All aboard for the Passport Challenge

A message from the Passport Program Administrators.

Hello all uWaterloo Employees.

October is Healthy Workplace Month and we have something fun and healthy happening next week. Our new employee wellness group has prepared a fun challenge for you and your teammates beginning on Tuesday, October 21 and ending on Friday, October 31.

The uWaterloo Get up and Go Passport Challenge has been designed to get you up and moving to various predetermined areas across campus. The objective is to get our employees to experience new UW locations, meet new colleagues and enjoy a healthy activity.

Here's how you can participate:

• Create a team of up to 6 players
• Be very creative with the team name—it should be “prize worthy”
• Register your team at uwworkwl@connect.uwaterloo.ca
• Beginning on Tuesday, October 21, check the Daily Bulletin every morning for the “clues of the day”.
• With the clues in mind, take your passport (which will be available on the Daily Bulletin tomorrow) and head out to the two sites you think the clues match. Get a date/time/signature by someone from that area.
• Follow the same procedure each working day until the contest ends on the 31st
• The Daily Bulletin of October 31 will have directions of where to send your passport for evaluation. Prizes will be distributed on Monday, November 3.

Remember, to be one of the winners, any and all creativity shown in collecting your signatures will be taken into consideration i.e. you collected a business card, swag, etc. Use your imagination.

Come on uWaterloo employees: Get up and move, and enjoy the game.
We are anticipating lots of laughs and lots of competition.

Sincerely,

Your Passport Creators

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Writing Centre supports student success

by Clare Bermingham.

The Writing Centre is very active across campus this term. With drop-in sessions at the libraries and the university colleges, re-designed workshops for undergraduate and graduate students, and new collaborations with faculty to support students and TAs in courses, the Writing Centre team is excited about changes to the Centre’s programs and services.

The Writing Centre is a place for all students. Staff work alongside undergraduate and graduate students from all faculties. They help students plan, write, and revise anything from a lab report to a business memo, an essay to an engineering design concept, and a cover letter to a dissertation. They support students who want to make their writing clearer, stronger, and more persuasive, whether it’s in the early planning stages or the last look at a draft.

At the Library, Writing Centre teaching associates offer timely feedback and advice. Someone is available at Dana Porter Library on Monday to Friday from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m., and at Davis Centre on Monday to Thursday from 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. Library drop-ins are ideal for anyone already in the library doing research or working on a project, or for anyone who needs a quick consultation. The drop-ins are a bustling success with more than 200 students having stopped by in the first month of service. 

This fall, the Writing Centre expanded services to offer drop-in consulting at Conrad Grebel, St. Paul’s, Renison, and St. Jerome’s one day each week over the lunch hours (12:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m.). For students who live and study across the creek, it’s an ideal opportunity to get advice individually or with a group.

The Writing Centre also reaches out through interactive workshops on writing-related topics, such as structure and coherence. These open sessions add to the support the Centre provides to students in core courses. Other initiatives include leading peer feedback sessions and supporting TAs involved in coaching and assessment. The collaborations are incredibly fruitful: students write more confidently and accurately, and faculty report measurable improvements in their communication skills.

The Writing Centre is enthusiastic about continuing to support student writing and communication on campus in innovative ways, and plans for further service expansion are in the works. In particular, partnerships with units and faculties create exciting opportunities to integrate learning and communication, helping students strengthen the skills they need to succeed at Waterloo and beyond.  

 

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Study links birth rates and prosperity

St. Paul’s University College Professor Teferi Mergo has co-authored a new global study conducted in 40 countries and published in the leading U.S. journal Science. The study confirmed that while a moderately low birth rate can boost a country’s overall standard of living, high fertility in some parts of the world continues to adversely affect overall prosperity.

“Our study shows that it is still advisable for governments to encourage people to have fewer children in countries with high birth rates,” said Teferi Mergo, also an adjunct professor in Economics at the University of Waterloo.

Led by researchers at the East-West Center in Hawaii and the University of California, Berkeley, research partners in 40 countries correlated birth rates with economic data and concluded that a moderately low birth rate of around two children per woman or less can actually boost a country’s overall standard of living.

