Thursday, April 30, 2015

Previous | Next

• Reception recognizes winners of awards, honours
• Waterloo subjects rank amongst the world's top 50
• RefWorks accounts to migrate to new servers
• Tobacco control talk and other notes

Reception recognizes winners of awards, honours

Steven Mock, Karla Boluk, and Troy Glover – all from the department of Recreation and Leisure Studies – were among the awardees recognized at the 2014-2015 Recipients of Distinguished Awards and Honours reception held on Tuesday, April 28.

Professor Mock received an Early Researcher Award from the Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation, Professor Boluk was honoured with an Overall Inspirational Teaching Award from the Ulster University Students’ Union, and Professor Glover received The George Butler Lecture from the Academy of Leisure Sciences and the William Evans Visiting Fellowship from the University of Otago.

The reception, hosted by the Office of Research at the University Club, honoured more than 90 researchers who received an award or honour during the 2014-2015 year.

Waterloo subjects rank amongst the world's top 50

Three subjects at the University of Waterloo rank in the top 50 in the world and eight other subjects rank among the top 100, according to results published today.

The rankings, published by UK firm Quacquarelli Symonds (QS), put Waterloo 20^th in the world for its work in Mathematics and 24^th for Computer Science – second amongst Canadian universities in both subjects. Waterloo is also ranked 48^th in the world for Geography.

Social science subjects of Psychology and Sociology at Waterloo join the list of subjects ranked in the top 100. Waterloo is again ranked in the top 100 for Civil Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Environmental Sciences and Statistics and Operational Research. Architecture, a new subject ranked by QS, and Mechanical Engineering complete a list of 11 subjects in the top 100.

“Universities know that rankings like these are not a perfect science, but they are a helpful guide to the kind of company that we are keeping,” said Feridun Hamdullahpur, president and vice-chancellor of Waterloo. “These results show that in many disciplines the University of Waterloo is a force for innovation alongside some of the most recognizable world names in academia."

QS ranks close to 700 universities worldwide in 36 disciplines. Waterloo is listed amongst the top 200 universities globally for 20 of the 36 subjects evaluated – with improved rankings in six subject areas. Waterloo ranked in the top three in Canada for five subjects and in Canada’s top five in 12 subjects.

“Mathematics and Computer Science at Waterloo are a cornerstones for the world-leading innovations for which our University and our region are known,” said Ian Goulden, dean of mathematics. “We attract outstanding students and faculty members from around the world and I am delighted that their hard work is reflected in these results.”

Geography at Waterloo rises into the top 50 in the world for the first time. The Department of Geography and Environmental Management is one of the leading Geography Departments in Canada with a strong commitment to the discovery, dissemination, and application of geographic knowledge focused on the complex interactions within and between the human and natural environments.

Waterloo Engineering is Canada's largest Engineering school. The Faculty works with more than 1,000 industry partners leading innovations in emerging areas including information and communications technology, advanced manufacturing, nanotechnology and smart energy.  The Waterloo Centre for Automotive Research housed in the Faculty has the largest concentration of automotive researchers in the country.

Waterloo also ranked in the top-200 for Philosophy, Chemical Engineering, Chemistry, Earth and Marine Sciences, Materials Science, Physics and Astronomy, Accounting and Finance, Business and Management Studies, and Politics and International Studies.

In 2014, Waterloo became one of only 11 universities in the world to earn a 5+ star rating in the QS Stars rating, which evaluates universities against over 50 different factors. QS introduced the star rating system to help future students make decisions about which school to attend, looking at criteria such as the employability of graduates, teaching, sports facilities, and many others.

RefWorks accounts to migrate to new servers

OnTuesday, May 5 at 12:00 p.m., all University of Waterloo RefWorks accounts will be migrated to RefWorks’ main servers in the United States.

There is an anticipated downtime window of several hours while the account data is migrated, during which time no one will be able to access RefWorks. All references, folders, attachments, and shares will be fully intact after the migration is complete. 

Once migrated, there will be a new URL to access RefWorks: http://www.refworks.com/refworks. A redirect will be put in place from the University of Waterloo Library’s website. Users will need to update any bookmarks/favourites.

Group codes are being eliminated and are no longer needed to access RefWorks accounts, however, unique login names are needed. Current login credentials will work, unless your current login name is already in use by another RefWorks user. If that is the case, you may receive a separate email notifying you of this with details on how to access your account and adjust your username. 

One of the benefits of moving to the RefWorks U.S. servers is that you can now take advantage of some updated features that were not available on the Canadian-based ScholarsPortal server, including the removal of the group code for log in. 

Write-N-Cite, now called ProQuest for Word, will need to be re-installed after the migration takes place. Users should uninstall their current version and go to Tools, Write-N-Cite, in their new RefWorks account to download the latest version of ProQuest for Word. Before installation of your new Word Plug-in, users should ensure that their computer has the latest update for the following programs:                                                

• Microsoft Word
• Java
• Visual Studio Tools for Windows

Users who wish to continue running Write-N-Cite III will have that option available.

The UWaterloo RefWorks team is available to answer any questions users may have about the migration. Feel free to let them know if any problems arise. Computing offices on campus have been notified of the migration, and if you use RefWorks on a University of Waterloo computer and Write-N-Cite is not working, please contact your system administrator.

The library offers hands-on RefWorks training sessions every semester.

Tobacco control talk and other notes

The International Tobacco Control Policy Evaluation (ITC) Project and the Propel Centre for Population Health Research will be hosting a presentation on tobacco control in Japan this Friday. 

Dr. Hajime Sono and Dr. Jun Sono from Tobacco-Free Advocacy Japan will speak on Friday, May 1 from 2:30 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. in BMH-LHN 2073 and will deliver a presentation about their efforts to support tobacco control in Japan, speaking about the goals and challenges of tobacco control advocacy and policy implementation in Japan, and their efforts to make Japan smoke-free before the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.

Dr. Jun Sono s a retired cardiac surgeon working as a civil servant and Director of the Nishinomiya City Public Health Centre, Dr. Hajime Sono is a visiting general practitioner and smoking cessation treatment physician in her clinic.

The presentation is sponsored by ITC, Propel, the Faculty of Applied Health Sciences, and the University of Waterloo.

All Retail Services outlets and Watcard offices will be closed today for inventory. They will reopen with regular hours on Friday, May 1.

The Centre for Teaching Excellence's (CTE) seventh annual Teaching and Learning Conference: Opportunities and New Directions kicks off today. This year's theme is "Making Teaching and Learning Visible: Clarifying and Communicating Teaching and Learning Processes" and the event promises to be an exciting day of presentations, panels and workshops.

Vice-President, Academic & Provost Ian Orchard will deliver opening remarks, followed by the President's Colloquium, delivered by this year's keynote speaker Dr. Linda Nilson, director of Clemson University's Office of Teaching Effectiveness and Innovation. 

Following the colloquium is a series of sessions on topics such as academic integrity, active learning, effective use of slideware, international learning experiences, and instructional design, to name but a few. In the afternoon is the Igniting our Practice session that will feature Troy Vasiga of Computer Science and Jonathan Witt of Biology, moderated by the CTE's Donna Ellis. 

A wine and cheese reception will close out the event.