Talent

The University of Waterloo is proud to welcome three new honorary doctorates at our fall convocation ceremonies.  

Honorary doctorates are an integral part of each convocation ceremony as recipients are awarded for their substantial contributions to the Waterloo community, to their profession or to society at large.  

An honorary doctorate is one of the highest recognitions of the University and is bestowed to honour individuals whose character and extraordinary intellect, creativity and service to society set a standard of excellence that merits this honour.  

The University of Waterloo's Cybersecurity and Privacy Institute (CPI) hosted its annual conference on October 12, 2023. The event brought together cybersecurity and privacy experts, students, faculty, entrepreneurs, government officials and businesses to delve into the pressing challenges and innovative solutions within the field. The conference was notably interdisciplinary, closely aligned with the University’s Waterloo at 100 framework — focusing on society, health and technology.

Passionate about helping people, Oumar El-Aina’s most rewarding University experience has been volunteering his time as an exercise trainer with elderly post-stroke patients and other individuals with mobility issues.

Spending several hours a week at the Faculty of Health’s Centre for Community, Clinical and Applied Research Excellence (CCCARE), the fourth-year kinesiology student works with participants to regain strength and functionality in the centre’s gym.

Mastercard and the Cybersecurity and Privacy Institute (CPI) at the University of Waterloo have announced a $550,000 partnership focused on research and talent advancement in cybersecurity. The funding will support projects that increase “Trust in Data” around:  fingerprinting, identification and validation, and data protection. 

While she is graduating with her MA in Clinical Psychology at fall convocation, Aliya McNeil is already working toward her PhD in the same discipline, here at Waterloo. She was recently awarded the Vanier Graduate Scholarship — one of the country’s most prestigious scholarships — to support her doctoral research and work.

Banking with a virtual reality headset may not be as far-fetched as you might think after students from the University of Waterloo’s startup incubator Velocity wrapped up a two-week-long “hackathon”, an innovation challenge aimed at augmenting the future of finance with VR and high-speed wireless technology.

If you don’t recognize his name, you’ll probably recognize some of the movies Chris Williams played a key role in creating. From voicing Oaken in Frozen to writing for Mulan to directing Big Hero 6, Chris has acquired a long list of film credits since studying Fine Arts at the University of Waterloo. Most recently, he wrote, directed and produced The Sea Beast for Netflix, which was nominated for Best Animated Feature at this year’s Oscars.

As technologies, like artificial intelligence, continue to advance innovation in the workforce, University of Waterloo co-op students are playing a crucial role in digital transformation.  

In 2022, the Employer Impact Award recipients utilized student talent to help feed the world, digitize the insurance landscape, and gain international perspectives.  

In a world experiencing rapid technological advancement and frenzied shifts in the economic landscape, it’s imperative that creatives, innovators and industry leaders come together and address the pressing issues Canada and our world faces.

Monitoring seaweed growth has the potential to accelerate regenerative seaweed farming and ocean restoration, and scale blue carbon initiatives, all presenting important opportunities in the fight against climate change.  

To bring key data about what’s happening below the surface above water, Velocity company Coastal Carbon received $1.6 million in funding from Canada’s Ocean Supercluster (OSC) to undertake the AI-Driven Sensors for Seaweed Measurement Project.