Talent

Russell Giles jokes that after this past weekend’s Great Northern Concrete Toboggan Race he doesn’t know what he’ll do with his spare time.

Leading up to the race hosted by Waterloo’s Faculty of Engineering, Russell, the captain of Waterloo’s Concrete Toboggan team, spent an average of 50-hours a week during the past couple of months working on the group’s toboggan. 

In 1992, on the 30^th anniversary of the Cuban missile crisis, historians Jim Blight and janet Lang organized a remarkable meeting in Havana between Fidel Castro, Robert McNamara, and former aides of Nikita Khrushchev. The group represented the key living players in the most dangerous military confrontation in history—a crisis that, the meeting revealed, avoided nuclear Armageddon at the last minute.

“Shé:kon, oh niiohtonhátie?,” “Hi, how are you doing?” is one of the first phrases taught in the University of Waterloo’s first Indigenous language course, Introduction to Kanien’kéha.

The Mohawk language course is being offered at Renison University College, partly to fulfill the recommendation from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) of Canada for post-secondary institutions to create degree programs in Indigenous languages. 

More than 100 girls took part in the second annual PhysiX: Girls Matter event, a day where Grade 7 and 8 students had the chance to connect with University of Waterloo students and explore the world of science.

Getting to the load frame stage had taken two days of designing and redesigning, constructing and correcting, relying on textbook lessons and improvising on the fly.

Xu Chu came to the University of Waterloo in 2010 as a fourth-year exchange student from China. Now, seven years later, he is about to embark on an inspiring career as a tenure-track assistant professor in the College of Computing at Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta.

Photo: Jay Parson

When the politics and histories that shape students’ lives emerge in class, Naila Keleta-Mae sees an opportunity for deep learning - not an interruption to her lecture notes.

The line between research and teaching is intentionally blurred for Professor Steven Bednarski, whose students are as passionate about scholarship and dissemination as he is.

“I think 18 to 25 years-olds are at their creative peak,” says Bednarski, “The fun part of my job is that I get to tap into that energy.”

When Jenna Yee dreamed of becoming a pilot, the Waterloo aviation student assumed she’d start small, spending time in the north to get her flying career off the ground.

But a new five-year agreement between the University of Waterloo and the Jazz Aviation Pathways Program (Jazz APP) means some aviation students will get a jump on a more direct career pathway with a major airline.

“This opportunity really opens a whole new pathway into the industry,” says Yee.

Four professors from three faculties are being honoured for their exceptional teaching with the University’s most prestigious teaching honour - the Distinguished Teacher Award (DTA).

The awards will be presented at the spring convocation ceremonies by Mario Coniglio, associate vice-president, academic. In addition to the citation, the four professors will also receive $1,500 to pursue teaching excellence. The 2017 recipients are:

Mónica Barra

Associate Professor

Chemistry