![[University of Waterloo]](/images/logobars/goldbar.gif)
| Yesterday |
Friday, November 18, 2005
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Editor: Chris Redmond credmond@uwaterloo.ca |
![[Dupuis at table]](/images/2005/1111dupuis.jpg)
'It is good to know,'
says Sherry Dupuis of the department of recreation and leisure studies,
'that the people around you care about you and are about the work you
are doing." That makes her a supporter of the
Keystone
Campaign -- the faculty, staff and retiree unit of Campaign
Waterloo. So there she is, featured as a new donor, on the front
page of the latest issue of
It's Our Waterloo, the Keystone newsletter. "I think
supporting students is very important," says Dupuis. She and her
husband, Bryan Smale, also a recreation professor, are UW graduates
as well as part of the on-campus community, the newsletter notes.
Keystone soared past its original $4.5 million target earlier this
year, and is now at 1,787 donors (a "tremendous" figure, says the
newsletter) on the way to a goal of 2,007 by 2007.
|
Kirsten Robinson of systems design engineering submitted her Sudbury Street Skins Project to the contest, sponsored by the Toronto-based Design Exchange. Purpose of the competition: to raise awareness about how Canadians experience the winter, identifying the physical exigencies and exhibiting universal design solutions applicable to winter environments.
Robinson proposes to cover sections of northern downtowns with innovative roofs made of an ecologically friendly material called Texlon. The "Street Skin" would hold in heat, creating a "micro-climate" that would be comfortable throughout the year.
"Northern cities can't have the kind of year-round street life that make cities in more moderate regions so attractive," said Robinson. "Our proposal gives northern cities a viable public space by capturing heat that the wind carries away right now." A partner in her proposal was her father, David Robinson, an economics professor at Sudbury-based Laurentian University. "I don't see how the local downtown core can compete with the malls without something like this in existence," said the elder Robinson.
Also scoring high in the competition was a team of graduates from the UW school of architecture, who took third place. Chris Hardwicke proposed a covered bicycle highway that would run above the roads. Alexander Tedesco proposed using geothermal heat to create warm public spaces.
First place in the competition was taken by Lite-Energy, a design for a light-emitting visor that is a safe all-seasons substitute for sunlight.
A selection of ideas produced by the competition is on display at the Design Exchange in downtown Toronto until the end of next week. The student teams are participating alongside established artists, designers and researchers.
Meanwhile, back on campus, there's a light coating of snow and ice this morning, and more will be falling over the months ahead. The plant operations department sends word that its grounds crew could use help on shovelling duty in the early mornings. "We need people to be ready to work outside starting at 7:30 on any weekday morning that there is 2 cm or more of snow on the ground," says Les Van Dongen of plant ops. "Pay this year is $10 an hour. We can work around students' schedules as long as they are available for the first hour of the morning." Anyone interested should get in touch with him by e-mail, lpvandon@uwaterloo.ca.
Rudolph E. Seviora of electrical and computer engineering began a six-month sabbatical on July 1: "The activities I have planned for the leave include research in the engineering of reliable software, in particular, research in monitoring the health of operational software systems and supporting strategies and techniques, and research in the Y-transform theory and its applications to such monitoring. The sabbatical leave will also be used to broaden the requestor's professional horizons, in particular, the areas of autonomic and embedded computing systems."
Tadeusz Gorecki of chemistry has a year-long sabbatical that began September 1: "I will spend the sabbatical leave working on the development of high-speed, high-efficiency separations by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). The work will be conducted at the Pfizer Analytical Research Centre, Department of Organic Chemistry, University of Ghent (Belgium), and at the Research Institute for Chromatography (Kortrijk, Belgium), in collaboration with Professor Pat Sandra.
Joanne Atlee of chemistry also began a twelve-month sabbatical on September 1: "I plan to work on a major revision to a textbook on which I have recently become a co-author. The textbook is entitled Software Engineering: Theory and Practice and was published by Prentice Hall.
