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Convocation is an exact Science today
The University's 116th Convocation is at the halfway mark today, and as we’ve seen this week so far, Convocation brings out all of Waterloo’s decades of tradition and celebration. We often start thinking about our own Convocation traditions, and President Hamdullahpur is no exception:
Today, the Faculty of Science celebrates its graduating students with two Convocation ceremonies.
Morning ceremony details
The first ceremony takes place at 10:00 a.m. as 404 undergraduates, 30 Master's, and 17 PhD candidates cross the stage to receive their degrees.
Bearing the mace will be Bruce M. Greenberg, professor, Department of Biology. Birgit Moscinski will sing the national anthem.
Curtis J. Richardson will receive an honorary Doctor of Science degree. Richardson is the John O. Blackburn Distinguished Professor in the Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences at Duke University. He earned his PhD in ecology from the University of Tennessee and shortly thereafter joined the faculty at Duke University where he has remained for most of his career. His research emphasizes phosphorus and metal biogeochemistry, and focuses on natural and restored wetlands as nutrient sinks and chemical transformers. He has addressed some of the most important wetland issues of our time, including long-term studies on the effects of nutrient phosphorus additions in wetlands in Michigan, Pocosin peatland losses in North Carolina, the restoration of the Everglades of Florida, and the globally endangered wetlands in southern Iraq. His recent book on “Methods in Biogeochemistry of Wetlands” will be a standard and required reading for all students for decades to come.
His stature in the field is exemplified by his list of recognitions having received nearly all that exist for wetland scientists: he was elected President of the Society of Wetland Scientists, the world's largest society for wetland science, and eventually was given its Lifetime Achievement Award. As well he has been elected a Fellow three times, each by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Soil Science Society of America, and the Society of Wetland Scientists. Probably the most prestigious of all is his National Wetland Award for Science Research from the Environmental Law Institute, a large national non-governmental organization focused on bringing together government decision-makers, scientists, journalists, and business leaders.
Jake Fisher of the Department of Chemistry will receive the Distinguished Teacher Award. Fisher is a Lab Instructor in Chemistry and is renowned for his teaching by his students and colleagues alike. One of his undergraduate students remarked that “his course notes are the most well written and in-depth course notes I’ve come across during my undergraduate career. Jake is always welcoming and willing to help, his open-door policy for asking help ensures that students fully understand. You can tell that teaching is not just a job for him, but a passion.” Fisher was also recognized for his patience by a graduate student: “I remember going to him with the same problem multiple times and he was always as patient as he was the first time. Patience is his character trait. It’s also great to know that someone as knowledgeable as Dr. Fisher is positive about the student’s growth and success.” Fisher’s approach to mentorship extends his impact to the Chemistry Department as a whole, as noted by a colleague: “Jake mentored me in such a way that I felt like I was responsible for supervising my students and not just simply ‘keeping an eye on them.’” Jake Fisher has had the honour of receiving the 2011 Excellence in Science Teaching Award.
Richard Nguyen will give the valedictory address.
Ryan Robert Ferguson will receive the Alumni Gold Medal.
Kianna Wan will receive the Governor General’s Silver Medal.
German Augusto Gómez Ríos will receive the Governor General’s Gold Medal for the highest academic standing in a doctoral program. His citation reads as follows:
“Ideas start here at the University of Waterloo”, and German is one of the exceptional graduate students who got several of them executed. German’s passion for the development of novel sampling technologies towards the rapid determination of important chemical substances in biological, environmental, forensic and food samples is directly proportional to his achievements.
German’s research in direct sample interface to Mass Spectrometry has reached national and international academic and public awareness. He has co-authored more than 30 peer-reviewed journal articles, 4 patents, and participated in several interviews for radio, television and press as well as more than 20 oral presentations at international conferences. German has already achieved a publication and citation record that is worthy of a junior faculty. No surprisingly, German has been awarded the Graduate PhD Seminar Award and the Bruker BioSpin award by the Guelph-Waterloo Centre for Graduate Work in Chemistry and Biochemistry in 2014 and 2015, respectively.
He is also the recipient of the Journal of Mass Spectrometry Award by the International Mass Spectrometry Foundation in 2016 for his contributions to this field. His research is extremely insightful and establishes new foundation that will be further exploited practically during the coming years by industrial and academic laboratories.
Afternoon ceremony details
The second ceremony takes place at 2:30 p.m. 312 undergraduates, 8 Master's, and 13 PhD candidates will receive their degrees. The mace-bearer is Heidi Swanson, assistant professor and University Research Chair, Department of Biology. Julie-Anne Desrochers will sing the national anthem.
Bernard Glick will be named Distinguished Professor Emeritus. Glick earned his BSc in Chemistry from City College of New York, followed by his MSc and PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Waterloo. After postdoctoral training at the University of Toronto and the National Research Council, Professor Glick spent three years as a Group Leader in an early biotechnology company before returning to Waterloo for a 35-year career as a faculty member. He is internationally recognized as a pioneer in plant-microbe interactions with over 260 research publications. His seminal textbook on Molecular Biotechnology is still widely used around the world.
Jo Handelsman will receive an honorary Doctor of Science and will address Convocation. Handelsman is Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professor and Frederick Phineas Rose Professor in the Department of Molecular, Cellular & Developmental Biology at Yale University. Professor Handelsman is a leading researcher in the field of microbial metagenomics, particularly of environmental samples. Her publication record in leading journals in her field as well as Nature Reviews, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and others, attests to her international profile in this area, as does her recent election as president of the American Society for Microbiology. She combines research excellence with strong teaching in science: at Yale, she established the Center for Scientific Teaching and has published widely on importance of education in science, including three books about teaching.
Further, she has been successful in promoting mentorship, especially of women in science. At Wisconsin and prior to joining on at Yale, she established the Women in Science and Engineering Leadership Institute, and subsequently served on the National Academies' panel that wrote the 2006 report Beyond Bias and Barriers: Fulfilling the Potential of Women in Academic Science and Engineering. As a result of her activities in education and mentorship, Professor Handelsman was appointed the first president of the Rosalind Franklin Society.In 2011, she was one of 11 individuals selected by President Barack Obama to receive the Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring, and in 2012, Nature named her one of the “ten people who mattered this year” for her research on gender bias in science.
Caroline Frances Illmann will deliver the valedictory address.
Additional awards and honours for Science
In addition to the awards and honorary degrees that will be conferred at today's Convocation ceremonies, several students will also be recognized for their outstanding academic achievements.
Receiving the Dean of Science Award for recognition of creative research as presented in a student’s Master’s thesis will be:
- Patrick G. Pumputis, Biology;
- Neil G. Raymond, Chemistry;
- Jennifer Mead, Earth and Environmental Sciences;
- Viquar Unnisa Begum, Optometry and Vision Science;
- Daniella Calderon-Nieva, Pharmacy; and
- Allison Sachs, Physics and Astronomy
The following students will receive the W.B. Pearson Medal for recognition of creative research as presented in a student’s Doctoral thesis:
- Maricor J. Arlos, Biology;
- Jason Tao, Chemistry;
- Taylor Maavara, Earth and Environmental Sciences;
- Ian Erkelens, Optometry and Vision Science;
- No Recipient, Pharmacy; and
- Elizabeth Gould, Physics and Astronomy
Finalists will make their Problem Pitches today
To be a successful entrepreneur, it is essential that you find a problem to solve, and thoroughly understand the scale of the problem. The larger the problem, the larger your profit could be. That’s why Velocity and the Problem Lab have teamed up again to host the Quantum Valley Investments® Problem Pitch Competition, where teams of students were tasked with the challenge of identifying important industry problems and conducting research, before pitching their findings for the chance to win a share of up to $7,500 in funding.
Six teams were selected as finalists from forty-three applicants, and they will each make a five-minute pitch on their research to a panel of judges today, competing for $5,000 (1st place) and $2,500 (2nd place) in funding.
Both teams will also have the opportunity to double their funding following the event, as they work with the Problem Lab to develop a solution to the problem identified. This term, the finalists have identified problems ranging from the complexity of next-generation medicines to large-scale data theft. The finalists and the problems they’ve identified are:
- Aerosmart: During emergency landings, pilots may be forced to dump fuel from their planes to reduce weight and land safely. This release of jet fuel has economic, safety and environmental impacts that need to be solved.
- Axtra: The flaws of modern computers and the resulting issue of large-scale data theft and destruction.
- FoodLinks: The opaque nature of agricultural supply lines to both retailers and consumers.
- Membio: The unprecedented complexity of next-generation medicines has made them impossible to manufacture at scale preventing the commercialization of cures to many detrimental diseases.
- PriveHealth: Big data in healthcare has the potential to impact millions of patient lives but is highly susceptible to security breaches.
- ReceptiSense: Foodborne illnesses affect 1 in 10 people globally because consumers do not have a reliable method of detecting spoilage levels of food costing billions from lost time at work and medical expenses.
The Spring 2018 Quantum Valley Investments® Problem Pitch Competition will be held from 7:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. tonight in Room 105 in (AL) Arts Lecture Hall.
Attendees from the university and the broader community are all welcome to watch the pitches. The audience (that means you) will decide which team wins the 3rd place People’s Choice Award! Please register to attend.
Bike Month rides into its second week
Bike Month is off to a great start at the University of Waterloo, according to a note from the Sustainability Office. "Over the first week, 181 bike trips were logged by over 50 employees and students across campus. Together, these cyclists saved 235 kg of CO2 emissions and rode over 1,000 km! The Bike Challenge runs until June 30, with chances to win prizes from the Sustainability Office and TravelWise. For more information, visit the Bike Challenge webpage. To show their appreciation, the Sustainability Office tagged over 600 bikes across campus with thank you notes, and will continue to tag bikes this week."
"On June 20, join the Sustainability Office for Bike Lunch at the Peter Russell Rock Garden (between MC and QNC) from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. Bring your bike by for a free tune-up, grab some free food and check out booths from campus and community groups!"