Governments generally favour somewhat higher birth rates to maintain the workforce tax base needed to fund pensions, health care, and other government benefits for the elderly. Yet “higher fertility imposes large costs on families because it is they, rather than governments, that bear most of the costs of raising children,” said UC Berkeley Economist and Demographer Ronald Lee, one of the lead authors of the study. “Also, a growing labour force has to be provided with costly capital such as factories, office buildings, trucks, and houses to live in.”

Lee and East-West Center economist Andrew Mason co-direct the National Transfer Accounts project, or NTA, which studies how population changes impact economies across generations. Working with NTA network co-authors worldwide, they based their calculations for the study on finding the birth rate and age distribution that strikes the best balance between the costs of raising children and of caring for the elderly.

Their results challenge previous assumptions about population growth. For example, they found that the fertility rate in the U.S. and many other countries is nearly ideal for overall standards of living, but that birth rates in parts of Asia and Europe are so low that they reduce living standards when public and private costs are included.

 

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International Open Access Week is upon us

International Open Access (OA) Week 2014 takes place the week of October 20 to 26. This year's theme, "Generation Open" focuses on the impact that students and early-career researchers can have in shaping the Open Access movement.

This week, the University of Waterloo Library will be hosting events to highlight the challenges and opportunities that Open Access presents to researchers.

Topics to be discussed include:

• Emerging federal funding agency OA requirements for funded research;
  
• open data; and
  
• trends in research data management

Visit the Open Access Week 2014 schedule for a full listing of events.

 

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Senate meets today and other notes

The University's Senate will be holding its October meeting today. The meeting's agenda includes the second reading of the the draft revised and consolidated Senate bylaws and the approval of a draft policy on research centres and institutes that defines them, outlines the scope of their activities, and their required governance and reporting structures "in order to support and facilitate the attainment of excellence and realization of their missions."

Senate will also be asked to approve new minor plans in digital arts communication and technical writing, a new technical writing specialization, a new specialization in global literature, a new specialization in applied history, a new Global Interactions specialization, and a new specialization in "revolution, war and upheaval," all in the Faculty of Arts. Senate will consider revisions to academic plans for Drama and Speech Communication, Political Science – Arts and Business, the School of Optometry and Vision Science, and several plan inactivations.

Senate will hear a report from the Fall Break Task Force on the proposed fall break (up the street at Wilfrid Laurier University, the first trial fall break is currently underway), an update on the Strategic Plan, and a presentation by Duane Cronin, executive director of WatCAR, and professor of Mechanical & Mechatronics Engineering.

Occupational Health is inviting all high risk staff and faculty to attend early flu clinics. The clinics are scheduled as follows:

• Monday, October 20 - 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
• Tuesday, October 21 - 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
• Wednesday, October 22 - 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.

In the past, the definition of "high risk" faculty and staff has included persons 65 years of age or over, adults with diabetes or other metabolic disease, chronic cardiac or respiratory conditions (asthma), cancer, obesity, kidney disease, blood disorders or anyone whose immune system is weakened, people who live in the same household as, or are in close contact with, a person who is at increased risk of the flu’s more serious effects, uWaterloo Police and Daycare workers.

The clinics are located in Health Services Room 1101. No appointments are necessary. Participants should remember to bring their health card, wear a loose-fitting shirt, and be prepared to stay at the clinic for 20 minutes after their injection.

Finally, a note from Jacqueline Martinz of the United Way campaign: "There is still time to donate to the University of Waterloo United Way Campaign. Your contribution will be used by the organization to make a difference in the community. The United Way Kitchener Waterloo and Area has three main focuses: From Poverty to Possibility, Healthy People, Strong Communities, and All That Kids Can Be. Last year, over 6000 people improved their standard of living through United Way programs dedicated to literacy and enhancing employment related skills. A staggering 48,803 people managed mental health issues and over 7000 youth developed new friendships while getting involved in activities through a wide range of roles.

The goal for the 2014 campaign is $250,000. Imagine how many people in the region that amount could help, and how many lives would be transformed for the better. More information on how to contribute is available online."

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