as any," said CS professor Gordon Cormack, coach of the two teams. "I'm confident that they'll both put in a strong performance and cautiously optimistic that one will prevail. Nevertheless, we expect tough competition. The general public expectation that Waterloo will advance is tough to meet."
The student teams are challenged to complete six or more "real-world" computer programming problems. The problems are drawn from high school and college mathematics and computing, as well as from everyday knowledge and problem solving. The students rely on their programming skills and creativity during the five-hour battle of logic, strategy and mental endurance. Students attempt to solve complex problems using C, C++ or Java compilers.
He writes: "Funded by a personal grant from Jim Balsillie (of RIM) matched by the federal Ministry of Finance, CIGI has nearly $60 million in endowment to bring the world's top international scholars to Waterloo. In a world whose security and prosperity are threatened by ethnocentrism and misunderstanding, there is a huge potential payoff to research into governance systems -- systems seen to be fair and mutually beneficial.
![[Barrels in front]](/images/2003/1106seagram.gif)
The Centre for International Governance Innovation makes its home in the former Seagram Museum building on Erb Street |
"The investment in the governance centre is a monumental contribution to human well-being. The local impact will be immediate: graduate students and post-doctoral researchers will interact with international scholars at the site of the former Seagram Museum. Over the decades to come, you are sure to see news of an impressive number of important contributions from the centre.
"Waterloo has a distinctive advantage as a place to study governance. Effective international governance takes account of values, and in this regard CIGI will operate constructively with a new and unique PhD program in Religious Studies emphasizing religious diversity and effective communication. The centre will be an asset to the School of Accounting and to virtually every department."
The front-page story in the fall issue of the newsletter, Arts and Letters, tells more about CIGI, describing it as "a cutting-edge think tank that addresses the need for an institution to study the character and desired reforms of the system of multilateral governance, particularly within the economic and financial area. Its purpose is also to raise Canadian domestic capacity to create a research institute of international significance, and to strengthen the intellectual resources supporting public policy in Canada."
John English of UW's department of history -- a former Member of Parliament for Kitchener -- is CIGI's executive director, and political science professor Andrew Cooper is associate director. Says Cooper: "We are confident that the research work we are planning at CIGI will be highly regarded and influential. By focusing not only on the problems but the solutions with respect to specific areas of global affairs, CIGI will become an attractive site for both established and promising practitioners and scholars."
At the official opening of the centre, UW president David Johnston was one of the speakers. "The Centre for International Governance Innovation," he said, "will be a research centre of prominence, and will aim to understand and explain the world's process of economic change -- a crucial factor in Canada's future prosperity. CIGI will allow Canada to make great strides in the understanding and evolution of the international economic and financial systems." He adds, "This centre will bring together scholars, international experts, and students. Together, they will work to improve multilateral governance systems, and they will shape policy dialogue on the international stage."
![[Jamieson]](/images/2003/1106jamieson.gif)
Roberta Jamieson (right),
chief of the Six Nations of the
Grand River Territory, will give the
Canadian Studies fall lecture tonight at 7:30 in the Humanities Theatre.
Her title: "The Future of Aboriginal Communities in Canada".
Jamieson, a Mohawk from the reserve southeast of Brantford, was
elected chief two years ago and is the first woman ever to head
Canada's most populous reserve.
Previously, for 10 years, she served as Ontario's ombudsman and was
earlier Commissioner of the Indian Commission of Ontario; she is a
member of the Order of Canada.
Her talk is the periodic Stanley Knowles Lecture, sponsored by St. Paul's
United College, and also the highlight of the current Native studies
lecture series. Admission is free and no tickets are required.
Earlier today, Eyal de Lara of the University of Toronto will be speaking at 10:00 (Davis Centre room 1304) on "System Support for Application Adaptation". He explains: "The need for applications to adapt to the limited and variable resources, such as bandwidth and power, that characterize mobile environments is well established. . . . I will introduce Component-Based Adaptation, a novel approach that supports powerful adaptation policies without requiring modifications to the application's source code." The talk is sponsored by the local IEEE Communications Society.
In an event this morning at Renison College, "An announcement will be made of a financial gift from BMO -- Bank of Montreal to Renison College's capital campaign. John Crossley, Renison Principal, said the gift will 'provide significant benefits' to the students at the college." The ceremony is scheduled for 11:00 in Renison's "link lounge".
An intense two-day non-credit course, offered by UW "in partnership with Franklin Covey Canada Ltd.", runs today and tomorrow for people who have -- or whose employers have -- the $997-plus-tax fee. It's one of five continuing education courses being offered this fall in cooperation with Franklin Covey, "the global leader in effectiveness training, productivity tools, and assessment services for organizations and individuals". Topic for today and tomorrow: "The Roles of a Leader: Based on Principle-Centred Leadership". On November 28, a one-day course is scheduled, under the title "Presentation Advantage" ("learn to present with confidence and credibility").
Municipal candidates are still showing up for the brown-bag sessions sponsored by the Environmental Studies Society (11:30 to 1:00 in the ES I coffee shop). Guests today are Ken Seiling, seeking re-election as chair of Waterloo Region, and Mike Kerrigan, UW student running for Waterloo city council.
The career services workshop series today presents "Letter Writing" at 3:30 and "Resumé Writing" at 4:30.
Marilyn Griffith of UW's biology department will speak this afternoon on "How Plants Survive Winter", giving an overview of the research that recently won her a Killam Fellowship. Her talk is one in the Interdisciplinary Coffee Talk Society series ("insight into some important or fascinating topic in terms understandable to those from other fields and yet on a high level"). It starts at 5:00 at the Graduate House.
![[Karray]](http://www.systems.uwaterloo.ca/Faculty/images/karray.gif)
Fakhri
Karray (left) of the systems design engineering department is
among ten
Canadian scientists invited by the American National Academy of Sciences to
take part in its annual
"Frontiers of
Science" symposium, which opens today
in Irvine, California. About 100 people are at the event "to learn about
research at the cutting edge of other disciplines while building new ties
between future leaders of the nation's scientific enterprise". Participants
are selected from "young researchers (under 45) who have made significant
contributions to science".
Looking ahead: tomorrow morning brings a talk in the tourism lecture series, "Towards More Sustainable Ecotourism" by David Weaver of George Mason University. He'll speak at 9:30 a.m. in Environmental Studies I room 132.
And tomorrow night, John Toews, former president of Conrad Grebel University College, comes back to give Grebel's annual Benjamin Eby Lecture, at 7 p.m. in the college chapel. He'll speak on "Toward a Biblical Theology of Leadership Affirmation: Rethinking Ordination".
CAR