Jackie Yeung, Jason Shaw and Sam Eyles pose with Jud Whiteside, the alumnus and university board of governors member whose name is attached to the top campus rec leadership award.

Annual awards from campus recreation

from the department of athletics and recreational services

The Waterloo athletics department recognized outstanding contributions by students to campus recreation on Tuesday, April 5, at the Campus Recreation Recognition Brunch. These students have gone above and beyond their everyday expectations to provide exceptional campus recreation services to the student body at Waterloo.

The first award handed out was the Jud Whiteside award, given to an individual who has made a significant leadership contribution to campus recreation. The award was presented to three outstanding students, each from their respective work term. Sam Eyles picked up the award for her services during spring of 2010. Eyles assisted in many campus recreation projects including Student Life 101, campus tours and many strength and conditioning initiatives. She was the conditioning and wellness assistant from January to September 2010 and was instrumental in the development of many fitness testing programs. She was also a member of the Ad Hoc Facility Advisory Board and was a co-chair of the Athletic Advisory Board.

Jason Shaw collected the Jud Whiteside award for his services during the fall of 2010. He was the lead on many special events including the You @ Waterloo Day, several open house events and the very successful Waterloo think pink campaign. Additionally Shaw spoke to the Ontario Olympic Youth Academy on what campus recreation at Waterloo has to offer, and he was a Waterloo representative for the Ontario Universities Fair in Toronto.

The final recipient of the Jud Whiteside award was Jackie Yeung for his work done in the winter term. Yeung recruited a large number of first aid instructors to increase the number of courses available. Additionally, he coordinated the co-examining of a large number of first aid instructors. Yeung has been a first aid and lifeguard instructor for several terms and has always been willing to lend a hand where needed.

The next award handed out was the Sport Club Award for Excellence, which recognizes club volunteers who have made a significant leadership contribution to their club. This award was presented to Chris Colliver (Juggling Club), Sanders Wong (Archery Club), and Ben Pickard and Dave Andrzejewski (Strength and Conditioning Club).

Colliver has been a member of the Juggling Club for several years and became its president a few terms ago. He has gone way above and beyond his responsibilities as the club’s president, even going as far as presenting a persuasive speech in one of his academic classes about the benefits of participating in Campus Recreation clubs. This term Colliver organized the club’s annual juggling festival virtually by himself. The festival included demonstrations and clinics and culminated with a two-hour performance in the Humanities Theatre which featured some of the most well known performers in the juggling world. 

Over the past year Wong has done a remarkable job in the difficult role of Archery Club president. His passion for the sport and all of the club’s members is always evident. His attention to detail and his strict adherence to all the guidelines and regulations set up by the department has made for a very safe and enjoyable club environment.

Pickard and Andrzejewski started the Strength and Conditioning Club in September of 2010, and it has become an instant success. They have worked extremely hard to share their passion for fitness with all of their club members. In such a short period of time they have developed a website that includes a discussion forum where members can receive advice about fitness and nutrition; they have made a name for themselves with their successful T-shirt campaign and have held numerous events, from lifting competitions, to dodge ball games and UFC socials.

The final award presented was the Outstanding Graduating Student award, presented to students who have made a significant contribution throughout their time working for campus recreation at Waterloo. Those students receiving the award were Trevor Hall, Adrian Tan, Emefa Quist, Sam Eyles, Victoria Babrick, Stephanie Chiang, Katelin Nichols and Jackie Yeung.

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Other notes, as winter term exams begin

One more thing about the campus recreation program: the "intramurals" operation, which is just one part of Campus Rec, now has an active presence on Facebook. "In the future," writes co-op student Matt Bahm from the athletics department, "we hope to expand to cover other parts of campus recreation such as fitness classes or clubs." • For athletics with an emphasis on the interuniversity Warriors, meanwhile, a year-end highlights video, 22 minutes long, is now available on YouTube.

Tuesday's meeting of the board of governors touched on many subjects besides the building projects and operating budget that were summarized in yesterday's Daily Bulletin. For example, co-op director Peggy Jarvie briefed the board about the rapid growth in the number of students needing jobs each term, to the point that almost 6,000 are employed this winter. Students consider the job search process to be "the equivalent of an academic course" in time and effort, she said. Among other developments in the co-op department: "We've developed a risk framework" for assessing international jobs, Jarvie said. In the past, she explained, the biggest "risk" for many such jobs was the university's inability to monitor what a student was actually doing in a faraway land (working up to university standard, or lying on a beach?). But, she said, "risk management went to a whole different level" with the recent experience of helping nine students escape Japan after its earthquake and tsunami, and from now on, the "international" staff in the Tatham Centre will be taking a broader view of what might go wrong and how to make sure it doesn't.

Future Daily Bulletins will include other snippets from the April 5 board meeting, including a report by George Dixon, vice-president (university research), on how successful the commercialization of Waterloo research continues to be.

In other matters . . . vice-president (external relations) Meg Beckel announced yesterday that Roberta Garcia, currently of Ryerson University, will serve a year as acting associate VP (annual and planned giving), starting May 2. A Waterloo science graduate who worked at TVOntario before joining Ryerson's development office, Garcia will be filling in for Erin Sargeant Greenwood, who is on maternity leave.

Proudly posing outside Renison University College (left) are a group of award-winning students and the people who teach them Japanese, including Fumie Shimoda, coordinator of Japanese language courses, at top left. They’re celebrating the National Japanese Speech Competition, held in Calgary on March 26, at which Waterloo student Min Hwan Suh (front and centre in the photo) placed first in the “advanced” category. This triumph comes just two weeks after he won first place at the Ontario competition in Toronto. Fellow students Kelvin Luk, Jihoon Lim, Xiaochen Zhang, Neil Trehin, and Asim Hussain joined Suh to collect an additional five awards at the provincial competition. “Among the 36 competitors, Waterloo students delivered their messages in a smooth yet expressive manner without any error,” says Shimoda.

The Waterloo Engineering Endowment Fund has allocated $60,000 towards improving undergraduate education in the engineering faculty — money earned by the multi-million-dollar endowment that builds up as students pay a refundable $75 fee each term. A list of the projects and their grants was published in the last winter term issue of the Iron Warrior newspaper; it includes $8,470 for "portable electronic test stations" for nanotechnology, $8,785 for the fourth-year chemical engineering terminal server, $1,500 to the Mars Rover Team and $1,500 to the Clean Snowmobile Team.

Today is the deadline for nominations as staff members prepare to elect one of their representatives to the university board of governors, for a three-year term that will start May 1. • The staff association is seeking applicants for positions as its representatives on the dean of engineering and dean of science nominating committees. • The association has also called for applications for a three-year seat as a member of its own finance review committee.

CAR

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