Thursday, November 16, 2017

Partnering with the world

by Michelle Pressé. Waterloo is celebrating International Education Week with a variety of on-campus activities, as well as a series of stories showcasing some of the international experiences of our students, faculty, and staff.

By partnering with leading universities, institutions, and corporate/industry partners around the world, the Waterloo Institute for Nanotechnology (WIN) has been able to establish its science and engineering research at the atomic scale on a global scale.

Lisa Pokrajac, Assistant Director of Research Programs for WIN, provides higher level management of the institute’s programs and helps identify funding to promote the University as a strong nanotechnology leader and find some of the world’s best and brightest talent. She also assists WIN faculty members with creating and fostering international partnerships. So far, the nine-year-old institute has research and educational collaborations with 19 nanotechnology institutions and programs in Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Israel, Japan, Poland, Taiwan, and the United Kingdom.

While the majority of Lisa’s work is domestic, she has travelled to China, Taiwan, and the United Kingdom to help promote WIN.

“It’s extremely rewarding to have the opportunity to work in an environment that focuses so heavily on internationalization,” says Lisa. “Coming from a multinational background myself, I understand the need to pay attention to cultural differences. It’s important to know how you should speak to someone with a different cultural or linguistic background than your own.”

Learning about a country’s cultural customs before visiting is a great way to ensure diplomacy. For example, being too direct with someone in one country could be seen as offensive, while not being direct enough with someone in another country could cause them to lose interest in the conversation and potential partnership.

One of WIN’s most recent partnerships is with the University of Bristol. In June 2017, a Memorandum of Understanding for Educational and Scientific Cooperation between Bristol and Waterloo was signed. This MOU allows opportunities to further explore possibilities for co-operation in training and research in science and engineering, highlighting the areas of nano and quantum science and technology, while developing a strong joint-graduate student training and research program.

“Having international partnerships with some of the world’s top nanotechnology universities, institutions, and industries allows students and researchers to build and maintain invaluable networks,” says Ian Rowlands, Associate Vice-President, International. “Collaborating with global partners allows WIN to move one step closer to its vision of becoming a global centre of excellence for nanotechnology and its applications.”

Lisa says these partnerships allow Canadian researchers, as well as budding and established entrepreneurs, access to larger markets (particularly Asia, Europe, and South America), and that having access to international markets opens up larger funding opportunities and networks.

International industry partners are also crucial to WIN, and often identify needs in other parts of the world.

“Clean, fresh water is a great example,” says Lisa. “While we – in Canada – take clean water, in abundant quantities, for granted, not everyone in the world has access to safe water supplies. By working together, across borders, we can create solutions that benefit everyone.”

Record number of co-op students interviewed this fall

by Jacqueline Gergal

A record-breaking 13,909 co-op students met with employers during the first ten days of main round employer interviews at the Tatham Centre this fall. That’s a 15 percent increase in interviews (including in-person, phone and web-based) over last year. On October 19, more than 1,700 interviews took place, breaking another record for the most interviews in one day.

“This main round, we saw and felt a volume and an energy we’ve never seen before,” said Grace Wong. “Our in-person employers alone paged for 15,167 students over the 19 day period, as compared to 11,573 last term. This term was the first with a fully operational fourth call centre, and we certainly maxed out all the space we had!” 

Even with all of these interviews, the response time from when a student is paged to when they are on their way to their interview is under two minutes.

“We have an efficient system here,” said Baltej Parmar, a co-op student helping out with interview day services. “With so many employers and students we are prepared for anything. Even if our system went offline we have all of the interview times, students and employers printed out on sheets of paper.”

The number of employer information sessions increased as well; for winter 2018, 62 organizations are already registered, which is and increase from approximately 50 at the same time last year. Both employers and students enjoy networking at the University of Waterloo, and seeing what opportunities are available.

With continuous interviews around the corner, the team at the Tatham Centre will be preparing for the next round of interviews which started this past Monday.

Pop-Up HR coming soon to campus

A message from Kenton Needham.

Have you heard? Human Resources is working on initiatives that support continuous improvement within our department and will allow us to provide better service to campus.

Since we moved to East Campus, we’re often told that it’s hard to get to our office. That’s why we’re creating opportunities to come to you. This month, we’re conducting a pilot for our Pop-up HR initiative. Pop-up HR will allow us to provide a better experience to University employees by setting up somewhere on campus and being available to answer HR questions on-site.

You’ll also be able to book private one-on-one meetings with an HR representative while we’re there. This initiative is a direct result of feedback we’ve received from the HR Satisfaction Survey and focus groups.

Pop-up HR details:

• November 21 in the new atrium in the expanded B.C. Matthews Hall building, from 9:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
• December 1 in the Tatham Centre, from 9:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.

Stop by the HR tent, or contact Raghda Sabry if you have any questions or would like to book a one on one meeting with an HR representative.

Take the President's Town Hall Survey and other notes

If you attended the President's Town Hall Meeting on Tuesday, November 14, or even if you didn't, please take a few moments to fill out the President's Town Hall Survey, which will assist University Communications in gathering your feedback on the annual event and in making improvements to the format, presentation, and proceedings.

The survey will be available until December 1 on the new Qualtrics platform.

After 30 years in the same location in Carl Pollock Hall, the Engineering Undergrad Office is moving to Engineering 2. On November 24 and 25 they will be moving to their new digs in E2-1772.

To facilitate the move, the office will close at noon on November 24.

And there are more changes afoot for the Engineering footprint - first floor rooms in E2 will undergo renumbering, but not until May 1, 2018, with the undergraduate office being the exception.