Engineering 6, towering toward the blue

A ceremony this morning will officially open the Engineering 6 building, pictured above, which sits near East Campus Hall and Engineering 5 near Phillip Street at the eastern edge of campus.

The five-storey, 115,000 square-foot building “is designed for innovation and discovery”, a news release today will say. More specifically, it houses 48 research labs for faculty, graduate students and staff in the department of chemical engineering, working in such areas as plastics and polymer science, biomedical engineering, green reaction engineering and advanced materials engineering.

Engineering 6, with a final price tag of $42 million, also provides space for student projects and office space for faculty, graduate students and administrative staff, as well as lecture and seminar rooms for chem eng.

The department has been moving lab and office equipment into Engineering 6 over the summer and fall. Along with this newest building on campus, it will continue to occupy two wings (“A” and “B”) in the university’s oldest academic building, Douglas Wright Engineering, which dates from 1958. Renovation of “C” wing in that begins in November, at a cost of $15 million, to provide new space for the department of civil and environmental engineering.

Today’s ceremony for invited guests will take place in the two-storey atrium at E6, and starts at 10:30. President Feridun Hamdullahpur and dean of engineering Adel Sedra will be joined by Peter Braid, the Member of Parliament for Kitchener-Waterloo, and John Milloy, government House leader and Member of Provincial Parliament for Kitchener Centre, along with other VIPs.

The two governments provided most of the funding for E6, which was designed by Diamond and Schmitt Architects. The government of Canada invested $18.25 million through the Knowledge Infrastructure Program for a project that included E6 and the recently opened Math 3 building, and the government of Ontario a further $17.75 million.

"I am very grateful for the government funding we've received for Engineering 6, our spectacular new chemical engineering building," says Sedra about the project. "The generous support we've received enables us to continue our innovative chemical engineering research and provides our students with leading-edge facilities for an exceptional educational experience. We're now well positioned to becoming one of the leading chemical engineering departments in the world."

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Gem show and kids' open house in science

a news release from the media relations office

The University of Waterloo will host its annual science open house this weekend to introduce children and their parents to an assortment of fun and hands-on activities. The free annual event, hosted by the faculty of science, offers activities and demonstrations aimed at children from kindergarten to grade eight, as well as their families.

The science open house takes place Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., in the Centre for Environmental and Information Technology building. The CEIT houses the earth sciences museum, which will also present a gem and mineral show from noon to 6 p.m. today and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday.

"The science open house and the associated gem and mineral show help children and their families get excited about exploring the wonders of science," said Peter Russell, curator of the earth sciences museum.

This year's open house will give children the opportunity to discover the inner workings of a cell, turn pennies into gold, launch rockets and take home their own plants from the greenhouse. Attendees will also be able to get a glimpse at the museum's latest exhibit, an educational simulation mining tunnel, with the theme Exploration, Extraction and Remediation: the Life Cycle of a Mine.

The always-popular chemistry magic show will take place at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. on Saturday in the nearby Biology 1 building, room 271. The open house will also include a travelling exhibit of the recently created Chem13 News Periodic Table Project, and children will have the opportunity to create their own periodic table element. They’ll also be able to have their photo taken at the earth sciences museum in a full-scale Tardis — the time and space machine featured in the science-fiction television series “Doctor Who”.

The gem and mineral show will feature a rock pile for young collectors, fossil fish digging, gold panning, creating an earthquake resistant building and more. A “carbon grill” barbecue, cooking up hamburgers and hot dogs, will offer lunch for visitors, outside the west entrance to the CEIT. Parking is available free in lot B, off of Phillip Street.

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Among other major events at Waterloo

The Student Success Week that’s been taking place since Monday reaches a climax this afternoon with the grand opening of the Student Success Office at its new quarters on the upper floor of South Campus Hall. “We encourage all staff, students, and faculty to stop by,” says Virginia Young, communications director for the SSO, “to take a tour of our new space, enjoy a piece of cake to celebrate the new office, meet our team, and learn about some of our current services and programs dedicated to helping students succeed. President Feridun Hamdullahpur will be saying a few words at 1:30 p.m.” The opening event runs from 12 noon to 3 p.m. The SSO, headed by director Sean Van Koughnett, incorporates some existing Waterloo units and programs, including the international student office, the student life office, the English Language Proficiency Program, VeloCity and the Kitchener-based Hub incubator. It’s organized into four units: learning services (with the emphasis on “transition advisors” and volunteer tutors), student experience (“new student transition, support for international students, and programs focused on the social, cultural and civic engagement of our students”), student innovation, and communications and research.

