Two of the Wardens, Mike Marshman and Larry Galadja, stood ready to assist with Iron Ring replacements at last month's engineering reunions.

Engineering hails Iron Ring wardens

Staff members, faculty member and alumni were honoured last week at the annual Faculty of Engineering Dinner, and there was a special award for an influential group who are seldom seen: the Wardens of Camp 15.

Approximately 200 people attended the banquet, hosted by dean of engineering Adel Sedra at Golf's Steak House on Wednesday night.

Camp 15 is the group of about 20 engineering alumni in the Waterloo area who maintain the traditions of the Iron Ring, symbol of Canadian engineers, and conduct the annual ceremony at which graduating engineers receive their rings.

“Not only are Camp 15 wardens responsible for the annual Iron Ring ceremony,” Sedra told the dinner audience, “they also attend all Waterloo engineering reunions — including the one that just took place last weekend — to provide replacement rings. As well, they’re actively involved in volunteering for the Faculty of Engineering. The wardens recently raised more than $50,000 for the Iron Ring Endowment Fund. The success of the endowment campaign has prompted Camp 15 to attempt to raise an additional $50,000. The first scholarship from the fund will be handed out this year.”

Accepting this award on behalf of the Camp 15, Waterloo, Kipling Ritual Wardens was chief warden Bill Stevens, who presented the dean with a cheque for $35,000 to add to the graduate scholarship fund.

This year's winners of the faculty's Teaching Excellence Awards were Terri Meyer Boake of the school of architecture, Ray Legge of chemical engineering, and Wayne Brodland of civil and environmental engineering. The three were selected by the committee of chairs and associate deans following the assessment of the 2006 activities of all engineering faculty members. The selection criteria require recipients to show a continued record of excellence in undergraduate teaching. Other contributions to undergraduate and graduate education are also considered.

There were two recipients of the faculty’s inaugural Outstanding Staff Performance Awards. Ken Bowman, a technician in the civil and environmental engineering department, received the award in the technical category. Bowman has been with civil and environmental engineering since 1973. “He has left his mark on the way our soil mechanics courses are integrated with the laboratory. Perhaps the most distinctive part about Ken is his competence and willingness to help everyone who needs his time and expertise,” says nominator Leo Rothenburg, chair of the department. Jeff Lederer, the general manager of the school of architecture, was presented with the award in the administrative category. Lederer oversaw the 2004 relocation of the school to its new facilities in Cambridge. In nominating Lederer school director Rick Haldenby says, “It is impossible to overestimate the challenges he has faced and overcome.”

This year’s Engineering Alumni Achievement Award winners:

Ron Dembo (PhD 1975, Management Sciences) is a risk-management visionary. His academic career has included professorships at Yale, MIT, and the University of Toronto. In the world of business, he worked as a consultant for Goldman Sachs in New York City, before founding Algorithmics Incorporated in 1989. Before being sold to Fitch Group, the company became the largest risk-management software company in the world. In 2005 Dembo started using risk management in a different way — he founded Zerofootprint Inc., which serves businesses and consumers who want to reduce their impact on the environment.

Donald Noakes (MASc 1979 and PhD 1985, Systems Design Engineering) has devoted his career to understanding and protecting Canada’s natural resources. Noakes began his career as a research scientist with the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans, eventually becoming director of the aquaculture division and playing a key role in developing a sustainable aquaculture industry in Canada. Today, as Dean of the School of Advanced Technologies and Mathematics at Thompson Rivers University, Noakes is a leading researcher in water resources and aquaculture. His expertise includes using mathematics and statistics to examine global issues such as climate change.

Claire Tomlin (BASc 1992, Electrical Engineering) is an aviation researcher and academic who teaches at both Berkeley and Stanford. Tomlin studies hybrid control systems for aircraft flight control and collision avoidance, and has developed practical solutions for determining when unsafe conditions may arise. Her high-flying career received a boost last year when she received one of the world’s most prestigious fellowships: the MacArthur Award, popularly known as the genius grant. She will use the grant money to expand her studies into the areas such as unmanned aerial vehicle design, and biological cell networks.

Research in Motion, founded by Mike Lazaridis when he was still a Waterloo Engineering undergraduate, received a Friend of the Faculty Award. As RIM has prospered in the business world, it has maintained a strong relationship with UW, employing hundreds of alumni over the years. In the past three years alone, RIM has hired more than 1,000 co-op students, and the Faculty of Engineering has received almost $2 million in contract research projects. RIM also sponsors graduate scholarships, and is a supporter of a number of engineering student projects including the Alternative Fuels, Formula SAE, Mini Baja and Midnight Sun Solar Car teams.

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Library meets its 'Kresge challenge'

“The Kresge Challenge has come to a successful close,” the UW library announced in its newsletter last week, adding that “In just under 24 months, we were able to raise $2.8 million.

“As a result, we have received a $600,000 US grant from the Kresge Foundation, the largest grant that Kresge has ever awarded to a Canadian library.”

Success with the challenge, before its extended deadline of June 1 this year, came “thanks to the unfaltering support of the UW community including students, staff, faculty, retirees, alumni and parents”, the newsletter says.

