Tuesday, April 24, 2018

LEARN update scheduled for this Thursday

The student and instructor views of the Waterloo LEARN Daylight interface.

A Message from Information Systems & Technology (IST).

A significant user interface update to Waterloo LEARN will be taking place this week.

What is changing?

Just before the Spring term, Waterloo LEARN will move to D2L's newest user interface (its “look and feel”), called Daylight. There will be no downtime. However, users logged into Waterloo LEARN while the update is being applied will notice changes to the look and feel.

We recommend that instructors avoid updating their grades in LEARN during the changes. An announcement will be posted once the update has completed.

Why are we making the change?

The move to the Daylight look and feel is required by the vendor, D2L. Waterloo LEARN will benefit from a new responsive design, meaning a more consistent experience across devices. While the look and feel is changing, there are no functional changes to tools within Waterloo LEARN. For general information on D2L’s new look and feel see https://www.d2l.com/user-interface/.  

When are we updating Waterloo LEARN?

Due to exams being rescheduled to Wednesday, April 25, the LEARN update to Daylight has been moved to Thursday, April 26 at 8:30 a.m. to allow students to complete their exams without disruption.

To see samples of the new navigation, please visit the Learn Help page.

Equity, inclusivity, and diversity celebrated at reception

2018 award winners with Waterloo Mayor Dave Jaworsky and MPP Catherine Fife.

This article was originally published on the Faculty Association of the University of Waterloo (FAUW) website.

There are so many people working to make Waterloo a more inclusive place that the Faculty Association’s Equity Committee presented four Equity and Inclusivity Awards this year instead of one.

“We found that we had to break the tradition of selecting only one winner,” said Faculty Association president Bryan Tolson on behalf of Equity Committee chair Weizhen Dong at a reception on April 18. There were simply too many nominees whose “actions have made our community a better place.”

The honourees’ remarks affirmed this sentiment, recognizing the support and contributions of networks of students, staff, and faculty across the University.

“The work I do is only possible because I am surrounded by people who value equity and inclusivity, and live and work consistently with those values,” said award recipient Christine Logel. Logel is an associate professor of Social Development Studies at Renison and champion for marginalized students whose work on social-belonging interventions have had tremendous positive, lasting impacts among women in engineering.

Fourth-year psychology student Sarah Wiley echoed Logel, saying: “There are so many people working in our community to make this a campus where we can all be successful, including my fellow award winners here today.” Wiley was recognized for local, provincial, and national advocacy work in areas including sexual assault prevention and funding for Indigenous students.

Recipients also highlighted the ongoing nature of equity and inclusivity work. Women in Computer Science (WiCS) has contributed to an increase of women in computer science at Waterloo from 11 percent to 22 percent over the last 10 years. “This is a remarkable increase,” said Jo Atlee, Professor and Director of WiCS, “but the representation of women in Computer Science is still less than it was in the past, and it is less than it is in many other countries, so there is still work to do.” (Some of this work will be funded by a recently-announced grant from Google!)

Architecture graduate students Samuel Ganton, Amina Lalor and Paniz Moayeri accepted the award for Treaty Lands, Global Stories (TLGS), an initiative that has pushed the School of Architecture to broaden its curriculum to incorporate the contributions of other cultures and worldviews. They, too, acknowledged that this work will be ongoing, noting that “curricula are never finished; they're living, breathing creatures that will forever need tending to.”

Both TLGS members and Wiley spoke about passing the torch to other student leaders. “I hope to have laid some of the groundwork for new activists to continue to shift the tides at the University of Waterloo,” Wiley said. “We must imagine the impossible. We must learn to dream and then fight for that dream. All of us have a part to play in creating a campus, and a world, of peace and equality.”

Diana Parry, associate vice-president human rights, equity and inclusion; Mayor of Waterloo Dave Jaworsky; and MPP Catherine Fife were also present to celebrate the award recipients.

Generation SDG summit continues today

A version of this article appears on Waterloo Stories.

The Generation SDG (Sustainable Development Goals) Summit is taking place from April 22 to April 25. It is the fourth in the Waterloo Global Science Initiative’s summit series, including Energy 2030 (2011), Learning 2030 (2013) and OpenAccess Energy (2016).

The summit aims to bring different disciplines, generations, and geographies together to develop implementation towards the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Among the goals: the need to end poverty, ensure inclusivity an equitable education, promote sustainable economic growth and decent work for all, and promote peaceful/inclusive societies for sustainable development.  This summit series is held in Waterloo every two years.

“We cannot wade tepidly into the problems that face our world. We must be bold. We must be creative. And, we must be collaborative,” said Feridun Hamdullahpur in his introductory remarks. “WGSI and the Generation SDG Summit is an opportunity to come together, share ideas in an open and frank way, and develop a practical roadmap for achieving long-term prosperity through science-based initiatives. I hope and believe we can do just that.”

Over the three days, members will develop a cohesive Canadian narrative, clearing pathways to catalyze implementation of SDG’s in Canada and abroad. Particular focus will include: 1) The development of a subnational framework for implementing the SDG’s; 2) Uncovering catalytic actions to accelerate process on all SDGs; 3) Delivering equity-based actions that address marginalized populations; 4) Identifying areas where Canada has an outsized commitment to the global community (example: permafrost, coastline, surface fresh water); 5) Recognizing areas where Canada can provide global leadership.

The next public event held as part of the Generation SDG proceedings will take place tonight at 7:00 p.m., with a public lecture by Dr. Ingrid Waldron of Dalhousie University on environmental racism and the politics of waste.

Get your free tickets to the event at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics.