Shirts help promote 'mental health wellness'

UW will mark a “Mental Health Wellness Day” tomorrow with involvement from various organizations and departments, centred on five hours of information booths and presentations in the Student Life Centre.

Helping to raise the profile are “UW Day” T-shirts that will be visible all across campus. “About 800 shirts have been distributed,” says university housing officer Chris Read. (At left, that’s Mary Lynne Bartlett of the Waterloo Store modelling a shirt and working on shipping supplies of them across campus.)

“We expect the highlight of the awareness campaign to come from the T-shirt component,” says Read. “There will be staff from many areas on campus wearing T-shirts, including food services, registrar's office, retail services, counselling services, health services, housing and residences, student life, the Feds, the affiliated colleges, the office for persons with disabilities, and athletics. Many student leaders are also participating in this day by wearing T-shirts.

“We also targeted faculty and instructors teaching the largest classes that day, and many of them have agreed to participate as well.”

The events of the day include information booths in the great hall of the SLC between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. “Beginning around 11:30, President Johnston will speak and provide some of his personal thoughts around mental health,” says Read. “He will be followed by Tom Ruttan of counselling services, Barbara Schumacher of health services and Rose Padacz of the office for persons with disabilities. This will be a unique opportunity to hear different perspectives and supports from our campus community.

“Housing and residences will also be running unique programming in the evening designed to help students better understand the issues around mental health.

“The goal of the day is to communicate, as a campus, an open and helping environment that allows individuals to feel comfortable discussing issues they may have around mental health. In a community our size, the odds that we will end up interacting with or knowing someone dealing with a mental health issue are significant.

“We have so many individuals on our campus dedicated to making our community one that is caring and supportive, and this is a day to promote just that.”

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Senate hears about orientation, and more

Orientation for new first year-students next fall will run in two parts, with two days of classes sandwiched between them, the UW senate will be told at its monthly meeting today. The news comes from the registrar, and is a follow-up to a discussion last winter in which senate members expressed concern about orientation lasting too long and making classes start too late each September. As a result, says the registrar's memo, the orientation review committee that has been at work behind the scenes is planning a new model: "Orientation in 2010 would run from Saturday, September 4, to Wednesday, September 8, and then from the evening of Friday, September 10, to Saturday, September 11. This scheduling will become standard in subsequent years and thus classes can begin earlier than in the past." Senate isn't yet being asked to give specific approval to the schedule for next year's fall term, but when it does come forward, watch for it to say that the first day of classes will be Thursday, September 9.

Also on the agenda for today's senate meeting are progress reports from Conrad Grebel University College and St. Paul's University College about their Sixth Decade plans and achievements, and "academic program review" reports on the political science department and several programs in the faculty of mathematics. In addition, senate will hear the usual reports from the president and vice-presidents, and get a briefing on this year's edition of the Performance Indicators report that's just been published by the institutional analysis and planning office. The senate meeting, which is open to the public, starts at 4:00 in Needles Hall room 3001.

“Join the Student Life Training Team!” says an invitation from the UW student life office, noting that the training team “is responsible for delivering the Orientation Leader Training program”. The enticement: “Enhance your facilitation and presentation skills for large and small groups!” And, of course, you’ll earn $12.50 an hour, for 10 to 20 hours a month. “Successful candidates,” says the announcement, “must be full or part-time registered (including co-op) students in good academic standing, have a sincere interest in Orientation and Student Life, have excellent presentation and oral communication skills, have a working knowledge of on-campus resources, have an interest in learning to facilitate discussion among peers.” Applications are due by October 26 — a week from today — and more information is on the Student Life Office web site.

Notes from the engineering faculty's e-newsletter for this month: "Dave Scott, a civil engineering master’s student, recently received the 2009 American Water Works Association’s Academic Achievement Award for best water-related thesis in North America. The purpose of the award is to encourage academic excellence by recognizing contributions made by students and academicians in the field of public water supply. . . . Michele Heng, a systems design engineering doctoral candidate, recently won a best paper award at the IEEE Toronto International Conference on Science and Technology for Humanity. Her paper entitled 'Preventing Future Brownfields: Engineering Solutions and Pollution Prevention Policies' was coauthored by Keith Hipel, a systems design engineering professor, Liping Fang, a Ryerson mechanical and industrial engineering professor, and Bruce Taylor and Lloyd Hipel, both of Enviro-Stewards, an international environmental consulting firm based in Elmira, Ontario."

Some of the one-liners appearing last week on the OMGUW web site: “You can now declare you have flu-like symptoms on Quest instead of going to the doctor to get a note. How many people are gonna do that so they can go out drinking instead of studying? . . . Scam artist in RIM parking lot, right beside DC in a white SUV, tinted glass and all. He is selling home audio systems. . . . I love the symphony of coughs prevailing in lecture halls lately. It’s so soothing. . . . I've given UW $39,479.62 and I'm still nowhere near getting my diploma. . . . There was a girl napping in the SLC quiet room yesterday, and she was talking in her sleep! . . . Waterloo is dead on Thanksgiving.”

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'Outreach' flourishing in engineering faculty

from the engineering faculty's e-newsletter

Shortly after Mary Wells started in the new role of Waterloo Engineering's associate dean of outreach she was quoted as saying she had the best job on campus. More than a year later she still feels the same way about the position created to help educate the public about what engineering is and the role it plays in society.

Wells (right) says one major success of engineering's outreach program is the synergies now happening across the campus. One synergy taking place this month involves Waterloo's engineering, science and math faculties that have teamed up to run a special event for high school students travelling from across Ontario to the Perimeter Institute's Quantum to Cosmos festival. The three faculties are offering themed sessions and lab tours to students on the same day as their Perimeter Institute visit. Engineering's four sessions, including one on green energy and one on nanotechnology, are proving to be favourites among the students who have chosen to visit UW.

Waterloo Engineering is also teaming up with Waterloo Region's Children's Museum by offering special engineering-focused workshops.

While Go Eng Girl!, one of engineering's biggest outreach programs, has been running for a number of years at Ontario universities, this is the first year that registration at Waterloo closed early due to full capacity. There are plans to expand Waterloo's 2010 event to increase numbers 25 per cent.

Another success story is Engineering Science Quest, a children's camp that will celebrate its 20th anniversary next year. "Waterloo has developed a strong reputation from its outreach programs, including ESQ, showing there's a pent-up need to supplement what's going on in elementary and high schools," says Wells.

One of her goals is to increase the level of outreach engagement within Waterloo Engineering, and ideas are already beginning to percolate. Students have expressed interest in adopting a school in a disadvantaged area of Waterloo Region and mentoring a First Lego League team or another group that will help stimulate interest in engineering and science.

CAR

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