The Daily Bulletin is published by Internal and Leadership Communications, part of University Communications
Contact us at bulletin@uwaterloo.ca
Submission guidelines
Engineering staff member develops new yoga program
This article is part of an on-going Campus Wellness Champions series.
Kathy Becker, a Teaching Development Associate in Engineering, remembers seeing advertisements for free yoga classes in the Daily Bulletin but could never manage to get to them because they weren’t offered on a regular schedule; by the time she found out about them, she already had other commitments in her calendar. She had the idea of creating a yoga series that staff could attend on a regular basis knowing that this could help improve her own and others' wellness. It wasn’t long before this was a reality, thanks to Kathy’s work preparing a successful proposal for the Staff Excellence Fund. The program runs every Wednesday at noon in the ENG 7 building in an area with lots of natural light with over 200 staff across campus who have benefited from this program at some point since its inception.
Kathy has heard from many participants about the impact of the series, “It makes them feel like a valued member of the university community, helps them alleviate physical tensions, and cope with stress in the workplace.” What she likes most about the series and its success is that she gets to meet so many people across campus that she would not have met otherwise.
The program has also had a ripple effect across campus, as she’s been contacted by others on campus who want to start additional yoga programs. Kathy has been a mentor to these staff members to help them get the program off the ground and shares her experience in how to run them successfully. There are now at least three other fully subsidized active staff yoga programs happening on campus regularly.
When we asked what she felt the impact her program had on the wider community she noted that “People need opportunities for wellness. People are very busy before and after work and lunch time is the perfect opportunity to support wellness.” Staff members who are well are also in a better mindset to help the students who need them.
The future of the program is something that Kathy thinks a lot about. The funding from the Staff Excellence Fund ends in 2020 and will need a reapplication and volunteers to help it grow. Kathy often gets faculty or students who would like to attend, but cannot because the funding comes from money allocated for staff. She would love it if the program could be offered centrally to make it accessible across the university and break down the silos between staff, faculty, and students.
Kathy’s story is one of many University of Waterloo community members who are finding new and interesting ways to foster wellness on campus. To find out more about the Staff Yoga Series on campus, visit their website. To learn more about how you can be involved in initiatives that aim to increase wellness in our community or read other inspiring stories, visit the Wellness Collaborative website. And if you’re a UW staff member with an idea for an activity that would support wellness for other UW staff, Kathy asks that you consider preparing your own application for funding – details are available at Staff Excellence Fund webpage.
Building the next WCMS project website
A message from Information Systems & Technology (IST).
Information Systems & Technology is excited to announce a new project website, Building the Next WCMS.
The WCMS is the centrally supported website creation and maintenance tool at the University of Waterloo and uses an open source product called Drupal as its foundation. The current version of our websites, or "WCMS 2", are built using Drupal 7 and will reach end-of-life in 2021, meaning it will no longer be supported by core maintainers with fixes, security releases, or enhancements. The next version of our websites, "WCMS 3", will be built in the next available version of Drupal, Drupal 8.
This project will manage the redevelopment of WCMS 3, and this new site will be used to share project information and updates on the work being done to "build the next WCMS".
Whether you’re a site manager, a content maintainer, or you simply browse Waterloo websites for content, your feedback and input as we build WCMS 3 is important to us. Visit the site to:
- Learn more about the initiative
- Review the current project timeline
- Read the Blog for updates from our web development team
- Submit any questions, comments, or feedback you may have about this work via the feedback form
We’ve posted two blog posts this month: an introduction to the project by Joe Kwan, manager, web development; and a summary of the WCMS user experience survey that was conducted earlier this year.
Questions or concerns? Please submit using the project feedback form or send directly to Joe Kwan.
Centre for Extended Learning welcomes new associate director
A message from the Centre for Extended Learning (CEL).
We are very happy to announce that April Philpotts will be joining us as our new Associate Director, Professional Development on August 22, 2019.
April has spent 22 years in the education and tech industries as a teacher, corporate training manager, and administrator, and is dedicated to helping individuals, companies and communities reach their potential.
Originally from an Arts & Education background, April began immersing herself in STEM focused organizations such as BlackBerry and Communitech halfway into her career in order to keep ahead in a rapidly changing technological world. April has worked closely with hundreds of individuals, industries, and community organizations to develop and lead market-led programs across a variety of areas including leadership and communication skills, sustainability-focused capacity building projects, and bridging programs for newcomer engineering and IT professionals to name a few.
April comes to us most recently from Humber College where she was the Director of Continuing Education for the Faculty of Applied Science and Technology, and oversaw a team responsible for continuing and community education, corporate training, and international programs. April was particularly successful in building strong relationships with community partners and clients, including the City of Toronto.
Under April's leadership we hope to see Waterloo Professional Development expand to include being a top leader in delivering industry-relevant, quality programming for an international community of lifelong learners.