President receives Diamond Jubilee medal

Feridun Hamdullahpur is one of the latest recipients of the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal. John Milloy, MPP for Kitchener Centre and Minister of Community and Social Services as well as Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities presented the award in a brief ceremony at yesterday's Senate meeting "in recognition of his exceptional contributions to the province and country."

Some background: to celebrate Queen Elizabeth’s diamond anniversary as Queen of Canada, the Government of Canada joined other Commonwealth countries in striking Diamond Jubilee Medals to be awarded to citizens who have made significant contributions to their community and country.

"Since becoming president he has worked tirelessly to support and grow the university’s regional, national, and international reputation, Minister Milloy said before presenting Hamdullahpur with the award.

The province of Ontario is awarding over 2,000 citizens with the medal, which commemorates Queen Elizabeth's 60 years on the throne. In total, 60,000 Canadians will be honoured with the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal.

Queen Elizabeth's reign of 60 years is the second-longest for a British monarch. Only Queen Victoria, who died 112 years ago today, had a longer reign, at 64 years.

Photograph by Jonathan Bielaski, Light Imaging.

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Convocation social media initiative wins award

The project to make convocation a social media affair has received top marks from an international university advancement organization.

The "Join the Convo-sation" initiative organized by Alumni Affairs and unveiled at convocation in June 2012 won a gold medal in the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) District II Accolades Awards program. The gold medal win was in the Social Media category.

Join the Convo-sation included the Twitter hashtag #uwgrad2012, live Twitter walls that added an element of personalization by displaying more than 2,000 tweets sent using the official hashtag, and photo opportunities with King Warrior, who held an erasable whiteboard displaying handwritten messages from new grads that were then posted on the Alumni Affairs Facebook page.

Alumni Affairs entered the campaign to the District II Accolades award this past fall, with the announcement of the win coming just last week. "District II" refers to the geographical peer group of 675 institutional members, including the University of Waterloo. The Council for Advancement and Support of Education is an international association of educational institutions with more than 3,600 members in 76 countries.

Among the judges' comments:

"Very well planned and executed project. Good advertising, for example use of # was communicated very well. Live tweets from audience, very effective at connecting with those not present at event. Photos with mascot was good addition. Good use of board at event. Very good ROI, low cost and high return."

Alumni Affairs will be submitting their winning proposal into the CASE Circle of Excellence and the Canadian Council for the Advancement in Education (CCAE) Prix d'Excellence competitions after adapting it to include the October 2012 convocation ceremony.

"Alumni Affairs would like to thank everyone who tweeted about convocation or congratulated graduates for their success this past June and October," writes Alison Boyd, associate director of Alumni Affairs. "It was wonderful to see the collaboration from many campus departments' Twitter accounts and comments from many staff and faculty supporting our new alumni."

Director of Alumni Affairs Jason Coolman will be picking up the award on behalf of the university at the CASE conference in Pittsburgh, PA in March.

 

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CIGI announces award competition

The Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI) has announced the second round of competition for its CIGI Collaborative Research Awards. These awards are available exclusively to tenure track faculty at the University of Waterloo and Wilfrid Laurier University who are interested in global governance.

For a proposal to be eligible for consideration by the CIGI Research Advisory Committee, it must demonstrate "a strong thematic link" to the mandate of the centre and a "contribution to policy-oriented research relevant to global governance" that addresses one or more of CIGI's program areas: the global economy, global security, the environment and energy, and global development.

There are three categories: the CIGI CRA Research Project, worth up to $30,000 over two years, the CIGI CRA Advanced Research Seminar, worth up to $15,000 over 12 months, and the CIGI CRA Strategic Research Initiative, worth a maximum of $450,000 over three years.

An information session will be held on Wednesday, January 30 at 2:00 p.m. in Room 1-23 of the Balsillie School of International Affairs, located in the CIGI Campus at the corner of Erb and Caroline in Uptown Waterloo. CIGI administrative assistant Alexandra Stephenson can be contacted for more information.

Applications will be accepted until February 23.

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