More departments have double names

Two more UW departments have joined a trend: longer official names to reflect diversifying fields of study.

The faculty of engineering announced this week that “mechanical engineering” is now the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering. It’s responsible not only for the familiar mech eng program but also for the program in mechatronics engineering, which will produce its first BASc graduates in 2008.

Earlier, “civil engineering” became the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. In addition to the civil engineering program — the oldest branch of what’s now recognized as engineering — the department now has sole responsibility for the environmental eng program, which at one time was also offered through chemical engineering.

The name change for civil eng was approved by the engineering faculty council on April 18, “effective immediately”, and reported to UW’s senate in June. The name change for mech eng has not reached the senate yet.

A third department in the faculty of engineering took a double-discipline name back in 1989, when “electrical engineering” became the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

Similar things have happened in other faculties. “Physics and astronomy” (faculty of science) is the newest, joining “Spanish and Latin American studies” and “drama and speech communication” (faculty of arts), “statistics and actuarial science” and "combinatorics and optimization" (faculty of math), and “health studies and gerontology” (faculty of applied health sciences).

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Designer profiled on Keystone website

“Housed in the cavernous Graphics design studio,” says the latest Keystone Campaign profile, “you’ll find Marybeth Huehn (left) working with a team of award-winning designers to develop communication materials that give UW a visual presence.

“Marybeth had been working in Toronto for 13 years when a friend told her that UW was hiring a designer so she decided to return to her hometown.”

Keystone — the branch of Campaign Waterloo that invites contributions to the university from faculty, staff and retirees — profiles somebody each month, drawing attention to the diversity of people who work here and the diversity of the reasons they become donors to the campaign. For July it was Huehn’s turn to answer a few questions:

What do you personally value about the University? “After working for a private agency, I found it a welcome change to work at UW, where I do far more than contribute to a company’s bottom line. It’s great to be part of such an exciting place.”

Why do you contribute to UW and to what do you designate your gift? “Because UW is a big part of my life, it’s natural for me to donate. I haven’t designated my donation to a specific area, because money is always needed for the University’s highest priority projects. Another way I help out is by volunteering on the Keystone Campaign Communications committee.”

What do you enjoy most about your job? “There is the creative aspect. Because I’m a visual problem solver, I get an immediate sense of accomplishment from my work. I also enjoy meeting clients, which balances the time I spend on the computer.”

What do you like to do in your spare time? "Almost every weekend I go to our home in Southampton, where I spend a lot of time in my garden, which covers the entire property. I like to cook, sew, play tennis, and I am learning to golf. Recently I started playing the piano again, after not touching one since I was a teenager. I also love to read, particularly magazines, because they give me visual ideas and the latest information."

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Drops in the daily downpour

Yesterday's Daily Bulletin said that the sixth annual MOPTA conference — Modeling and Optimization: Theory and Applications — was being hosted by the department of statistics and actuarial science. Well, no: it's actually based in the department of combinatorics and optimization, with support from various UW units. The conference (right) has attracted about 120 Canadian and international mathematicians, says Henry Wolkowicz of C&O, who is co-chair of the event along with Tony Vannelli of electrical and computer engineering. It's the first time MOPTA has been held at Waterloo; next year, McMaster.

And last week we reported on preliminary plan for how UW will cope if Ontario is hit by a "bird flu" pandemic — a document prepared by a working committee, approved by top officials and now available online. There have been some unhappy comments, apparently, because not all departments are discussed in the plan. The document says very little about academic activities, on the assumption that either UW will be open during a health crisis, and people will do the best they can, or it'll be closed by the health authorities. It concentrates on support services, and particularly those that would be vital to continue in just about all circumstances: keeping the campus heated and clear of snow, maintaining computer networks, paying staff and faculty members on time, and distributing information about pandemic safety. Catharine Scott, the associate provost who chaired the planning process, commented yesterday that one purpose of the published plan is to nudge all departments — not just the ones mentioned in it — to look at their own operations and see what the highest priorities would be for keeping going if their staff were decimated by the flu.

Speaking of paying everybody on time, today is the July payday for faculty members and most staff. Faculty are due for a little change in one of their deductions, namely the faculty association membership fees, but it won't be evident until next month, says a notice from the association: "Effective July 1, 2006 the mil rate for Association deductions will return to its normal rate of 4.75. The Association was able to reduce the mil rate for the past two years because of the healthy state of our reserves. The change will appear on your August pay report."

"Open enrolment" for fall term undergraduate courses begins today. June brought online appointments for returning students to choose their courses, and for the past two weeks enrolment has been open to new first-year students; as of today, and through September, the system is open equally to everybody.

Nominations for a vacant staff seat on the UW board of governors are still open (until next Friday). . . . About 40 participants in the SWAD junior wheelchair sports camp are at UW (in the Ron Eydt Village conference centre) for the weekend. . . . Michelle Zakrison, president of the Federation of Students, sent out a memo this week advising that there's a student vacancy on the Student Life Centre management board. . . .

Finally . . . I was interested to see a note posted on the newsgroup uw.general the other day, commenting on the dig that's extending through Waterloo Park (and, soon, the east side of UW's main campus) to install a new sewer line. "Mid-20th-century archeologists might be interested," an observer wrote, "in the diggings at the end of the football field near Seagram Drive. It appears that there used to be a city dump of some kind there. I noticed several interesting bottles and even a piece of a 1959 Toronto Telegram newspaper."

CAR

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