Talent

Exceptional students were recognized along with accomplished graduates and a longtime corporate supporter when more than more 400 people gathered in November for the 2018 Waterloo Engineering Awards Dinner.

In addition to hundreds of graduate and undergraduate students cited for excelling in academic and extracurricular pursuits, the annual event at Federation Hall honoured alumni in four categories and a company with a long history of backing researchers and students.

Whether it’s creating a mural in a public space or building a tiny mobile home, two Waterloo School of Architecture alumni are fulfilling their artistic passions in unique ways.

Stephanie Boutari (BArch ’11 and MArch ’14) and Adam Schwartzentruber (BArch ’11) chose to study architecture not knowing where it would lead, but driven by a common desire to pursue a creative career.  

Future innovations rely on researchers doing basic science, Canada’s newest Nobel laureate told a near-capacity crowd during the President’s Lecture at the University of Waterloo.

Donna Strickland, a professor of physics at Waterloo, advocated for support of curiosity-driven research during a thought-provoking discussion with Kate Lunau, senior editor at Motherboard, VICE’s science and technology site. The fireside chat followed Strickland’s lecture.

Nadayar Enegesi (BCS '13)
Alumnus, Faculty of Mathematics
> Co-Founder, Andela

With an acceptance rate of only 0.8 per cent, CNN has called African IT company Andela, one of the most selective programs in the world and “…harder to get into than Harvard.”

The University of Waterloo’s flagship entrepreneurship program, Velocity, is launching a venture fund that aims to connect early-stage startups to the capital they need. 

The new AngelList-powered venture fund, which will invest in startups in sectors ranging from software to biomedical, will launch this Spring. It will give investors a simple way to invest in a diversified portfolio of early-stage startups supported by Waterloo’s Velocity Garage. Since launching 10 years ago, Velocity has helped launch 300 companies who have collectively raised over $850 million in funding.

Researchers at the University of Waterloo have taken a huge step towards making smart devices that do not use batteries or require charging.  

What is one million times thinner than a strand of hair and two hundred times stronger than steel? 

The answer is graphene, a two-dimensional nanomaterial. The wide ranging  properties of graphene, discovered in 2004, make it ideal for producing flexible electronics, increasing the lifespan of batteries, improving the performance and energy efficiency of water filtration systems, as well as smart packaging to prevent food spoilage.   

Four engineering researchers from the University of Waterloo were named fellows of the Royal Society of Canada (RSC) and members of the Royal Society of Canada’s College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists.

Waterloo’s Feridun Hamdullahpur, Zhou Wang, Carolyn Ren and Alexander Wong are joining this prestigious national organization. The RSC recognizes remarkable contributions in the arts, humanities, and sciences, as well as Canadian public life.

Edgy, entertaining and educational: the provocative play Single and Sexy is celebrating its third decade as one of the highlights of Orientation Week.