Wednesday, February 17, 2021

Black History Month is a time for reflection and celebration

This is the latest post from President Feridun Hamdullahpur's blog.

Black History Month is a time for reflection and celebration. It is also a time to learn, collaborate and act for needed systemic changes inside and outside of our community.

Highlighting our Black community and areas for positive change

There is greatness in our diversity. We welcome exceptional people from around the world to our campus and into our community on the merit of their ideas, determination and perseverance. Waterloo’s Black students, faculty, staff and alumni – some coming to our institution from outside Canada, and others whose roots go back to the very beginnings of this country – continue to be an integral part of our strength as an institution and as a community. We have been highlighting some of their accomplishments and contributions throughout this month.

It’s clear from my conversations with Black members of our community that the protests and calls for action of 2020 did not come out of nowhere. The emotion, the anger and the frustration that we have seen since the horrendous killing of George Floyd has been simmering for centuries. Now is the time for change and so many in our community have stepped up to help create that change through the President’s Anti-Racism Taskforce (PART), and I thank them from the bottom of my heart.

Progress should not take generations to manifest

I am excited by the progress we have made already through the dedicated actions of PART.  The Community Collaborative driving PART forward has advanced discussions of a new Black Studies program and discussions regarding a dedicated cultural centre focused on education, teaching and inclusion within our community. There is much more to come from this powerful and talented group.

It is wonderful to see our Faculties and other departments on campus also advancing anti-racism, equity and inclusion in our community through discussions, actions and the needed investment in staff and support. It is the right thing to do and benefits everyone in our community.

In the spirit of collaboration, learning and open dialogue, I look forward to the Rooted in History: A Celebration of Black History as Canadian History event on February 26.

This event is an excellent opportunity for our community to come together in celebration, to be inspired, be educated and be introspective as we consider our own role in creating a more inclusive and empowering community at Waterloo. I encourage our entire University to join us as we take in performance, a keynote address and a panel of some of our most formidable thinkers in celebration of Black History in Canada and those trailblazers making history at Waterloo right now. Registration for this event will open in the very near future.

We’ve seen in the past that you cannot simply will racism away through nice words. Highlighting Black History Month and the contributions of our Black community members is a wonderful place to start, but it is important to integrate everything great and progressive about this month into our everyday actions.

Please join me in taking the celebrations and reflections of this important month forward to strengthen Waterloo and all of its community members.

President updates campus as Waterloo goes back into the red

Effective Tuesday, February 16, Waterloo Region transitioned out of the provincial shutdown and into the Red – Control zone of the province’s revised COVID-19 response framework.

President Feridun Hamdullahpur has updated the University community about the impact of this change.

"This allows us to gradually resume some teaching, research and other operations in line with our safe and staged return to campus," President Hamdullahpur wrote in a memo circulated to employees on Friday. "We expect to return to our operating levels from before the holiday break when the provincial stay-at-home order began on December 26."

In-person course activity will begin after reading week on February 22 for courses that were originally scheduled to be in person this term but were moved online because of the stay-at-home order. Essential courses that continued in-person throughout the shutdown at a reduced capacity of 10 students can return to original class sizes. The Office of the Registrar shared more information and instructions with instructors of in-person courses on Tuesday, February 16. You can find a list of these undergraduate and graduate courses on the COVID-19 website.

Courses originally scheduled to be online this term will continue online.

Some research activity that was suspended due to the shutdown will resume. The Office of Research shared more details with faculty and researchers on Tuesday, February 16.

Travel between regions of the province, especially from areas in Red - Control or Grey - Lockdown status, should be limited to essential purposes.

Student residences remain open as normal. 

Some Food Services outlets will begin to reopen after reading week with limited seating. Visit their website for hours.

Athletics facilities will reopen, but will be limiting the number of people who can use facilities at the same time.

Print + Retail Solutions will remain closed for in-person shopping for now. Limited locations may open on March 1, as the situation allows. Curbside pick-up service will continue.

On Monday, February 22 the Davis Centre Library will re-open for studying, with limits on occupancy. The Library’s Special Collections & Archives will also re-open on an appointment basis. See the Library’s website for hours of operation.

Designated study spaces will reopen for individual study on Monday, February 22.

In-person general office activity may resume for those activities that were permitted prior to the provincial stay-at-home-order. You will hear more from your leaders or department heads about your specific area’s plans. If you have been working from home, continue to do so until you hear from your supervisor or leader.

"While I am pleased to move out of the shutdown and resume some operations, we must remember that the Red – Control zone still means stringent measures to contain the spread of the virus remain in place. We should stay at home as much as we can, remain diligent and continue to do our part by following all government and University safety protocols."

"It is also important as we continue working in pandemic conditions to remember to seek support if you need it, and to continue to take care of yourselves and each other."

New research shows we can train ourselves to be wise

This article was originally published on Waterloo News.

While distanced self-reflection is an ancient technique, the new study provides evidence-based insight into how this method fosters wisdom in daily life. 

“Particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic, resolving social conflict is an important skill, but people often fail to reason wisely when conflict arises, so we designed a simple intervention to help them,” said lead author Igor Grossmann, professor of psychology at the University of Waterloo. “Our findings provide the first empirical evidence for the trainability of wisdom in daily life when working through challenging interactions.” 

Wisdom—or wise reasoning—is defined by the researchers to include intellectual humility, appreciation of different ways uncertain situations could unfold, consideration of and attempts to integrate diverse viewpoints.

For this study, the researchers conducted experiments with a total of 555 participants from English-speaking parts of North America to test a method for promoting wisdom in the context of daily real-world experiences.

In one experiment, participants were instructed to keep a month-long diary in which they reflected from a distanced third-person perspective on one daily interpersonal conflict experience. For instance, a participant wrote about themself in the third person by picturing themselves in the conflict and asking, “Why is [their own name] feeling or behaving this way?” Participants in the control groups used first-person reflection or were given no direction on how to reflect. Compared to these controls, the experiments using distance third-person reflection promoted wiser reasoning over time. 

“This increase in wise reasoning occurred because distanced self-reflection broadened people’s typically narrow self-focus,” said Grossmann. “The benefit of the practice was particularly pronounced in the participants’ ability to show intellectual humility and acknowledge others’ perspectives as a means toward conflict resolution. 

Illustrating an application of wise reasoning today, Grossmann points to the COVID-19 pandemic, covered by uncertainty, where there is often a conflict between protecting self-interests and civic duty toward vulnerable populations. “There is no universal answer here, as the recommendation may change depending on the specific context. According to philosophers, wise reasoning – recognizing limits of one’s knowledge, approaching the dilemma from multiple perspectives, trying to consider ways to resolve this dilemma via a compromise and considering both short and long-term consequences—may be one way to gain deeper insight into the fit of recommendations to a particular context.” 

The same characteristics were recently recommended by leading behavioural and social scientists in the World after Covid project, said Grossmann, a video database of scholarly reflections for pandemic survival and changes ahead.  

The paper, Training for Wisdom: The Distanced Self-Reflection Diary Method, was published in Psychological Science, and is co-authored by Grossmann with Anna Dorfman, Harrison Oakes, Abigail A. Scholer (University of Waterloo), Henri C. Santos (Geisinger Health System), and Kathleen D. Vohs (University of Minnesota).

Waterloo invites scholars to apply for 2021 AMTD Waterloo Global Talent Postdoctoral Fellowship

A message from Graduate Studies and Postdoctoral Affairs.

In fall 2020, the University of Waterloo welcomed four brilliant researchers as the inaugural AMTD fellows. The call for the next round of exceptional applicants launched late in 2020, with an application deadline of March 12, 2021. Application is by invitation of University of Waterloo researcher only – endorsement deadline is this Friday, February 19, 2021. The financial value of AMTD fellowship includes annual salary of $75,000 plus $7,500 engagement fund, plus access to additional dissemination fund.

More details, including eligibility criteria, the endorsement process and deadline are on the University’s AMTD Fellowship website. 

Grade 10 Family Night tomorrow and other notes

Grade 10 students and their supporters will be attending tomorrow’s Grade 10 Family Night information session where they will learn more about university admissions and financing details, as well as hearing from current students and a professor on things students wish they knew before applying to university. This is a great time for younger students and their supporters to learn about actions they can take now to prepare for university.

Registration is still open for the virtual event which takes place Thursday, February 18 from 6 to 7:30 p.m. on MS Teams Live Events.

The Centre for Bioengineering and Biotechnology (CBB), with support from the Faculties of Health and Engineering, has partnered with Praxis Spinal Cord Institute for their Ideation Challenge. The Praxis SCI Ideation Challenge is a new program "designed to support transformative commercializable concepts to improve the quality of life of people living with #SpinalCordInjury." 

You can register for the live launch on February 22 from 5:00 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. and contact cbb@uwaterloo.ca for support forming your team.

"Innovative technology can have a transformative impact on society," says a note from GEDI. "In our upcoming GEDIx: A 30-minute Exchange webinar, we’ll look at one of the ways the profusion of innovation at the University of Waterloo can be commercialized. This can lead to improved quality of life, enhanced business productivity, and job growth when technology is moved from research into the marketplace."

"Join us Tuesday, February 23, 2021 at 1:00 p.m. for a discussion with our Waterloo Commercialization Office (WatCO) and GEDI Exchange member Evercloak, as they delve into the benefits of commercialization through UWaterloo. Just 30 minutes of your time: 20 minutes for our guests to present new ideas, and 10 minutes for audience Q&A."  

For more information and to register for event, visit the GEDIx: A 30-minute Exchange website.

Employers on campus next week hosting employer information sessions include Open Text, Infosys, and The Miller Group. Make sure to register through WaterlooWorks and check the calendar for any updates.