And then there's the introductory essay by Ann Dowsett Johnston, the magazine's "editor at large" and one of the most powerful people in Canadian higher education, after steering the universities coverage for the past decade. This year she writes about the excitement of undergraduate research, and the life-changing experience for a student of finding the right faculty mentor.

She also talks about the admissions crunch: "This fall, with an increase of more than 50,000 undergraduate students, Canadian universities experienced their biggest year-to-year enrolment increase ever -- for the third year in a row. . . . "Two years ago, experts forecast that the Canadian university system was going to have to accommodate a growth of 200,000 students by 2011. Now, those numbers look extremely conservative: as of this fall, Canadian universities have already absorbed half that growth."

She quotes one university president, not identified: "We've done everything we could to whitewash this thing, that we are maintaining quality -- and that's a bunch of crap." And another, Harvey Weingarten of the University of Calgary: "We're scrambling. And the reality is that we have more and more students each year who are qualified, for whom there is no room -- and not just facilities, but faculty. Let me express a little sympathy for governments. I don't think they anticipated this kind of growth. It's a wonderful headache to have -- but it's a headache nonetheless."

Breakfast tomorrow is at Brubaker's cafeteria in the Student Life Centre, from 8:30 to 10:30. Tony the Tiger (of Kellogg's) and Pounce de Lion (the UW alumni mascot) will both be on hand, and customers can get their pictures taken with Tony, says Jeannie Watt of food services. "We will be handing out some free samples of a power shake that our dietician has designed as a good energy booster," she adds -- oh, and there are $2.49 breakfast specials.

Pixels in the big picture

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. The deadline is "the first Friday in February" for the DTA, and seven days later for the Registered Student award. Details can be found on the teaching resource office web site.

The elevator here in Needles Hall has been in and out of service in the past few days, shaking and rattling. Perhaps with an eye to preventing something similar in the Physics building, the Physics elevator will be out of service from Wednesday morning to Friday night for a safety upgrade, the plant operations department advises.

I rather liked the letter in Friday's Imprint from a student complaining about noise in the Dana Porter Library -- which, she says, is getting worse lately. "If you have to talk, do it quietly," she suggests -- and: "The library is not a boom-boom room for you and your whoever to kiss, be cuddly or coo to each other -- it's seriously gross. Please stop."

A note in Arts & Letters, the arts faculty's alumni newsletter, announces that a new PhD program in applied economics is about to begin. It will, says the paragraph, "satisfy a growing demand for economics PhDs in government and industry. To reflect this, the two major areas of specialization will be Public Economics, and Technology and Management. The first encompasses the breadth of applied public policy in public expenditure and taxation, health economics, and education and natural resources, and should well equip the student for a policy-making career in the public sector. The second field will especially try to train potential private sector managers to deal with the increasing importance of the Internet, rapid technological change, and intellectual property in the digital world. Reflecting the UW tradition, the program will include co-op experience, potentially allowing for people who already have careers in these fields to participate." Jim Brox, chair of the economics department, says the first students in the new program will be admitted next fall.

Thursday will bring the Campus-Wide Fast that's being sponsored by the Muslim Students' Association as part of the Ramadan observance. "The idea," writes Junaid Quadri, "is that students, staff and faculty at UW will fast during the daylight hours on Thursday, and join us for an end-of-day meal at Ground Zero. Local businesses have agreed to sponsor $2 for each person who fasts." I'll say more about this event tomorrow.

CAR