Thursday, June 6, 2019

Celebrate the 2018 Outstanding Performance Award recipients

"I am very pleased to announce the award recipients for 2018, and would like to take this opportunity to congratulate them for their outstanding contributions to the University of Waterloo," writes Vice-President, Academic & Provost Jim Rush. 

Effective May 1, 2005, in accordance with the 2003 Faculty Salary Settlement, the University of Waterloo established an Outstanding Performance Fund to reward faculty members for outstanding contribution in teaching and scholarship.

Applied Health Sciences                               

Jack Callaghan; David Hammond; John Hirdes; Heather Keller; Ellen MacEachen (Stothers); Katie Misener; and Zara Rafferty.

Arts

Steven J. Balaban; Ramona Bobocel; Gary Bruce; Tara Collington; Martin Cooke; Tara Cooper; Shannon Dea; James Diamond; Michael Dixon; Christopher Eliasmith; Anna Esselment; Myra Fernandes; Francisco Gonzalez; Daniel Gorman; Randy Harris; Eric Helleiner; Shelley Hulan; Margaret Insley; George Lamont; Emmett Macfarlane; Patricia Marino; Andrew McMurry; Christine McWebb; Timothy Paci; Barbara Schmenk; Abigail Scholer; Anindya Sen; James Skidmore; Daniel Smilek; S. Lynne Taylor; Nancy Vanden Bosch; and Christina Vester.                        

Engineering

Kankar Bhattacharya; Donald Burn; Clifford Butcher; Eric Croiset; Krzysztof Czarnecki; Samir Elhedhli; Ali Elkamel; Monica Emelko; Xianshe Feng; Bruce Hellinga; Jan Huissoon; Jane Hutton; Andrew Levitt; Shavin Malhotra; John McPhee; Kevin Musselman; Stephen Smith; Mark Smucker; Ehsan Toyserkani; Mihaela Luminita Vlasea; Derek Wright; Alfred Yu; and Weihua Zhuang.             

Environment                               

Richard Kelly; Luna Khirfan; Brendon Larson; Markus Moos; Stephen Murphy; Andrew Trant; and Michael Wood.                        

Math                             

Christopher Batty; Daniel Brown; Steven Furino; Kevin Hare; Jesse Hoey; David Jao; Lila Kari; Achim Kempf; Jochen Koenemann; Lap Chi Lau; Anita Layton; Christiane Lemieux; Jimmy Lin; Xinzhi Liu; Wayne Oldford; Vern Paulsen; Stefan Steiner; David Tompkins; and Ruodu Wang.

Science       

Nandita Basu; Carey Bissonnette; Paul Craig; Jean Duhamel; Andrea Edginton; Heidi Engelhardt; Scott Hopkins; Patricia Hrynchak; Norbert Lutkenhaus; Roger Melko; Graham Murphy; Cynthia Richard; Rebecca Rooney; Donna Strickland; Benjamin Thompson; and Christopher Yakymchu.

New features for Waterloo Photos

A message from Information Systems & Technology.

IST is pleased to announce the launch of two new features for Waterloo Photos, the central digital asset management system: On the fly access and Waterloo Content Management System (WCMS) integration.

On the fly access  

• The "on the fly" feature will allow Waterloo employees to access the Waterloo Photos service without needing to submit a request for access, and without needing to belong to an established (Waterloo Photos) org unit. On the fly access will allow these users to view assets that are in the View and Download Only access level (i.e. no restrictions on download and use).  

WCMS integration

• Digital assets from Waterloo Photos can now be added to many of the content types within the WCMS (e.g. Web page, Blog, Person profile) when using the Listing page image or Upload an image upload options in the supported content types. 

For more information on Waterloo Photos, please visit the Waterloo Photos website.  

For help using Waterloo Photos, please visit the WCMS website.

Milestones marked at new Alumni Weekend

By Claire Mastrangelo.

Last Saturday afternoon, Federation Hall filled with exuberant tales of love and misadventure. More than 200 Waterloo alumni and guests attended a celebratory lunch in honour of their 25^th, 50^th and 55^th anniversaries of graduation. Many had returned to campus after years away — in some cases as long as five decades — in order to reconnect with old friends and relive treasured memories.

“Alumni make Waterloo the special place that students know and love today,” said Hannah, a student speaker from the Faculty of Environment.

“So many of our favourite experiences at Waterloo are only possible because of our alumni’s continued connection,” added Kenique, an Arts student. 

The anniversary lunch was part of Waterloo’s new Alumni Weekend. Hosted by the Office of Advancement, the day-long event drew 1,350 Waterloo graduates to the University. Alumni took part in more than 25 activities across our campuses, including tours, games, talks and meals.

 “We wanted to create opportunities for alumni to reconnect with Waterloo and each other,” says Sonya Bastedo, Alumni Officer, Outreach. “It’s been really wonderful to see such an enthusiastic response from our grads. Many brought in their old leather jackets and mementos from their time here; it’s clear that Waterloo is really special to them.

“I’d like to thank everyone who helped to make this event a success,” she adds. “We had a terrific team of staff and volunteers who created the best possible experience for our alumni. I’m already looking forward to working with them again next year.”

Update on organizational change at the Centre for Teaching Excellence

A message from the Centre for Teaching Excellence (CTE).

The Centre for Teaching Excellence is pleased to share with our university community that as of July 1, 2019, we have been approved to make a few changes to our organizational structure:

• All job titles that include “instructional developer” will change to “educational developer”;
• Trevor Holmes will become CTE’s Associate Director, and all 5 remaining Senior Educational Developer positions will report to him;
•  Mary Power’s new title will be Senior Educational Developer, Faculty Programs, and she will manage all faculty programs;
•  Mark Morton’s new title will be Senior Educational Developer, Inquiry & Communications, and he will manage all research-related programs and services along with communications from CTE;
• Katherine Lithgow’s new title will be Senior Educational Developer, Integrative & Experiential Learning;
• Veronica Brown’s new title will be Senior Educational Developer, Curriculum & Quality Enhancement; and
• Svitlana Taraban Gordon’s new title will be Senior Educational Developer, Graduate Programs & Internationalization.

These changes represent the first phase of revising our organizational structure in response to the external review that we did in 2017.  One key goal was to significantly reduce the operational load on the Director position to make more time for strategic and organizational-level work. 

This change should accomplish that, and position the Centre for ongoing success.

Any questions should be directed to Donna Ellis, CTE’s director.