The current election is for one director representing the Faculty of Environment for a one-year term (August 28, 2025 to June 30, 2026).
Each candidate was invited to submit a candidate information form; candidates' answers have not been altered in any way.
To get a sense of what qualifications you might want to look for in a candidate, learn more about being a Board member.
Voting runs from 9 a.m. on Tuesday, August 5 to 1:30 p.m. on Thursday, August 21, 2025.
The candidates
Daniel Cockayne
I am seeking election of the one-year interim Environment director. I am an Associate Professor in the Department of Geography and Environmental Management and I started working at UW in 2016. On the FAUW board, I am specifically interested in how FAUW can respond effectively to the University’s budgetary challenges while representing its members through principles of equity and justice. I intend to promote what I see as FAUW’s central responsibilities to uphold academic freedom and advocate for its members. I believe in a consultative approach to collaboration and decision-making, seeking to involve a range of perspectives in a given discussion.
I previously served on the Board of Directors from 2019-2021. I worked for several years with the Gender and Sexual Diversity Alliance (now the Queer and Trans Alliance), which often involved discussions with FAUW (including FAUW’s Equity Committee), UWSA, the Equity Office, and a number of other groups around campus. One of the primary achievements that I’m proud of in that role is advocating for equity in our shared health plan (specifically in terms of IVF benefits), which involved liaising with a number of individuals and groups across campus and bringing these issues to the Pensions and Benefits committee. I am involved in a number of department-level committees, and have a strong commitment to equity in my teaching, research, and service.
Richard Kelly
Why I want to serve on the FAUW Board of Directors:
FAUW represents all of us, and I strongly believe that it’s important to focus on working collegially to get to the best possible outcome for our community in times of fiscal constraint. My aim is to help maintain and strengthen our collegial governance structure that underpins our University. This structure has helped to build our organization into a world leading institution while enabling us to respond thoughtfully in a reasoned manner to internal and external pressures. Including a diversity of voices within this structure is important to ensure that we continue to build a sustainable future for our community during these testing times.
The skills and attributes that I bring to the position:
I have served the university in many roles during my career at Waterloo. I have been Department Chair and Associate Chair, Associate Dean for Research, and have served on or chaired many committees including DTPC, DACA, FTPC, decanal search, DPR, FPR, Senate, SLRP. My research requires the contribution to and management of national and international research team members and my various journal, book and editor positions have required me to work with different academic perspectives. I strongly value collaboration and collegiality and have been able to leverage my varied experiences to help support my colleagues and our institutional goals.
My approach to collaboration and representing all FAUW members
Like many I am a keen proponent of collegial governance that enables our faculty to work with our university administrators, many of whom are or were faculty members themselves. This is important to support our collective efforts that navigate a path through the operational stresses and strains that we face. This will be my first FAUW BoD position, and I am keen to represent colleagues honestly and sincerely and to ensure that the academic freedoms we are granted remain a strong and lasting cornerstone of the institution.