A conference is under way in the Davis Centre today and tomorrow “celebrating the contributions of Mary Thompson (right) to the statistical sciences”. Thompson retired from the department of statistics and actuarial science in 2009, 40 years after her arrival on Waterloo’s faculty. She worked largely in the areas of survey sampling and probability, was co-director of the Survey Research Centre for many years, and served as president of the Statistical Society of Canada, chair of the stats department, and, for several months in 2001, acting dean of mathematics. In 2006 she was named a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. The conference web site notes that she “has made important contributions to several areas in statistics, including stochastic processes, survey sampling, estimating equations, biostatistics, and aspects on foundations for statistical inferences. This conference is an opportunity to celebrate these achievements and the impact Professor Thompson has had on the discipline of statistics, her students and colleagues, the Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science at the University of Waterloo, and the statistical communities through her vision and leadership.”

A “musical/visual multi-media presentation and several readings” at Conrad Grebel University College today will celebrate the launch of a new book (left). It’s Sound in the Lands: Mennonite Music Across Borders, a collection of essays drawn from the proceedings of a conference held at Grebel in 2009. Edited by Maureen Epp, Carol Ann Weaver, Doreen Helen Klassen and Anna Janecek, the volume is a sequel to an earlier collection based on an earlier conference. The book, says Weaver, “re-evaluates the meaning of ‘Mennonite music’ in various contemporary global settings, including work by leading Mennonite writers, composers, and musicians. Representing a broad range of disciplinary approaches and personal perspectives, these essays challenge readers to consider how Mennonite music-making is enriched by an interplay of historical circumstances, varying traditions, and cross-cultural experiences.” The launch event starts at 12:30 today in Grebel’s great hall; a reception will follow.

A reception honouring the retirement of two faculty members in the psychology department, John Holmes and Michael Ross, is scheduled for today, 3:30 to 5:30 at the University Club. "Both John and Mike," says Sharon Adams, the administrative officer in psychology, "each had academic careers that spanned forty years, and their influence in the early days of Psych established an approach to graduate education that truly changed our department’s direction for PhD advising and mentoring. Their influence will be highlighted by a number of our alumni attending the celebration. Both are giants in the field of social psychology and continue to make major contributions to scholarship and graduate students in this field." The address for last-minute RSVPs is sladams@ uwaterloo.ca.

Saturday will mark the grand opening of the Sakura Japanese Language School at Renison University College. The event begins at 11:00 a.m. and will feature a number of speakers from multiple levels of government, as well as Japan’s Consul General in Toronto, Eiji Yamamoto. There will also be a Mochi-making demonstration beginning at 10:30 a.m., a Renison news release says. “The Sakura program is currently open to children four to six years of age and teaches the fundamentals of reading, writing, speaking, and listening to Japanese. The lessons will also teach students about Japanese culture. Classes began on September 10 and run every Saturday from 1 to 3 pm. The program can currently accommodate 15 students.” Glenn F. Cartwright, principal of Renison, says the program was started with the support of individual donors and the Japan Foundation, and will fill a small but very important niche in the Kitchener-Waterloo area. “Although the principal work of Renison University College is undergraduate education, the college is pleased to meet a perceived need in the community for Japanese Language teaching to children,” he says. “The language preschool complements our existing programs in East Asian Studies and strengthens our links to the Japanese community.”

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New guidelines governs staff work at home

a memo from the human resources department

The University of Waterloo has recognized an increase in staff members who wish to work from home a number of days per week. New guidelines, developed by the Staff Relations Committee, are intended to provide a working tool for staff and managers to determine the appropriateness of whether a staff role can be managed from a work from home relationship. 

These guidelines do not cover the full-time staff member who works from home but rather the staff member who has a permanent space at the university but wishes to work from home one to two days per week.

This program is intended to be staff driven and it is up to the staff member to complete the request, and working with their manager, gain the necessary approvals. It is important to remember that managers have the sole discretion as to whether they approve the request or not. The reality is some roles simply do not lend itself to working from home especially those roles that are customer facing.

Staff who currently work one or two days a week from home will need to complete the forms and gain approval in order to continue the working arrangement.

The program is effective November 1, 2011. There will be no grandfathering of existing arrangements.

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