Over the past year, faculty, staff and retiree donors funded important projects aimed at enhancing the student experience on campus — initiatives like improving mental health awareness, encouraging equitable participation in co-op, enriching the Library’s resources and so much more.
When Kay Awe (PhD Candidate) came to Canada from Nigeria seven years ago, it was December — and it was the first time he’d ever seen snow.
About to start his master’s in civil engineering, not even the harsh Canadian winter could deter him. “Waterloo was where I wanted to come,” he says. “It’s one of the best schools in engineering in Canada and I knew it would prepare me for the future.”
As University of Waterloo systems design engineering postdoctoral scholar Ilknur Umay was getting ready to go to bed earlier this week, she happened to look at her phone. What she saw scared her. There were multiple missed calls and texts from her brother in Türkiye telling her to turn on the news.
On behalf of the University of Waterloo community, I would like to express my concern and condolences to the families and communities throughout Türkiye and Syria devastated by Monday's earthquakes.
In particular, my thoughts go out to members of our campus community who have family and friends in the affected areas. Waiting for word from your loved ones when you are so far away is lonely and so difficult.
Bertha Bridget Kankam (MBET ’22) recently completed her master’s degree in business, entrepreneurship and technology (MBET) at Waterloo Engineering’s Conrad School of Entrepreneurship and Business.
That is a worthy success in and of itself, but Kankam is not your typical MBET student. Better known to many as Yaa Yaa, she is an award-winning singer-songwriter from Ghana.
Thursday, February 2 marks World Wetlands Day, an international government agreement acknowledging the importance of wetlands and their ecological role in conserving our ecosystems.
“Wetlands are these climate change superheroes,” says Dr. Rebecca Rooney, a wetland ecologist and professor in the Department of Biology. “Wetlands are a portfolio of ecosystem services: including flood prevention, breaking down pesticides, storing large amounts of carbon, and provide habitat for more than 32 per cent of Ontario species at risk who rely on these wetlands to mitigate climate change.”
In the Canadian academic landscape, scholar, artist, and professor, Dr. Naila Keleta-Mae (Communication Arts) is a visionary. Her Black And Free Project explores Black expressive culture through various mediums — and this year, Keleta-Mae’s work is going beyond academia and being brought to life for the public. A series of events, classes, and exhibits are planned which explore the themes inherent in her multi-year research-creation project on blackness and freedom.
Since its release in November 2022, OpenAI’s ChatGPT has caused a stir, with a stream of op-eds and news stories focused on the ways the program opens possibilities for academic misconduct by students.
But for professors at the University of Waterloo, interest in the new AI is more about how it can be used in the service of education and how it impacts sectors across the economy.