Feridun Hamdullahpur serves up a burger and a smile at yesterday's Welcome Week lunch outside the Student Life Centre. The president and other senior leaders had their hands full as students crowded into the courtyard for the free meal.

The SLC was definitely the place to be for free food offerings yesterday. Early birds were treated to a flipped flapjack and syrup Monday morning at a pancake breakfast, also in the courtyard.

More Feds Welcome Week 2012 details follow below.

Photograph by Jonathan Bielaski, Light Imaging.

Back to top

Feedback sought on draft staff policy

"The Staff Relations Committee invites your feedback on significant draft revisions to the staff employment policy," reads an email from the Secretariat distributed to university support staff yesterday.

The revised Policy 18 is available in two parts on a Sharepoint site established for the review, which has been ongoing since February 2012. The first document contains the proposed policy itself, including rights, responsibilities and principles, and the second document outlines operating procedures and other "how-to" instructions.

A review subcommittee has been looking at Policy 18 for several months now, evaluating the degree to which the current policy does or does not address the changes that have occurred in the relationship between the university and its staff due to demographics, expectations, and the work environment. "The proposed policy is intended to provide greater mobility and flexibility for Staff, and at the same time improve flexibility and responsiveness for the University," reads a note from the subcommittee introducing the draft policy.

Feedback can be sent directly to Karen Jack, Secretariat, Needles Hall, or by email by noon on Monday, October 1.

A question and answer session is being scheduled for later this month and details about the time and location of that session will be published soon.

Back to top

Finding Franklin with Bob Park

This Arts Communications piece can be found on the Faculty of Arts' website

Robert Park of the Department of Anthropology is participating in a Government of Nunavut archaeological research project into the Franklin expedition, assisting Nunavut's Director of Heritage, Dr. Douglas Stenton. They have been looking for new archaeological sites that may have been occupied by Inuit soon after the Franklin tragedy, and also re-investigating archaeological sites created by the Franklin expedition.

Last week, CBC's Peter Mansbridge flew to Nunavut, and King William Island in particular, where he joined Bob and Dr. Stenton at work excavating a site known to hold remains and artifacts from the Franklin victims. And exciting discoveries were (and are being) made, including buttons, wooden debris, an 1840s toothbrush, a tooth and other small items.

CBC coverage of this search is extensive online, on radio, and on television, including a two-part feature on The National scheduled to air September 10 and 11. Tune-in and catch up with the discoveries.

Back to top

Tuesday: this, that, and the other thing

Feds Welcome Week 2012 continues today with "Cooking with Brian McCourt, The Bauer Kitchen's Chef de Cuisine" at 12:00 p.m. in the Student Life Centre, and an evening with Cash Cab host Adam Growe at Fed Hall. Doors open at 8:30 p.m. and The Adam Growe Quizze and Comedy Showe gets underway at 9:00 p.m.

The University of Waterloo Art Gallery (UWAG) is hosting its annual Master of Fine Arts (MFA) alumni exhibition (above) from Thursday, September 13 to October 27. Each year, the MFA program hosts the Keith and Winifred Shantz Internship Award, a program that supports the study and apprenticeship of graduate candidates working with an established artist of their choice, either in Canada or abroad between the first and second year of their graduate program. Since its inception in 1996, over sixty MFA candidates have participated in this unique internship program.

The exhibition, which celebrates the memory of Win Shantz, focuses on recent work by eleven MFA Alumni, each of whom has established a significant professional practice as a visual artist since graduation.

Orchestra@uwaterloo's first open rehearsal of the Fall term is scheduled for this Thursday, September 13, at 7:00 p.m. in Ron Eydt Village's Great Hall. Register online.

And as much as we'd like to think that love weathers all hardship, the weather interfered with Saturday's campus group hug, which has been postponed. I have been informed that plans are in the works for a re-do on Saturday, September 29 (a day filled with many other warm fuzzies) with the first-year class, Orientation leaders, and anyone else who wishes to participate in a mass embrace encircling the Ring Road. More details to follow.

Back to top