Thursday, August 15, 2024

Volunteers needed for campus move-in

A message from Campus Housing.

As September quickly approaches and with nearly 6,000 students planning to live on campus this fall, Campus Housing is still looking for eager staff, faculty, students, and alumni who want to welcome students to their new home. 

We have over 100 volunteer shifts still available to support move-in. Your support would make a big difference for our new students!   

Move-in volunteer details: 

Campus Housing move-in will take place between Thursday, August 29 and Sunday, September 1. 

• Volunteer for a few hours or as many shifts as you’d like!  

• View roles and shifts on the volunteer sign-up form. (Tip: Toggle on “hide shifts that are full” to see what's still available)
• Questions can be directed to movein@uwaterloo.ca.

Highlights for volunteers: 

There are many ways to support move-in; from helping students navigate campus, to welcoming students and families in parking lots, to supporting students with belongings. If you sign up as a general volunteer, you can let the team lead know how you are most comfortable supporting the event.  

Don’t want to volunteer alone? Sign up with a friend or even a group as a team-building activity.  

New this year: every parking lot will have a Campus Housing staff member in a team lead role to ensure every volunteer is supported throughout the process.  

ATMs and other digital self-serve devices fail to meet accessibility needs, say researchers

A news release from the Media Relations team.

Most self-service interactive devices — kiosks, ATMs and other digital interfaces — don't measure up to the accessibility needs of Canadians who report to have a disability, a new study has found.

In partnership with the CSA Group (Canadian Standards Association), University of Waterloo researchers interviewed people with lived experiences of disability and received an overwhelming consensus that most self-serve devices have little to no accessibility features or they have trouble finding them.

More than one-quarter of Canadians aged 15 years and older identify as having a disability, according to the 2022 Canadian Survey on Disability.

"Regardless of one's ability level, it's important that people are able to use these devices correctly with minimal distress and have a consistent experience with access to consistent features," said Gaya Bin Noon, PhD candidate at Waterloo's School of Public Health Sciences and the study's lead author.

Common concerns expressed by participants included the protection of personal information, privacy and security and the consistency and usability of these devices.

Participants also cited that their ability to use a self-service device is undermined if they need to seek assistance from a staff member, in addition to their concerns about revealing personal information.

"Independence is a big one for me," said one participant. "It's really important to be able to accomplish a task on your own independently, especially if it's something confidential."

One solution found in this study was to pair personal devices, or smartphones, to compensate for any accessibility shortcomings in self-service devices. A personal device would minimize the need for alternative accessible technology while maintaining privacy and security.

"Many smartphones already have personalized accessibility features attached, with screen readers and all of the user's personal data already loaded in," Bin Noon said. "They would be guaranteed to have something that they are familiar with and that works."

Another theme in the researchers' interviews with participants was the need to broadly promote accessible features and increase accessibility training for on-site staff. Participants noted that users frequently seek out accessibility information on company or organization websites, making it especially important that online resources clearly state any self-service devices' accessibility features.

Waterloo researchers hope this study can help shape guidelines on optimal safety and usability for manufacturers of self-serve devices.

"We're also trying to raise awareness as to what the gaps are and how it affects people who are just trying to live their lives, like going to the bank, encountering airport border control, ordering sushi or checking in at their doctor's office," Bin Noon said.

The study, Concerns regarding the accessibility of self-service interactive devices for people with disabilities, was recently published in Disability and Rehabilitation: Assistive Technology. Co-authors include Bin Noon, Dr. Plinio Morita, students Luka Ugaya Mazza and Gillian Morgan from Waterloo's School of Public Health Sciences, as well as Stephanie Singh and Dragica Jeremic Nikolic from the CSA Group.

P-Card activities moving to Concur this Friday, August 16, 2024

Starting Friday, August 16, 2024, P-Card purchase coding, submitting, reviewing, and approval activities will transition from CentreSuite to Concur, the University’s existing expense reimbursement system.

Did you know there are approximately 700 P-Cardholders and Approvers across campus? This transition will consolidate several of our existing purchasing processes/systems aimed at providing a better overall end-user experience when utilizing the P-Card. This means P-Cardholders and P-Card Approvers will now be working with fewer systems, and will perform these routine P-Card activities within a system that is familiar to campus. This will effectively reduce the number of systems users needs to use or know how to use.

During the transition, P-Cardholders and Approvers may need to access both Concur and CentreSuite to finalize July 16 - August 15 reports. New P-Card activities for the weeks of August 16 - September 15 should be reported in Concur. Easy access to both systems can be found on the P-Card website.

A few key things to know:

• Finalized CentreSuite reports are due by August 25 and the first Concur reports will become due to P-Card Approvers on September 20. Finalized reports are due to Finance by September 25, 2024.
• A new training module, entitled Finance P-Card Training, is available in LEARN self registration. P-Card Training is encouraged for all new and existing P-Cardholders and Approvers. Successful completion of the P-Card training and quiz will be tracked in Workday.
• The P-Card Manual and P-Card Training website have been refreshed.
• Please ensure all prior CentreSuite reports are saved outside of CentreSuite by December 31, 2024, as access to CentreSuite will be removed.

For full details, please visit our CentreSuite to Concur Transition website for project updates or send us your questions to our Finance Jira Portal, and we are happy to assist.