Friday, December 11, 2015

On Monday, these ideas must die

On Monday, December 14, the University of Waterloo's Cognitive Science program will examine what concepts and theories are blocking progress in understanding mind, brain, and intelligence as they celebrate This-Idea-Must-Die Day.

 

What ideas are on the chopping block? A number of presenters from across campus will make the case for their eradication:

 

• Autism as Disability, Brian Cozzarin, Management Sciences
• Character Trait, Igor Grossmann, Psychology
• Conceptual Metaphor, Randy Harris, English
• Deep Learning, Chrysanne DiMarco, Computer Science
• Digital Dementia, Marcel O’Gorman, English
• Fusiform Face Area, James Danckert, Psychology
• High Precision Tool, Daniel Berry, Computer Science
• Memes, Paul Thagard, Philosophy
• Minds are Internal, John Savarese, English
• Nature vs. Nurture, Heather Henderson, Psychology
• Right and Wrong, Jeff Orchard, Computer Science
• The Right Level, Chris Eliasmith, Philosophy and Systems Design Engineering
• Taking the Average, Terry Stewart, Theoretical Neuroscience
• Unbounded Rationality, Jesse Hoey, Computer Science

Additionally, a $100 prize will be awarded to the student who best identifies two or more ideas that deserve to die together. Fun stuff!

An update to the orientation planning process

a message from the Orientation Advisory Committee.

It wasn’t that long ago that the Orientation Advisory Committee, along with numerous on-campus departments as well as thousands of student volunteers, put together a fun-filled week of activities and information sessions to help our new students transition to life on campus. With the holiday break quickly approaching, the Orientation Advisory committee has already been hard at work to develop a new Orientation week program that now includes two days of classes. With the Fall break in place, the committee has the unique opportunity to review Orientation week programming.

The Orientation Steering committee has asked the Orientation Advisory Committee to lead the development of a new orientation program and has laid out expectations on how to move forward in developing the best program possible for our students.

The expectation from the Orientation Steering Committee is that a new orientation program be created that:

• Is developed collaboratively with broad consultation with students, staff, faculty and campus partners,
• Reflects the mission of Orientation Week and also considers this orientation as a pieces of a larger student transition process,
• Is based on best practices, research, and understanding of a successful first-year orientation experience,
• Ensures a continued positive student leadership opportunity for upper-year students,
• Works from the best elements of previous Orientations, while leveraging this opportunity to develop a program that responds to the current needs of the campus community.

The Orientation Advisory Committee will be leading the way in the creation of Orientation Fall 2016 that will fulfill this mandate. Working with an external facilitator, we will be using a collaborative, strengths based process to understand the best of the past and design our way forward together.

The Orientation Advisors in each faculty will be inviting key staff, faculty, and students from their area to participate in these discussions and help to develop a new orientation program that draws on their past experiences and perspectives from participating in Orientation week. Planning sessions will continue throughout January, involving all collaborative partners with the result of a new schedule for Orientation 2016 developed by the end of the month.

The process over the coming months will help to ensure we create a revised orientation program that meets the needs of the current campus community and links to the larger student transition process, and we look forward to connecting and receiving input from our campus partners along various stages of this process. 

Remembering Jack Adams, Waterloo's first storyteller

Jack Adams, the University of Waterloo's first public relations and communications director, died December 8.

The son of a Brampton newspaper publisher ("Howdy" Adams of the Brampton Gazette), Adams attended the University of Toronto and began a career in trade and business magazine publishing before moving to Hamilton to edit the in-house staff magazine for Canadian Westinghouse. He then became a partner in a public relations consulting firm, and it was from there that he began working with the University of Waterloo in 1959 as a public relations consultant, acting as a link between the fledgling university and the community that surrounded it.

In January of 1961 Adams was hired full-time as the University of Waterloo's first director of public relations, and quickly coined the title Information Services to describe the work of his department, which at the time was a two-person operation.

"Jack set the model of openness and responsiveness that was the university's communications practice for many years afterwards," recalls colleague Chris Redmond, who Adams hired in 1973.

Adams' responsibilities included maintaining media relations with newspapers, radio and TV stations, putting outside reporters in touch with news at the University and issuing news releases about University activities, and finding speakers for community groups, developing special publications (like the alumni-focused Quarterly, forerunner to today's Waterloo Magazine), and providing communications advice to University officials.

"Information Services is filling a need to communicate to the community what is happening at a large institution providing a great many services to the public, both through its academic programs and the research it does," he once told the Waterloo Chronicle. "Universities are very people-oriented and there is a need to keep the public informed as to what they're doing."

Adams was short in stature and his shock of white hair led local media to refer to him as the "silver-maned Jack Adams" whenever he was out in the community promoting the University. He was known for his enthusiasm and kept a klaxon horn with a rubber bulb on his office desk, which he would squeeze whenever things got boring, keeping his colleagues on their toes. 

Information Services was later rechristened Information and Public Affairs, becoming Communications and Public Affairs in 2003 before being renamed Marketing and Strategic Communications in 2014.

Adams was also put in charge of The Gazette, a mimeographed newsletter established in November 1960 as a source of news for faculty and staff.

A newspaper for students, The Chevron, already existed at that time and from the point of view of the University's administration it was getting entirely too good at its job, often getting out ahead of the University on breaking institutional news and framing stories in a way that was both professional and brazenly disrespectful.

So, at the behest of President Gerry Hagey, who had himself been in public relations before becoming a University president, Adams oversaw the re-imagination of The Gazette into a weekly tabloid paper that would be available to students, faculty, and staff. The newspaper's new format debuted in the spring of 1969, and was unique for a house organ in that it had a large degree of editorial independence. It appeared weekly on Wednesdays, a schedule chosen in part to preempt the Chevron's Friday publication date. The Gazette proved to be a model for similar publications produced by universities across the country. 

In January 1984, Adams took on the role of Consultant, University Relations, and was responsible for special projects involving the University's public image. He retired in 1985.

Adams' involvement with the University was matched only by his involvement with the community, and he was active with both the chambers of commerce in Waterloo and Kitchener, the Arthritis Society, the K-W Figure Skating Club, and the Doon School of Fine Arts. He played a major role in the development of the Rink in the Park skating facility on Seagram Drive (now the Granite Club).

"He had been largely responsible for establishing the university's relationships with the local community in which it was growing so rapidly, and he knew everybody on campus and off," writes Redmond. "He also threw off bright ideas the way holiday firecrackers throw off sparks." Redmond recalls that Adams' morning cry was "Hey, you want a great story for the paper?" 

A reception for family, friends and colleagues will be held on Sunday, December 13 from 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. at the Henry Walser Funeral Home in Kitchener.

His family is establishing a new scholarship in his memory that will support studies in digital media, recognizing and rewarding full-time students entering their fourth year in the Global Business and Digital Arts program at the Stratford Campus. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made through the funeral home to the Jack Adams Memorial Scholarship.

He is survived by his wife Helen and daughters Judith and Catherine, who are both Waterloo alumni.

Adams was 91.