Thursday, February 25, 2021

Virtual event will celebrate and showcase Black excellence

The Government of Canada declared February as Black History Month 25 years ago. Led by the Honourable Jean Augustine, the first Black woman federal cabinet minister, Black History Month is a time dedicated to sharing, celebrating and honouring the impact of Black heritage and culture. 

Although a quarter-century has passed, the importance to recognize Black excellence remains just as significant. 

In the spring of 2020, the world was angered and united in the wake of brutal acts of racism across North America. In June, the University of Waterloo solidified their plans to engage the campus community in addressing racism on campus by introducing the President’s Anti-Racism Taskforce (PART). On Friday, February 26, PART will host their first event called “Rooted in history – a celebration of Black history as Canadian history”. 

Comprised primarily of Black, Indigenous and People of Colour (BIPOC) members, PART dedicates its work to ending systemic racism and holds itself to guiding principles towards realizing a more inclusive environment. 

“Transparency, conversation and engagement within the campus community are key,” says Feridun Hamdullahpur, president and vice-chancellor. “We want to ensure that this level of transparency is met by amplifying the voices of the BIPOC community, learning and growing from lived experiences.” 

Highlighting music from local Canadian-Caribbean vocalist Rufus John, keynote remarks by Member of Provincial Parliament for Kitchener Centre Laura Mae Lindo, and a panel discussion hosted by Kathy Hogarth, special advisor to PART and professor with the School of Social Work at Renison University College, the event will celebrate the achievements of Black Canadians and members of Waterloo’s Black community. 

“This event is a historical moment for the University of Waterloo, affirming its commitment to confronting and addressing racism in its midst,” Hogarth says. “These moments of all communities coming together to celebrate BIPOC excellence offers rich spaces for dialogue and potential for change — change that is so desperately needed through the institution”. 

PART has expanded its website to include a new page that recognizes Black History Month, stories of Black excellence, and will promote in the weeks to follow various events related to anti-racism and updates of their work.   

To find out more about the Rooted in History event happening Friday, February 26 at 1:00 p.m. visit the PART website.

2020 Tax slips now available

Human Resources has announced that T4/T4A forms for 2020 are now available via Workday in the Pay > Tax Documents section. Each T4/T4A file contains two pages, the tax form data for 2020 plus the filing instructions on the back of the form.

“If you worked for multiple companies during the year (for instance the University of Waterloo and one of the University Colleges), or if you switched from a temporary to a permanent position, you may have more than one tax form,” says the memo from Human Resources. “Please be sure to access all forms for the tax year.”

In addition, some employees will be able to access a T2200S form (Declaration of Conditions of Employment for Working at Home Due to COVID-19) through Workday. These forms are not located with T4/T4A slips in the Tax Documents section of Workday but rather in the Personal > Documents section.

“It is your responsibility to determine whether you meet Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) eligibility rules and only deduct the expenses for which you are eligible when filing your personal income tax return,” says the memo from Human Resources. “If you wish to deduct expenses, you are advised to review the CRA’s publications and/or seek advice from your personal tax advisor, as the University does not provide personal tax advice. Finance has published additional information regarding the T2200S form on the *Update* 2020 Personal Income Tax Forms Related to Working from Home due to the COVID-19 Pandemic web site.”

T2200S forms have been published for those employees who are presumed to have worked from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic, full-time or part-time, for more than 50 per cent of the time for a period of at least four consecutive weeks during 2020 between March 16, 2020 and December 31, 2020. Human Resources notified employees who have a T2200S form in Workday through email.

Additionally, 2020 T4A tax forms for scholarships/bursaries issued through Student Finance will be available in the finance section on Quest by Sunday, February 28.  

“T4/T4A forms (including those for student scholarships/bursaries) for 2018 and prior years are available” through Workday in the Personal > Documents section, the HR memo continues. 

Employees can access Workday from the Human Resources homepage, or by going to the following link: https://wd3.myworkday.com/uwaterloo/d/home.htmld. Employees must be registered for 2 Factor Authentication (2FA) in order to access Workday. 2FA registration questions can be directed to IST at helpdesk@uwaterloo.ca.

Please contact payroll@uwaterloo.ca for support if you do not have access to Workday or have questions regarding accessing your tax forms.

BlackBerry investing in Indigenous students through new awards program

by Beth Bohnert, Office of Advancement.

A new awards program launched by Waterloo tech giant BlackBerry aims to help Indigenous students overcome one of the biggest challenges they face in obtaining a university education — sustainable financial support.

“Many people have the misconception that all Indigenous students receive full funding from the federal government for post-secondary education,” says Robin Stadelbauer, indigenous initiatives coordinator in the University of Waterloo’s Indigenous Initiatives Office.

