Wednesday, November 21, 2018

President's Town Hall Meeting today

Join the conversation and attend the President's Town Hall Meeting this morning in Federation Hall. The event begins at 10:30 a.m.

Attendees will have the opportunity to hear from the President as he speaks about the and shares his vision for the year ahead, and engage in a dialogue with the President and members of the University's senior leadership.

Submit your questions by email to townhall@uwaterloo.ca, on social media with the hashtag #uwth, on the livestream chat or live at the event.

A luncheon will follow from 12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m.

If you can't make it in person, watch the event live online.

On-campus celebration planned for Donna Strickland

The University community is invited to celebrate Professor Donna Strickland as she prepares to travel to Stockholm to formally receive the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2018.

The send-off celebration will take place on Thursday, November 29 in the Science Teaching Complex's Main Commons from 3:30 p.m. to 5:00 p.m., with remarks beginning at 4:00 p.m. 

Dean of Science Robert Lemieux will speak and introduce President Feridun Hamdullahpur, who will then introduce Professor Strickland. Following Professor Strickland's remarks, the chair of Physics and Astronomy, Brian McNamara, will wrap things up.

There will be a special guest book for people to add their best wishes. 

Light refreshments will be served.

Register today.

In addition, mark your calendars for 10:30 a.m. on December 10 to join the on‑campus viewing party of the ceremony marking Professor Strickland’s outstanding achievement.

Quest project update: summary of initiatives

A message from the Student Information Systems (SIS) Steering Committee

In our last project update (May 2018), we noted that the focus of the multi-departmental team supporting Quest would shift from updating and enhancing the system, to completing client-facing work that would result in tangible benefits for students, faculty and staff across campus.

Over the past four months, the Quest support team has completed several improvements in support of this goal. A summary of this work, including the benefits to our campus community, are outlined below. We are proud of these accomplishments and are pleased to offer clients a more robust and reliable service that improves workflow processes and transactions, and provides students greater self-service functionality.

Summary of work

Initiative: Apply to graduate (graduate students)

Improvement: Provide the ability for grad students to apply to graduate within Quest.

Benefit: Self-serve, online option rather than a paper document.

Status: Complete

Initiative: Net Estimates (required change)

Improvement: Meeting governmental requirements to provide students with an estimate of financial aid with their offers.

Benefit: Provides better information to applicants about the funding they will receive allowing them to make a more informed decision.

Status: Complete

Initiative: CIBC International Payments

Improvement: Improve processes for receiving international payments into Quest.

Benefit: Funds are received and processed more quickly; eliminates manual data entry errors. During the fall term, over $8 million was received.

Status: Complete

Initiative: OSAP e-confirmation of enrolment (phase 1)

Improvement: Improve disbursement processes and receipt of OSAP payments.

Benefit: Significantly improves accuracy and reduces the time it takes to disburse OSAP payments to students.

Status: Complete

Initiative: Self-service Proof of Enrolment letters

Improvement: Improve accessibility to Proof of Enrolment forms.

Benefit: Self-service, online option for downloading form at no cost (in most instances) to students. There have been ~31,500 letters run since mid-July and ~1,000 fewer students waiting in line to complete this request at the start of term. 

Status: Complete

Initiative: International English Language Testing System (IELTS) enhancements

Improvement: Copy IELTS from OnBase to Quest to enable them to be used in evaluating applicants.

Benefit: Eliminate manual data entry of IELTS results saving approximately 500 hours of coding and eliminating manual data entry errors.

Status: In functional testing phase

Initiative: Workday interfaces

Improvement: Replaces transfer of information between myHRinfo and Quest.

Benefit: Allows us to continue to process interactions between the two systems.

Status: Final testing of two remaining interfaces

Initiative: Critical patch updates

Improvement: Application and complete system testing of security updates to the underlying PeopleSoft technology.

Benefit: Supports strong security to protect student information.

Status: Primary testing complete; migration to production planned for end of Nov 2018

Contact the SIS Steering Committee

If you have requests or ideas you would like to share, we are happy to hear them and encourage you to speak to a member of the SIS Steering Committee:

• Graduate Studies and Postdoctoral Affairs: Jeff Casello
• Information Systems & Technology: Bruce Campbell, Daryl Dore, David Kibble
• Registrar’s Office: Cathy Newell Kelly
• Finance: Patricia Hancock

Stuff the Warrior Van drive begins; other notes

'Tis the season: The Stuff the Warrior Van Toy Drive launches on Saturday, November 24 outside the CIF Arena for the Women's Hockey vs. Queen's Gaels game at 2:30 p.m.

A collaboration with Community Relations and Events, UW Police, the Waterloo Regional Police, UW Parking Services and the Knights of Columbus, the toy drive donates toys to children of all ages ranging from infant to 16 years old. This year the Toy Drive runs from Saturday, November 24 until Friday, December 21.

Other stops for the Warrior Van include the President's Holiday Luncheon at 12:00 p.m. outside Federation Hall.

Drop off toys at the Columbia Ice Field Equipment Desk Monday to Sunday (9:00 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.), the Physical Activity Complex Main Office Monday to Friday (9:00 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.) and UW Police Services - Monday to Friday (9:00 a.m. - 4:30 p.m.)

Representatives from the University of Waterloo celebrate being named one of Canada's Top 100 Employers at the Fairmont Pacific Rim Hotel in Vancouver on November 19.

A delegation from the University of Waterloo was on hand in Vancouver this Monday to pick up the Canada's Top 100 Employers award at the Top Employers Summit at the Fairmont Pacific Rim Hotel.

The University of Waterloo has been named one of Canada's Top 100 Employers for three years in a row. Canada's Top 100 Employers is an annual ranking of businesses and organizations across the country who lead in attracting and retaining employees. The results are published in a special insert in the Globe & Mail and online.