Blinded by the light: or at least, they would have been, without their nifty protective eyewear. Physics student Melanie Chanona and Civil Engineering grad Marius Hexan were among the hundreds of stargazers (sungazers? planetwatchers?) who took in the rare Transit of Venus on Tuesday.

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Social Development Studies profs win awards

A news release from Renison University College

May was a great month for Social Development Studies professors, with three two of them receiving awards or grants.

Professor Kristina R. Llewellyn (right) received the Outstanding Publication in Curriculum Studies Award for her article, Educating for active compliance: discursive constructions in citizenship education. This annual award recognizes an outstanding publication related to scholarly insights and advances made in Curriculum Studies in Canada, and is given out by The Canadian Association for Curriculum Studies (CACS).

[Note: due to an embargo, one of the award recipients cannot be named at this time. My apologies for any confusion]

Professor J.C. Blokhuis (left) has received a research grant of $37,400 from the Spencer Foundation for a comparative legal study entitled, “Public Educational Authority and Children’s Rights from a Parens Patriae Perspective.” The Spencer Foundation, established in 1962 by Lyle M. Spencer, founder of Science Research Associates (SRA), awards grants to applicants whose research about education will ultimately improve students’ lives and enrich society.

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VeloCity Venture Fund disbursed today

"The VeloCity Venture Fund is happening today in the SLC Great Hall from 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.," writes VeloCity marketing and communications manager Kim Ho. "We are thrilled to be giving away $100K to support 4 start up teams at $25K each."

The pitches will take place from 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. followed by the announcement of the winning teams and networking at 3:00 p.m. with light refreshments served.

The VeloCity Venture Fund was created in March of 2011, inspired by Kik Interactive Inc. founder Ted Livingston's $1 million donation as well as his personal success story. Livingston created his mobile messaging app while living in the VeloCity residence. The fund awards up to four $25,000 prizes to student-run startups to help them become established in their related industry.

"We are honoured to welcome our special guest, Vice-President, Academic and Provost Dr. Sallie Ann Keller in addition to our judges Michael Stork, Karamdeep Jinar, and Tim Ellis to this unique event," concludes Ho.

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WCMS migration continues

Here's a note from Pat Lafranier of Information Systems and Technology (IST): "We are pleased to report that as of today we now have 70 websites in the Waterloo Content Management System (WCMS) including Applied Health Sciences, Environment, Science, and Engineering. To see a complete list of sites in the WCMS and sites in the progress of being migrated check out the WCMS migration schedule on the Web Resources site. Working with areas across the university has helped to guide us with functionality requirements and given us constructive feedback and we appreciate their continued input. Migration meetings, training, support, and adding new functionality (e.g. forms, social media widgets, OFIS integration) continues to keep the WCMS team very busy. WCMS information is available from the Web Resources website."

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Pension plan info sessions coming

"The Pension and Benefits Committee (P&B) will be hosting public information sessions for members of the University of Waterloo pension plan on June 12, 2012 and June 26, 2012," reads a memo circulated yesterday.

"The information sessions will provide an overview of the pension plan, its financial position, how it compares relative to other public sector plans, steps taken in recent years to improve the position of the plan, as well as changes P&B intends to recommend to the Board to maintain the long-term health of the plan. The recommended changes include:

• Increasing university and member contribution rates
• Extending the averaging period for calculating final average earnings (used for the pension calculation)
• Decreasing guaranteed indexing of pensions to 75% of CPI
• Increasing the pension plan cap
  

"The above changes will be explained in more detail during the presentation. After the presentation, the actuary and members of P&B will be available to answer questions."

Pension plan members are encouraged to attend. Managers are requested to allow employees to take time to attend these meetings during work hours. The meetings will each be 1.5 hours in length and will be held in J.R. Coutts Engineering Lecture Hall (RCH). The meeting dates, times and room numbers in RCH are:

• June 12: 2:15 p.m. to 3:45 p.m., RCH301 and 5:45 p.m. to 7:15 p.m., RCH307
• June 26: 12:45 p.m. to 2:15 p.m., RCH301, 2:15 p.m. to 3:45 p.m., RCH301, and 5:45 p.m. to 7:15 p.m., RCH307.
  

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Copyright clearance agreement statement

a message from the Vice-President, Academic and Provost

The University of Waterloo has decided not to sign the copyright license negotiated by Access Copyright and the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada.

The University will work with its internal stakeholders to ensure copyright regulations are respected, required permissions are obtained, necessary costs are covered, and appropriate transparency and accountability exist.

Further information will be provided as more specific details are available. In the interim, should you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact Bruce Mitchell, Associate Provost, Resources, or Mark Haslett, University Librarian.

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