Olga Vechtomova of the management sciences department has a six-month sabbatical that began November 1: "During my sabbatical leave I plan to research linguistic methods of discourse analysis, such as rhetorical structure and lexical cohesion analysis, and apply them to develop information retrieval techniques to support the resolution of complex information needs. The work will be carried out at the University of Waterloo."
Steffanie Scott of geography also began a six-month sabbatical on November 1: "My half-sabbatical leave will be spent between Waterloo and Asia, conducting fieldwork and writing up the findings of past research. Most of my time will be spent working on three inter-related projects on "The Challenge of Agrarian Transition in Southeast Asia"; "Land and Rural Livelihoods in Vietnam's Market Transition"; and "Sustainable Livelihoods and Poverty Reduction."
Jeremy M. Anglin of the department of psychology will begin a sabbatical on January 1: "The purpose of this six-month sabbatical leave is to enable the applicant to complete, write up and submit for publication a number of his recent research studies on language development in children. The studies include investigation of vocabulary development and of the emergence of children's ability to talk about the non-present, the past and the future."
| WHEN AND WHERE |
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'Regional Responses to Sustainable Architecture in Canada',
exhibition at Cambridge Galleries Design at Riverside, UW Architecture
building, until January 15.
Touring Players children's production of "Cinderella", 10:00 and 1:30, Humanities Theatre. Cognitive science colloquium: Paul Thagard, UW philosophy, "Hot Thought: Mechanisms of Emotional Cognition", 1 p.m., to be held online: details. RoboRacer Challenge hosted by mechatronics engineering program, student-build robots compete, 1:30 to 5:30, Student Life Centre great hall. Sri Lanka seminar: David Wood, environmental studies, and Drew Knight, office of research, on proposed UW restoration project, 3:00, Environmental Studies I room 221. 'Beyond Therapy', Engineering Society play, tonight 7:00, Saturday 2:00 and 7:00, Arts Lecture Hall room 116, tickets $6. 'Our Town', drama department production, tonight and Saturday 8:00, Theatre of the Arts, tickets 888-4908. CS4U @ UWaterloo Day open house for grade 9 and 10 students and their families, Saturday 9:30 to 4:30, Davis Centre, hosted by school of computer science, talks include "What Computers Can't Do", "The Ancient Art of Origami Combines with the Modern Art of Algorithms", "Applications of CS in Medical Instrument Development." Details online. 'Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire' private showing at Galaxy Cinemas, organized by Graduate Student Association, Sunday 9 a.m., tickets $8 (children $6) at Graduate House. Miniature art show and silent auction, department of fine arts, preview Monday-Thursday, sale November 25 from 4:30 to 9:00, East Campus Hall. Tourism lecture series: Stefan Gossling, Lund University, Sweden, "Tourism in a Carbon-Constrained World", Monday 9:30, Arts Lecture Hall room 105. 'Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price', free film showing sponsored by Federation of Students, Monday 8:00, Humanities Theatre. Staff association craft sale November 24-25, "Davis Centre room 1301. |
Web users wanted for testThe Web Usability Study Group is looking for students, faculty members and staff to take part in a usability study of the UW web home page. "In return for 45 minutes of your time," sometime November 30 through December 2, "you will receive a WatCard voucher worth $15," an announcement says. Needed are 10 staff, 10 faculty, 10 undergraduates and 10 graduate students, and anyone interested can inquire online. |
People inside and outside the faculty of math have been invited to a midday event today in the Davis Centre: "a major gift announcement for the School of Computer Science". The event is hosted by UW president David Johnston; dean of mathematics Tom Coleman; and Johnny Wong, director of the CS school. Proceedings start at 12:30 in the Davis Atrium, light refreshments are promised, and everyone's welcome.
