The 2012 Waterloo Engineering Awards dinner held on November 22 honoured engineering's exceptional students, alumni and a friend of the faculty. More than 2,500 students received awards this year for everything from top marks to extracurricular activities such as leadership, community engagement, and involvement in athletics.
A number of awards were distributed at the event, including:
The Friend of the Faculty Award was presented to Maplesoft, a company established in 1988 as a spin-off, whose core intellectual property was developed from a University of Waterloo research project in symbolic computing.
The Team Alumni Achievement medal was awarded to PLANT Architect, Inc. The firm was launched in 1997 by Lisa Rapoport, Chris Pommer, and Mary Tremain, all graduates of the university's bachelor of environmental studies program and the School of Architecture.
The Young Alumni Achievement Medal was received by Gholamreza Chaji, (PhD '08, Elect), recognized as "a leader and innovator in the flat panel display industry" and president and CTO of IGNIS Innovation, a local company founded through technology invented at the university.
Two Alumni Achievement Medals for Professional Achievement were also handed out:
Ilia Kaufman (MASc '69, Elect; PhD '71, SD) was recognized for founding his own software consulting firm Kaufman Consulting Services Ltd., which has "become a world leader in both the art and science of computational linguistics."
Michael D. Watkins (BASc '80, Elect), was recognized for his work as a best-selling author on leadership and talent management, whose book The First 90 Days, Critical Success Strategies for New Leaders at all Levels was named one of the 100 best business books of all time."
"I wish all our award winners the very best and I look forward to their future accomplishments!" wrote Engineering Dean Pearl Sullivan in a memo that was distributed to engineering faculty and staff.