'The Trumpets' is a show by Master of Fine Arts candidate Cameron McKnight-MacNeil, on display this week at Render, the UW art gallery in East Campus Hall. Also on show is "Drawing Lines" by another MFA candidate, Monika Raciborski. A reception honouring the two artists is scheduled for Saturday afternoon.

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Carty returns to head nano institute

Canada's last national science advisor is returning to UW to lead what’s intended to become one of the world's best centres for nanotechnology. An announcement yesterday said that Arthur J. Carty will serve as the first executive director of the new Waterloo Institute of Nanotechnology.

Carty (right), who was a long-time chemistry professor at UW and dean of research 1989-1994, will provide both scientific and managerial leadership to the fledgling institute, said a UW news release. Priorities will include establishing a vision and research directions, identifying funding opportunities, setting priorities for the hiring of faculty and endowed chairs, developing cross-disciplinary linkages internally and with external partners, and overseeing construction of nanotechnology space within a $120 million quantum-nano centre that’s scheduled for construction north of the Biology buildings.

"The university is pleased that Dr. Arthur Carty will return to oversee the scientific and managerial aspects of this important new research initiative," says David Johnston, UW’s president. "Our aspirations for the institute are great and we were determined to find the right individual with a unique set of credentials. Dr. Carty is certainly that individual."

Carty will begin an initial two-year term on May 1. He will spend 90 per cent of his time in those first two years on nanotechnology, reporting to the deans of engineering and science, who oversee the institute. He will also spend a portion of his time as a special advisor to the president on international science and technology policy and will be a research professor in the department of chemistry.

"After 14 years in government, I am looking forward to returning to Waterloo to meet a new challenge — that of building a unique world-class institute dedicated to the emerging field of nanotechnology," says Carty in the news release. "Waterloo is one of the most dynamic communities in Canada, and with this initiative, the university will be well positioned to serve as the wellspring of innovation in this multidisciplinary enabling technology, which will impact profoundly across all areas of society and industry in the years ahead."

Carty has held senior science positions across Canada. He was national science advisor to the government and prime minister of Canada from April 2004 until last month. Before that he spent a decade as president of the National Research Council of Canada.

He is also a former president of the Canadian Society for Chemistry, honorary fellow of the Chemical Institute of Canada and the Fields Institute for Research in the Mathematical Sciences, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, as well as an Officer of the Order of Canada and Officier de l'Ordre national du Mérite of France. He has more than 300 peer-reviewed publications and five patents to his credit.

He has a doctorate in chemistry from Nottingham University and spent two years at Memorial University of Newfoundland. Over 27 years at UW, as a professor of chemistry, Carty served as the first director of the Guelph-Waterloo Centre for Graduate Work in Chemistry, chair of the chemistry department and dean of research. The university's Arthur J. Carty Lecture Series, endowed by UW colleague Frank Karasek, involves an annual lecture on science or science policy of broad general interest.

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UW summer programs for children

With March break over, and parents thinking ahead to how they'll keep their children busy in the summer months, UW has prepared the annual list of kids' programs that will be held on campus. It includes the two big day camps, a couple of nursery schools, and special-purpose camps in dance, music and sports. Here's a summary.

Arts Computer Experience is a day camp for children aged 7 to 12, running four two-week sessions starting June 30. The program includes art, drama and music as well as computing, plus outdoor activities and swimming. Details are on the ACE web site, and coordinator Marsha Wendell is at ext. 35939.

Engineering Science Quest operates a variety of one-week programs, from June 30 through August 22, for children entering grades 1 to 9. It promises "an opportunity to see, touch, invent, design, create, and experiment"; the "ExXtreme" programs for older kids focus on the world of computers and technology. There are satellite programs this year operating in Stratford, Chatham, Brantford and Six Nations. Details are on the web; the phone number at the ESQ office is ext. 35239.

Two on-campus day care centres are taking youngsters during the summer. The Hildegard Marsden Day Nursery summer camp is open to children aged 4 to 7 (phone ext. 35437); the Klemmer Farmhouse Co-operative Day Nursery summer program is for children 2-and-a-half to 5 (phone 519-885-5181).

