The University of Waterloo is “Canada’s Silicon Valley” and the place to be “if you’ve got a big technology idea to turn into a billion-dollar company,” according to the annual Globe and Mail Canadian University Report released this week.
The report highlights Waterloo’s “massive co-op program”, the largest in the world, and points out that the university offers Canada’s only undergraduate degree in nanotechnology engineering.
The Globe and Mail report is released in October every year. Information is gathered from professors, alumni and the universities themselves. “Most importantly, we spoke to real-life students about the good and bad of their university experience,” the report states.
Social entrepreneurship hub
A feature story that is part of the Globe and Mail report makes note of University of Waterloo’s leadership in social entrepreneurship, highlighting a startup, Cango Consulting Inc. founded by Jonathan Rivard, a graduate of the Conrad School of Entrepreneurship and Business.
The Globe and Mail Report identifies Mike Lazaridis as a notable Waterloo alumnus. Lazaridis founded RIM, now BlackBerry, while still a student of engineering at Waterloo. Lazaridis has supported the University of Waterloo through many generous philanthropic gifts including more than $100 million for the Institute for Quantum Computing.