The arts research seminar series today presents "The Humanities in an Age of High Technology", with a panel including David Noble of York University, controversial as a technological historian and academic freedom advocate. "He is going to challenge humanities scholars to take up their responsibilities," says Naomi Sunderland, research officer in the arts faculty (who herself is about to leave UW and take up new challenges in Australia). Noble will be joined by Sheila Ager of the classical studies department, François Paré of French studies, and dean of arts Bob Kerton, starting at 2:30 in Arts Lecture Hall room 113.
The downtown Artery Gallery, operated by UW students, tonight celebrates the opening of "Just What I've Always Wanted", a show of works in various media by five Master of Fine Arts students from Guelph, York and Western. The show runs through December 18; the opening reception is tonight from 7 to 9 p.m. Artery is at 158 King Street West in Kitchener and is open Wednesday from noon to 3, Thursday from 10 to 12, Friday from 12 to 6, and weekends from noon to 3.
The second annual Impact entrepreneurship conference gets going tonight at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre and a couple of Toronto hotels. The two-day, student-organized event features industry representatives, educational partners and more than 300 students from coast to coast who will meet, learn, network and find out about job opportunities. It's organized by a group founded at Waterloo and now involving students at other universities as well. Keynote speaker is men's wear tycoon Harry Rosen. Also speaking is Bill Tatham (as in "Tatham Centre"), an entrepreneur who sold his tech start-up company Janna Systems for a Canadian record of $1.76 billion in 2000.
Sister Pat Murray, world traveller and administrator on behalf of the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary, based in Rome, is tonight's speaker at St. Jerome's University. She'll give this year's Teresa Dease Lecture, which was endowed by the Institute, perhaps better known as the Loretto Sisters. Murray will speak on "Learning Justice, Compassion and Hope-Filled Action", drawing on her experience working with people from Bulgaria to the lands of the Lakota Sioux. "She challenges us," a St. Jerome's announcement says, "to develop and deepen a spirituality that will influence everyday living as members of the global community." The lecture (admission free) starts at 7:30 in Siegfried Hall.
A 20-per-cent-off giftware sale at the UWShp in South Campus Hall continues today and tomorrow. . . . Gays and Lesbians of Waterloo are announcing "Boys & Boi's & Grrl's & Girls" Night" (hey, you think that's easy to type?) Saturday night at the Starlight on King Street. . . . The Tamil Cultural Association has the Humanities Theatre booked for an event Saturday night. . . .
Users of Bookit, the online calendar and meeting system, are warned that it'll be out of operation for an upgrade this weekend. "We recommend that you do not use Bookit from Friday 8 p.m. to Saturday 6 p.m.," says Pat Lafranier of information systems and technology. Current Bookit information will be saved tonight and "migrated to the new version of the server software" when the job is done, she says -- meaning that any changes made to people's data in the meantime will be lost. Bookit is UW's version of Oracle Calendar.
Sports this weekend: UW's Warriors are the defending champions as the four-team OUA championship tournament runs Sunday at the University of Western Ontario. Waterloo will face Toronto in the morning and be seen again in the afternoon in the gold (presumably) or bronze medal match. In another championship meet, UW swimmers will be in the Laurier pool Saturday evening and Sunday as the OUA Campbell Division title is contested.
On campus, the women's hockey Warriors host Toronto at 7:30 Saturday night in the Icefield. Elsewhere, the basketball teams, both men and women, are at Ottawa tonight and Carleton tomorrow night. The men's hockey squad is at Toronto tonight and Ryerson tomorrow. And the men's volleyballers visit Ryerson on Saturday afternoon and Toronto on Sunday.
In the local community it'll be a lively weekend, not least with the Santa Claus Parade tomorrow, starting at 10:00 at King Street and Bridgeport Road and making its way into downtown Kitchener. Today through Sunday, two important craft events are happening in the Waterloo Memorial Recreation Complex just south of campus. Members of the K-W Weavers and Spinners Guild and the Waterloo Potters Workshop will both have their works on show and for sale, just in time for Christmas shopping.
CAR