The Ontario Mennonite Music Camp for young people aged 12 to 16 will run August 10-22 at Conrad Grebel University college; for details call 519-885-0220 ext. 24226.

The UW Girls' Volleyball Camp for players from grades 9-12 is scheduled for July 8-11; registration is online and the phone number for information is ext. 35692. A Specialized Positional Clinic is scheduled on July 7 for athletes aged 15 to 18.

Warrior Hockey Camps are scheduled in several categories: August 18-22 (boys and girls aged 5 to 12) and August 25-29 (ages 8-12) plus "specialty camps" for players aged 11 and 12 the first week, 13 and 14 the second week, and power skating camps both weeks. For details call ext. 32635.

Missing from the UW list this year is one familiar entry: the Carousel Dance Centre. Carousel will no longer be part of the university by the time summer gets under way, and its 2008 summer programs will be offered at its new location on Parkside Drive in Waterloo.

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Campaign hopes to attract doctors

by Jennifer Ormston, reprinted by permission from the Waterloo Chronicle

A group of six concerned citizens has embarked on a $2-million fundraising campaign to promote the new Health Sciences Campus in Kitchener, with the hope of attracting more health-care professionals to the area.

"Doctors and nurses really are our Achilles heel," said Bill Weiler, a member of the Med Ed Group, a small organization of local volunteers who are promoting and raising funds for the centre. "Fifty-thousand people without a doctor, and we haven't got enough nurses to even handle the CCAC program, so we have an Achilles heel — it's a really serious situation."

Going back 10 years, this area faced a health-care crisis without an MRI, cardiac unit or cancer centre, Weiler said. That situation improved with the creation of St. Mary's Hospital Cardiac Centre, the Grand River Hospital Cancer Centre and the acquisition of an MRI machine, thanks in part to the work Weiler and others did as part of a local health lobby group called the Three Musketeers.

Now, the Med Ed Group believes the area is facing another crisis — the shortage of doctors, nurses, pharmacists and health-care workers. "At the same time as we have a crisis, we now have an opportunity, and that opportunity is the Health Sciences Campus, which we consider to be one of the most unique health-sciences centres in Canada," Weiler said.

The Health Sciences Campus in downtown Kitchener, at the corner of King and Victoria streets, will eventually house the Waterloo regional campus of McMaster University's Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine, as well as the K-W Family Medicine Residency program. It will also serve as a satellite campus for the University of Waterloo with a school of optometry clinic and contact-lens research centre, school of pharmacy and integrated primary care clinic.

Funds raised by the Med Ed Group will be distributed among four key areas: mentorship and faculty development, education enhancement, student assistance and research. "We're focusing on the first three to start with," said group member Marilyn Wilkinson, adding education enhancement will be a top priority. "There's a lot of equipment that the hospitals in particular could use, as well as equipment that will be needed at the medical school to help with training." This includes simulated models to teach students how to work on patients. "It's all things that are over and above the basics that the ministries will fund," she said.

The group's goal is to make this medical school the best of its kind in Ontario by the end of 2010, Weiler said.

This comes at a time when the Waterloo-Wellington Local Health Integration Network estimates 50,000 people in its jurisdiction don't have a family physician. "We need to keep them here," Weiler said of health-care providers. "If this community wants to create an opportunity for itself to keep these doctors and nurses here, we have to make sure that we give them the tools, the space and the equipment to do that," he said.

Med Ed Group member Bruce Antonello, who also chairs the local Chamber of Commerce's physician recruitment council, said studies show the factors that attract people to an area are if they were born and raised there, or if they studied there. "So we have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to attract medical students and in showing them how well we do things here, keeping them," he said. The group's aim is to top off government funding to make this school second to none. Once we get them here, we hope to keep them here. All indication is that a vast majority of the people who will come here will stay."

Donations to the Med Ed Group can be made at the local Community Foundations.

CAR

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