Internationalization 2013-2018 Strategic Plan Mini Town Halls

First mini town hall on Internationalization

The first mini town hall session, hosted by theme lead Nello Angerilli, was held April 2, 2014 in the Earth Sciences Museum, Centre for Environmental and Information Technology (EIT).

See highlights from the event:

Second town hall on Internationalization

The second town hall, hosted by theme lead Ian Rowlands, was held in the Mike and Ophelia Lazaridis Quantum-Nano Centre on May 26, 2017.

Rowlands outlined the theme's goals, which were twofold: to be recognized internationally for excellence and innovation in education, research and scholarship, and to educate globally literate and world-ready graduates. He also spoke about the role played by Waterloo International to promote Waterloo's interests globally: by being strategic and focused, looking to add value by identifying opportunities, making linkages and advancing campus priorities.

Rowlands highlighted that in 2016 there were over 7,000 international students studying at Waterloo, representing 18 percent of the undergraduate student body and 39 percent of graduate students. He also noted that Waterloo has inked agreements with 37 of the top 100 universities in the world.

He said that teaching, research, and learning at Waterloo should be enhanced by internationalization. International experiences, whether involving learning opportunities abroad, welcoming international students to campus, or making research, teaching, and academic publishing linkages with international partners will enrich the experiences of students, faculty, and staff at the University.

Questions were taken from the floor and from social media on a number of topics, including how internationalization fit into the rest of the University's strategic plan themes, the financial resources that were in place to help students, faculty and staff take advantage of international opportunities, how Waterloo picked its partners, emergency support for international students, and how Waterloo was preparing to deal with an influx of international students and faculty in the wake of the US travel ban, to name a few.

Read the full coverage of the event in the Daily Bulletin

Watch the Global Prominence and Internationalization live webcast