Every year, one student from each faculty is presented with a Co-op Student of the Year Award for exceptional contributions to one or more of their work term employers. These awards take place towards the end of the winter term and celebrate student achievements from the winter, spring and fall terms of the previous calendar year.
Congratulations to all Co-op Student of the Year Award recipients.
2019 Co-op Student of the Year Award recipients
Yasmeen Mihad Razvi
Health Studies, Faculty of Health
Employer: Odette Cancer Centre at Sunnybrook Hospital
- Recognized for her Spring 2019 work term, where she served as a Clinical Research Assistant at Sunnybrook’s Odette Cancer Center.
- Initiated a study analyzing the accuracy of survival predictions for patients seen in palliative clinic; manuscripts were accepted into Supportive Care in Cancer and Annals of Palliative Medicine.
- Co-initiated a review of radiation doses to the heart and lung of approximately 5,000 patients seen at the Odette Cancer Center spanning from 2011 to 2018.
- Created a literature review on the lack of adherence of clinicians to treatment guidelines which was published in Supportive Care in Cancer and cited and shared by researchers around the world.
Taylor Legere
Peace and Conflict Studies, Faculty of Arts
Employer: Intact Centre on Climate Adaptation at the University of Waterloo
- Recognized for her Winter/Spring 2019 (8-month) work term, where she served as an Operations Coordinator at the Intact Centre on Climate Adaptation for the University of Waterloo’s Faculty of Environment.
- Created the "Three Steps to Basement Flood Protection Infographic" which has been shared broadly across Canada.
- Developed an app mock-up for her team that provided residents with a customized action list on how to reduce their flood risk.
- Promotes both co-operative education and her area of study to incoming students by participating in open houses and orientation.
Eric Jihoon Song
Biomedical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering
Employer: Maisha Meds
- Recognized for his Spring 2019 work term, where he served as a Software Developer at Maisha Meds.
- Worked on a core Android Application that allowed customers in Kenya to buy the pharmaceuticals they needed.
- Improved the old application by redesigning the basic data models within the app to target user complaints, help with future scalability and ensure full backward compatibility.
- For his capstone, he is interested in the effects of how the sub-Saharan African climate influences the effectiveness and quality of pharmaceutical drugs in East Africa – a notable problem for the public in this region.
David Pau
Planning, Faculty of Environment
Employer: Region of Waterloo’s Transportation & Environmental Services
- Recognized for his Spring 2019 work term, where he served as a Student Planner for the Region of Waterloo’s Transportation & Environmental Services department, focused on development for Grand River Transit.
- Helped successfully launch the largest transit infrastructure project in Waterloo Region’s history: the ION Light Rail Transit.
- During the launch process he identified and fixed an error, that previously inflated the number of bus riders by approximately 35%, to increase the accuracy of bus rider data in an annual region-wide report.
- Spoke to over 20 Canadian transportation professionals at the 2019 Unified Mobility Summit about his contributions to the GRT as a co-op student and the benefits of co-operative education as whole.
Keer Liu
Computer Science, Faculty of Mathematics
Employer: Slack Technologies Inc.
- Recognized for her Spring 2019 work term, where she served as a Software Infrastructure Intern at Slack Technologies Inc.
- Performed a data migration from Slack’s old database to a more reliable database which resulted in reduced costs and improved efficiency and quality.
- De-provisioned the old database which saved a large amount of server maintenance money and improved the database quality, saving engineers from operational overheads.
- Organized the 2018 UW Engineering Hackathon, hosting more than 300 students and over 10 organizations at the event’s Job Fair, promoting student-employer connections.
Lydia Vermeer
Biochemistry, Faculty of Science
Employer: Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre
- Recognized for her Winter and Spring 2019 (8-month) work term, where she served as a Genetic Counsellor Assistant at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in the Cancer Genetics department.
- Prepared a 40-page document along with numerous supporting materials for the development of a new format of genetic counselling and testing for breast-cancer that is physician-initiated.
- Helped curate a database of clinic patients with mutations which involved comparing 4,000 mutations to online databases to ensure they were entered in standard notation.
- Rewrote the student manual to ensure a smoother transition into the workplace for future successive Waterloo co-op students.