About Waterloo Engineering

A global leader in engineering education and research

When local entrepreneurs established our university, with Engineering as the founding faculty, they approached the task from a business perspective, knowing creativity and innovation were the keys to problem solving. Co-op education, as we now know it, was born. 

Waterloo Engineering at the University of Waterloo is Canada’s largest engineering school and a pipeline for top engineering talent to the world’s leading companies. Ranked among the top 50 engineering schools in the world, our reputation for excellence is built on the foundation of co-op education and a bold history of innovation.

We are renowned as a university that embraces differentiation. We are trailblazers, laying the ground work for others to follow – the most sought after engineering school in Canada.

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The epicentre of technology talent

The Waterloo Engineering Strategic Plan 2020-2025 has embedded at its core a commitment to diversity and equity throughout all programs, policies and processes, with particular emphasis on under-represented communities. During these tumultuous times, that commitment is more important to us than ever.

Waterloo Engineering offers 15 bachelor degree programs, including degrees in emerging multidisciplinary areas such as architecturalbiomedicalenvironmental engineering, management engineeringmechatronics, and nanotechnology.

All undergraduate programs are 100% co-op, more than 7,600 co-op positions are arranged for students annually. Each year, we graduate the largest number of engineers at both the undergraduate and graduate level in Canada. 

In 37 graduate degree programs, including course-based and research masters, and doctoral studies, our graduate students benefit from a robust and innovative research environment.

The University of Waterloo is one of the world’s top technology schools…[attracting] prominent faculty members from around the world as well as Canada’s top engineering and computer science students.

New York Times

We are proud of our reputation for leadership, innovation, and excellence

$86.8 million+

in Research Funding in 2019/2020

8 NSERC Design Chairs

and Industrial Research Chairs

100% ownership 

Unique, inventor-owned intellectual property policy

195

Industry Partners

Mary Wells headshot

Mary Wells
Dean of Engineering

Mary Wells is Dean of Engineering at the University of Waterloo (July 1, 2020 - ), the ninth dean since the Faculty was founded in 1957. From 2017-2020, she was Dean of the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences at the University of Guelph.

Biography of Mary Wells →

There is an undeniable reputation throughout tech of the kind of engineering talent that comes out of the University of Waterloo. The students here are probably going to be the business leaders of this century.

Alexis Ohanian, Co-Founder, Reddit