The grant offered by the Kresge Foundation was originally described as $750,000 towards the library’s renovation projects, but that was before the Canadian dollar went soaring. Originally the deadline for raising $2.8 million was the end of 2006, but it was twice extended, as invitations went to faculty and staff (through the Keystone Campaign), alumni and parents of students, and outside friends of the library.

“The money raised during the challenge has and will continue to enable us to make truly dramatic changes within both the Davis and Dana Porter libraries,” library officials say now. “In addition, the challenge has helped create a stronger, more diversified base of support. Gifts from individuals, corporations, and foundations have all played an important role.

“Leadership gifts have allowed us to install a state-of-the-art RFID security and collections management system in both the Davis and Porter libraries (3M Canada gift); renovate the 3rd floor of the Porter Library which now includes the Peter and Betty Sims Reading Room, a computer research area, and new study carrels throughout the floor (Peter and Betty Sims gift); provide high speed workstations throughout the libraries (IBM Canada gift).

“Other funds raised will be directed to upcoming projects, including a major renovation to the main floor of the Porter Library; continuing renovations to the Davis Centre Library; upgrading individual and group study areas in both libraries.

“The Kresge Challenge was spearheaded by our spirited library staff whose belief in this initiative was unparalleled. To everyone who made this feat possible, our sincerest thanks. The UW community will enjoy the benefits of your generosity for years to come.”

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Leaders celebrate campaign, and more

Leaders of Campaign Waterloo, some big donors and other friends of the university have been invited to an "appreciation celebration" tonight in Toronto, to be held in the slope-floored lounge that's a feature of the new Crystal at the Royal Ontario Museum. "The purpose," says events officer Annette Trudelle of the development office, "is to show appreciation to, and thank, Campaign Cabinet, Patrons' Council and other major champions of Campaign Waterloo's stellar success. It is also to share the story of UW's and the campaign's accomplishment, to showcase UW accomplishments made possible by the campaign, to celebrate UW's 50th Anniversary, and to share plans for the future." UW president David Johnston and board chair Bob Harding will be featured, as will alumnus and donor Bill Tatham. And so will Meg Beckel, the new vice-president (external relations), who will be revisiting her previous haunts: until coming to UW October 1, she was chief operating officer of the ROM.

Work by UW Master of Fine Arts students is on display this month at the downtown "Artery" gallery operated by the student Society of Fine Arts, or SOFA. An opening reception was held Friday night, and the show, titled "Exposure", runs through October 31. Artists represented, says SOFA president Adam Meyer, are Monika Raciborski, James Olley, Cameron McKnight-MacNeil, Ram Samocha, Asha Roznowski, Colin Carney, Miranda Urbanksi, Amye Switzer, Nathalie Guagliotto, and Scott Everingham. The gallery, at 158 King Street East in Kitchener, is open Saturday and Sunday 12 to 3, Monday, Wednesday and Friday 3 to 6.

The School of Accountancy has announced the winning team in the 2007 BDO Dunwoody WatCase Competition, held at the beginning of the fall term. Congratulations are due, it says, to Pamela Ching, Ires Leung, Katelyn Culliton, Sylvia Luong and Stephanie D’Costa for placing first in the competition. More than 200 students took part in WatCase, which is a requirement for upper-year students in accountancy. This year’s case was provided by Armtec. The competition was an intense week for the participants, starting with the case being distributed on September 7, and written reports due just days later, on September 11. The next two days saw each group present their findings to a panel of judges including BDO Dunwoody, UW and Armtec representatives. The winners were announced at a reception on Friday, September 14. “Once again the WatCase competition was a great showcase for our program and our students, who showed great development in their preparation for the real business world,” says Jim Barnett, director of the school.

An announcement from Kathryn Lennon of the Waterloo Public Interest Research Group: “The 2nd Annual WPIRG Human Rights Conference is now accepting submissions for its Multimedia Exhibition. The theme of the conference and the exhibition is the rights of displaced peoples. The exhibition will be held in the Lower Atrium of the Student Life Centre on October 29, 30 and 31, and in conjunction with the conference on Saturday, November 3. The broad goal of the exhibition is to display the multitude of perspectives, voices, and experiences that define the complex situations of displaced peoples, and to analyze and critique the way that the mass media currently explores these issues. All mediums are accepted, including photography, writing, sculpture, media collages, music, painting, video, film, digital, design and performance arts pieces. If your work is not selected for the exhibition, it may be used for follow-up events.” Proposals (“a brief description of your work”) are due by October 17 at the WPIRG office in the SLC, e-mil info@wpirg.org.

The men's and women's Warrior golf squads are competing today in the Laurier Invitational, being held at Gray Silo in east Waterloo. • Here's a reminder that applications for positions as don in the UW residences in spring 2008 are being accepted until November 2. • The shuttle van from Columbia Lake Village to the main campus starts running today for the 2007-08 season and will continue until the end of classes in April.

And . . . a brief article turned up on UW Opinion last week from a prominent staff member, complaining about "bulk mailings that go to all/most members of the UW community . . . can't the university come up with a way to allow such mailings to be viewed electronically?" There does seem to have been a lot of paper across campus this fall, and I suspect it's not easy, from the viewpoint of an event organizer, to be confident that all the potential audience has been reached. Still, the article has a point. Certainly the Daily Bulletin could do more, especially if organizers made sure that information gets to the editor in time to be included; often they don't. And is everybody aware that the campus also has the UW Events online database?

CAR

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