![[University of Waterloo]](/goldbar.gif)
| Yesterday |
Tuesday, February 3, 2004
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Editor: Chris Redmond credmond@uwaterloo.ca |
![[Concentration, water bottle]](/images/2004/0203mbet.gif)
Laptop life:
a thousand words' worth of insight into the Master of Business,
Entrepreneurship and Technology is packed into one image. Chris Hughes
of UW Graphics photo/imaging had his camera in the MBET lab in Needles
Hall recently, getting pictures for use in publicity.
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Capper's resignation, effective just as reading week begins, will leave the VP's position vacant for two and a half months. A new Federation executive, currently being elected, takes office May 1.
"I would like to offer my sincerest thanks to all those who have helped make my time with the Federation of Students as memorable as it has been," Capper said in his e-mail. "Most importantly, I wish to express immense gratitude to Chris Edey, John Fedy, Liam McHugh-Russell and the entire Federation of Students staff for sharing in the joy and hardships of this position." Edey is Federation president, Fedy is VP (internal), and McHugh-Russell is VP (education).
Capper's announcement said he has "accepted a career opportunity in his field of study, planning, from which he recently graduated".
The position -- which is a full-time job -- will stay vacant for the rest of the spring. Under Federation rules, if the VP's job falls vacant more than half way through the one-year term of office, "the vacancy shall be filled by the Vice-President, Internal delegating and dividing responsibilities as deemed necessary by the Executive Board."
An article about Health/Kinesiology 349, written by Donna Ellis of the teaching resources office, appears in the latest issue of the office's newsletter, Teaching Matters. She writes that "Having just completed her second offering of this course in the Fall 2003 term with 74 students, Linda shared her ideas about dealing with this special type of blended or hybrid course."
More from the article: "Linda used the UWone system for the online components of her course. Students were introduced to the course website from the first class, and were told to regularly check the announcements posted since any changes to the course schedule would be there. She also posted her syllabus, contact information, and lecture notes to make the website a complete course reference. In her announcements, she highlighted due dates for assignments and links to grades.
"Linda found that attendance at her office hours decreased since students had easy, on-going access to course materials. Students also submitted their assignments online.
"The course website was integrated far beyond the course administration level, though. In this course, students completed various online pre-class exercises, which were generally guided-reading questions, multiple-choice questions about the readings, or assignment preparation tasks, such as the Library's online information literacy tutorials. She was also able to easily incorporate online readings and resources (such as TRACE tip sheets) as bases for the exercises.
"In the first offering of the course, Linda used in-class quizzes to encourage students to keep up with their readings, but this past time, she dropped the quizzes in favour of online assignments. Overall, she appreciated not having to spend class time on the quizzes, and the students were ready to engage in discussions and use the material. This change helped to integrate the technology and make it a more significant part of the course, thereby helping students to see the value in learning how to use the online system.
"In addition to the online exercises, students needed to complete a multi-part assignment -- a population health intervention (e.g., dealing with increases in Type 2 diabetes). The scenario was that they were experts in health behaviour change from across Canada who were to come together to address a specific health issue. As happens in the 'real world,' the groups of 5-7 were not able to meet face-to-face before presenting their plans. Therefore, they met online, using the discussion boards and chat rooms available through UWone. Linda's course had three 50-minute lecture slots weekly, but she was able to cancel some in-class sessions to allow for the group work, which was done primarily online. . . .
"The students also had the benefit of being able to go back and easily access course materials because the materials remained on the website."
Ellis's article notes that nothing is perfect: "She and her students endured some technical difficulties, particularly early in the term, but said it was worth persevering. As well, instructors should not assume their students are technologically savvy -- some will not even know how to upload files. She suggests that faculty really focus on integrating the online components fully into the course instead of treating them like add-ons.
"There is a time investment on the part of both students and faculty to learn how to use any online system, and better buy-in occurs when students know they will use their new skills for more than one part of the course. Moving to integrating online components can also provide faculty members with the opportunity to re-think their course goals and designs because new types of assignments or materials can now be easily accessed and managed. But faculty members need not feel alone -- both LT3 and TRACE staff are available to help ease the transition and offer suggestions."
| WHEN AND WHERE |
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Yume peace crane project, making 1,000 origami cranes, 9:30 to
5:00, Student Life Centre.
