Integrity tutorial ready for grad students

a memo sent to academic department last week by Bruce Mitchell, associate provost (academic and student affairs) and interim provost

With endorsement from Senate Graduate and Research Council, an online tutorial focused on academic integrity has been prepared. It can be accessed on the Academic Integrity Office website.

The purpose of the tutorial is to provide information for graduate students about basic UW policies and guidelines relevant to academic integrity, and also regarding three key aspects: (1) crediting sources, (2) collaborative research, and (3) cheating, fabrication and falsification. These are generic matters, relevant to all graduate students.

The intent is that all new graduate students will access and go through the tutorial before they attend Faculty-specific sessions on academic integrity. This arrangement will allow Faculty sessions to focus on discipline-specific issues and concerns. It also will avoid separate individuals in six different Faculties having to update material for their graduate students related to basic policies and guidelines, and to create material on these generic topics.

Roland Hall, Richard Hughson and Bruce Muirhead were members of the working group that provided oversight for this initiative. Asma Bala represented graduate students, and the design and substance were provided by Christine Jewell, Leanne Romane and Jackie Stapleton from the Library. Faye Schultz from the Academic Integrity Office and Bruce Mitchell also were members of the group.

A draft tutorial was 'tested' with two sets of graduate students. They provided comments to enhance the tutorial.

Users of the tutorial will have opportunity, once they have finished it, to share their ideas about the value of the tutorial, and what might be done to improve it.

The online tutorial is now accessible, so you can determine the best way to alert your new graduate students about it, and encourage them to complete it. If you have questions, please send them to fschultz@ uwaterloo.ca or mitchell@ uwaterloo.ca.

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Project leadership program offered again

by Sheila McConnell, office of distance and continuing education

“Innovative,” “high quality” and a “serious alternative to a traditional in-class program” are the words that any new professional development program would love to hear, but they sound even better coming from Toyota Canada’s Hao Tien.

Tien is describing the new online Certificate in Project Leadership program from UW, a program that he is “proud” to be part of. "Waterloo is well known for its innovative approach in teaching and online program delivery," says Tien, who graduated from Waterloo's engineering program in 1990. "This enables the university to support a high quality program such as the online Certificate in Project Leadership."

Though a technical guru, he says that project leadership skills do not only apply in the IT world. "I would recommend this program to everyone, including all students, and professionals. As a matter of fact, due to globalization and increased competition, it is paramount that all employees know how to efficiently and effectively deliver complex projects faster, better and at optimal costs."

Tien is one of the three industry experts featured in the program's weekly expert panel. The panel also features Bruce Fleming, former Chief Information Officer of Ellis Don and now the CIO at AMEC, and Helen Polatajko, senior vice-president of CIBC Mellon.

"They're asked questions each week which focus on the topics that are being discussed that week in the course and students are able to benefit from the experience of these senior project professionals," says Peter Carr, program director and curriculum developer of the program and also a professor in Waterloo's management sciences department.

"These industry experts are one example of how we designed the program to create project managers that can apply what they learn in the real world," says Carr, explaining that he produced the program in consultation with the Continuing Education department and publisher IT World Canada.

"Traditionally, project management programs only prepared students for the Project Management Professional exam and never taught them how to effectively manage the people involved in their projects. We go beyond the PMP designation requirements to create managers with a strong project leadership capability."

"There's lots of technical training for the role of the project manager but there are also a lot of issues that come up in project management where managers need more than just technical training," agrees Dave Revell, a senior vice-president in BMO Financial Group. He and his team were recently featured as a case study for the certificate program after winning a Canadian Information Productivity Award.

Tien adds that Toyota Canada only employs project managers who are both artistic and scientific. "I always look at project management as two things: There's a science side of project management where you need to know how to apply theory and how to plan, measure, and report, and there's an arts side to project management to deal with communication, how to manage team dynamics and priorities, and managing up and managing down.

"For a project of high complexity where it involves a multitude of stakeholders, lots of process improvements and what not, it is very key to have a project leader that's good at both. If you are missing any of these, it's not so good. If you are missing the science side you can actually supplement it using the artist skill set, but the arts side is completely crucial for project success."

The program was launched last November, with the first class finishing in April of this year. It consists of four 4-week modules, and will be offered twice this fall — starting September 14 and November 23 — with two more opportunities scheduled in the winter term.

CAR

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