In reality, the federal government’s Post-Secondary Student Support Program provides a limited number of education dollars to Indigenous communities for distribution to qualified applicants. What’s funded and who receives funding can vary from community to community and from year to year, depending on the money available. In addition, only status First Nations and Inuit students can apply for this funding.

The BlackBerry Scholars Entrance Award will provide several awards of up to $20,000 per student, paid over eight academic terms. Status and non-status First Nations, Inuit and Métis individuals are all eligible.

"Over the past 30 years, thousands of University of Waterloo students and graduates have helped to build our company and turn it into one of the world’s most recognized and celebrated technology brands,” said John Chen, Blackberry’s executive chairman and CEO. 

“We’re thrilled to once again expand our relationship with the University of Waterloo to support Indigenous students with the BlackBerry Scholarship Award, helping them reach new heights as they begin their post-secondary careers. Any one of them could very well turn out to be a world-changing inventor or leader and with this investment we’re proud to help pave the path for their future success as part of Waterloo’s campus-wide Indigenous strategy.”

“These awards are significant because they provide a reliable source of funding over the course of a student’s university career,” Robin says.

She encourages Indigenous students beginning their first year of studies at Waterloo this fall to apply for a BlackBerry Scholars Entrance Award before the April 15 deadline.

Mapping the globe and creating a better world

By Etta Di Leo. This article was originally featured in the Global Impact Report.

University of Waterloo alumni Yuanming Shu (MSc ’10, PhD ’15) and Shuo Tan (MSc ’10) are changing how we map the world — by capturing more detail quickly and at less cost. They’ve co-founded Ecopia AI (Ecopia) with a vision to use artificial intelligence (AI) to digitize and label everything — every detail on Earth — and then have it constantly update in real-time. 

“We want to capture as much detail of the physical world as possible so companies, humanitarian organizations, governments and citizens can better understand and interact with their environment,” Shu says. “If Google Maps is the first generation of digital mapping, we are creating the second generation.” 

Ecopia’s mapping technology uses data from satellites, mobile phones, drones and air imaging sensors. The information-rich picture of our world can be used by governments and industry to better plan and power applications such as smart cities, real estate, insurance, autonomous driving, and augmented reality. 

While Ecopia has been creating 2D maps for the past few years, the team recently advanced their AI-based systems to create and update 3D maps at a continental scale.  

“Traditionally, creating and maintaining large 3D maps was extremely expensive, which limits the number of applications,” Tan says. “With this advancement, Ecopia is able to significantly reduce the cost and enable the massive adoption of 3D maps across many applications.” 

Empowering the world’s largest humanitarian organizations

Ecopia’s technology is perfectly suited to help organizations build for a future where data and information empowers us to make better decisions. Ecopia provides maps that help inform our social landscape to best provide services such as vaccines and clean energy to developing countries that have been left off of out-of-date traditional maps. 

“With accessible, up-to-date data, end users can accelerate decision making to enable a more significant impact on a local, regional, or national level,” Shu says. “A few examples of how the digital maps are being used include disaster preparedness, response and recovery, vaccine delivery, malaria elimination and health surveillance and informing field operations.” 

Ecopia has partnered with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC) and Maxar Technologies to create comprehensive digital maps of sub-Saharan Africa. The image collection, which began in late 2019, has mapped 417 million buildings, 17 million linear kilometers of roads and 582 hectares of forests across 51 countries.  

This mapping has helped empower Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the worlds largest humanitarian organization to give Tanzania’s government critical life-saving data they need for vaccine distribution, population mapping and disaster response. 

The company is now focused on updating the digital maps for all 51 African countries and the project is set to launch officially in 2021. 

Navigating a pandemic to stay on course

While the COVID-19 pandemic has created challenges for Ecopia, it has also allowed the company and its founders to think differently.  

“The pandemic taught us to think outside the box,” says Tan. “It has allowed our teams to refocus internal resources around new product development and existing product refinement. We’ve also been creative around how we attract new customers.” 

The company has also managed to grow despite the challenges and has been named as a recipient of the Deloitte Fast 50 and the Deloitte Fast 500 for the last two years in a row.  

“We were really surprised by how much a small team can do with AI,” Shu says. “We are a 40-person company. We’ve never raised capital, and we grew our business organically. However, our team has mapped over 40 million square kilometers of land across more than 100 countries. With the further advancement of AI, I think it will become a trend to see more and more small teams do big things with AI.”  

The company has ambitious plans for international expansion and continued market growth. Over the past year, Shu and Tan have seen the need for increased global connectivity. They see digital maps enabling that connectivity. 

“We’re constantly finding new applications for international expansion,” Shu says. “We’re very uniquely positioned to lead the market and are actively hiring to expand the team and execute on our mission to digitize the world using AI.”