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Daily Bulletin

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Monday, May 29, 1995

$12 million in NSERC money

The research office has sent out word about 1995-96 grants to UW from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, the biggest single source of funding for research on this campus. Total for the coming year: 419 confirmed grants, plus a few "conditional" ones, bringing in $12,336,003. That's down somewhat from the $12,847,989 that arrived in 425 grants in 1994-95.

The bulk of the money, more than $10.2 million, comes in "operating" grants for faculty members and University Research Fellows. There are also half a dozen "infrastructure grants", including $264,000 to support the general work of the Institute for Computer Research, and more than $2 million in equipment grants.

Detailed information on this year's NSERC results have been sent across campus by the UW office of research, which has something else to celebrate this week: a new Web page, accessible through UWinfo. Among the many things it provides is a link to the Community of Science, a massive American database of researchers and their interests.

Election is getting closer

The Ontario provincial election is set for June 8, just ten days off. There are now five candidates in Waterloo North riding, which embraces UW:
Bob Byron, Liberal
Sandra Kryn, Family Coalition Party
Hugh Miller, New Democratic Party
Blaine Watson, Natural Law Party
Elizabeth Witmer, Progressive Conservative
Candidates in Waterloo North, as well as Kitchener and Kitchener-Wilmot ridings, have been invited to a public meeting in UW's Theatre of the Arts this Wednesday, May 31, at 12 noon. UW's Federation of Students, and counterpart groups at Wilfrid Laurier University and Conestoga College, are sponsoring the event.

Juggle your schedule and be there

Where? At the Community Campaign picnic on Thursday. That's the suggestion from the UW development office, anyway. Suzanne Poole over there notes that most people on campus are constantly juggling responsibilities, problems and paperwork -- and on Thursday they might get a few ideas or inspirations from the UW Juggling Club. The picnic also offers live music, line dancing, food and $1 hot dogs. It happens on the Davis Centre lawn, from 12 noon to 1:30 on June 1, as the annual celebration of UW ("More than a place to work") and the Campaign, which has so far raised almost $3 million from staff, faculty and retirees.

The procedure about policies

Coming on or about Wednesday is the new edition of the UW Policies, Procedures and Committees book, designed mostly for desk reference by staff and faculty members. It includes the full text of UW's policy documents as well as other useful information, and this year's version has a snazzy purple cover.

Postscript to Friday convocation

Digby McLaren, the prominent earth scientist who was to give the address at Friday afternoon's convocation, wasn't able to be there, having suffered a detached retina early in the week. On short notice, the other honorary degree recipient for Friday, Cambridge chemist Felix Franks, addressed convocation instead. McLaren's honorary degree has been postponed to a future convocation session, I'm told.

And let me apologize to Michele Mosca, the valedictorian on behalf of science students, to whom I referred in the feminine gender in Friday's Daily Bulletin. "Michele Mosca is very much a male," says one of the several people who promptly advised me of my error. "He is also the recipient of the Alumni Gold Medal in mathematics." I also heard from Mosca himself: "It's certainly not the first time someone has assumed that I'm female," he understandingly said. (As a "Chris", I've had the same thing happen to me more than once.)

At both convocation sessions on Saturday, graduands were introduced and received their degrees three at a time, the same as had been done experimentally on Thursday. The tradition has been two at a time for bachelor's degrees, but convocations have been getting pretty long, and it looks as though three at a time will be standard from now on.

Chris Redmond
Information and Public Affairs, University of Waterloo
(519) 888-4567 ext. 3004
credmond@watserv1.uwaterloo.ca

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