'Selling Your Skills' interview workshop, 3:30, Tatham Centre room 2218. Engineering exchange week, 11:30 to 1:30 outside Poets Pub, Carl Pollock Hall, today featuring Japan, Hong Kong, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, Mexico. India's culture: "A Bridge Across a Chasm", Shabnam Ivkovich, 12 noon, Student Life Centre multi-purpose room. Federation of Students election forum, 12 noon, AHS lounge, Matthews Hall. 'The Investing Tutorial', UW Business and Investment Club, 5 p.m., Math and Computer room 1085. Students for Life discussion, "Post-Abortion Syndrome", 6 p.m., Arts Lecture Hall room 209. Job fair tomorrow, 10:00 to 3:30, RIM Park, 130 employers, details online. Upstart 2004 theatre festival, short plays in Studio 180, February 4-7 and 11-14, schedule online. 'Was There a Big Bang?' lecture sponsored by Perimeter Institute, Wednesday 7 p.m., Waterloo Collegiate. Engineering graduate studies overview presentations, Friday 3 to 6 p.m., University Club. |
The increase, which would go into effect in September, would take the basic monthly rate to $456 in a double room, $485 in a single room in Columbia or an interconnecting room in the Village, $508 for a single room in the villages, and $519 or $548 for a single room in UW Place, depending on the size of the suite. All those figures are based on a two-term residence commitment; students who stay for just one term pay more.
Rates will go up by 10 per cent in the Minota Hagey Residence, to $530 a month for a single room. In the apartment units at UW Place, existing tenants will face no increase. They currently pay from $620 to $693 a month for a two-bedroom apartment. New tenants, as of September, will pay $750 a month. Non-students in those units will continue to pay $1,500 a month.
Rent for the new apartment-style homes on the north side of Columbia Lake Village is being established for the first time: they'll go for $950 a month.
Among other items on the agenda for today's board of governors meeting:
The program review was brought to UW's senate several months ago -- sorry, I'm pretty late summarizing it in the Daily Bulletin -- as part of the series of reviews that will eventually cover all UW departments on a seven-year cycle.
The review team noted that it "was impressed with the high level of achievement in terms of teaching and research, apparent excellent morale and collegiality within the Department. The Department is among the very active and successful biology departments (in terms of teaching and research) in Canada." That's particularly striking because, it said, biology has "the highest teaching loads of any department at UW", with an average class size of 125 students and an average faculty workload of 2.3 courses per year.
"Service teaching is a major activity for Biology," the report noted. "Nearly 68% of the students enrolled in Biology courses are registered in academic plans other than those offered by the Department. Five courses have been developed explicitly for non-majors."
The review team recommended that the department continue to upgrade introductory laboratories to improve the undergraduate lab experience; ensure flexibility for the de-coupled laboratory and lecture introductory courses so that students who later decide to major in biology will have opportunity to take those labs; "enhance communication skills of students by providing more opportunities for scientific writing; better integrate course offerings when co-op students are on campus for academic terms; . . . consider ways to reduce the negative consequences of very high student to professor ratios, with one suggestion to hire more sessionals to teach introductory level courses."
It should also "develop long-term strategies" to deal with the space shortage.
Replying to the review, the department said it "will continue to modify and approve laboratory offerings, in both introductory and advanced courses; will hire a Lecturer in Applied Microbiology and Molecular Biology to be a full-time teacher, and also to convert some regular faculty positions into Lecturer positions to have more dedicated teaching positions in order to reduce the high student/faculty ratios."
And: "It also agrees that it has a severe space shortage, but that this is unlikely to improve in the near future, even with the completion of the CEIT building. A major concern is the lack of sufficient class rooms for very large classes, and believes UW needs a class room that would accommodate 500 to 600 students.
"If no or few additional resources are provided, Biology will replace two or three of expected 6 retirees over the next 7 years with Lecturers. Lecturers will be committed to full-time teaching, and such appointments will enable Biology to offer its mix of courses, and accommodate extra students. Since Lecturers would not have a laboratory, this approach would also help with space problems. However, a cost in the longer term will be reduction in the research capacity of the department, as Lecturers will not be expected to have research programs, and the likelihood that it will become more difficult to attract high caliber faculty and graduate students."
The program review also touched on a whole new area of study, saying the department thinks "that molecular biology will emerge as both important and pervasive, and that the department could expand in that area, with a goal of expanding from its present 29 faculty to about 50, with the necessary space to support such growth.
"Biology believes that the potential of molecular biology is similar to the situation of computer science many years ago, when UW invested in computer science capacity before there was general appreciation for how important computers would become. It argues that UW should now make the same type of investment in molecular biology."
CAR