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Daily Bulletin

University of Waterloo -- Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
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Monday, April 29, 1996

Time begins on Opening Day

Here we are in a new fiscal year -- officially starting Wednesday, but really today -- and here we are on the threshold of spring term registration. On this overcast Monday morning, meanwhile, some hundreds of UW students are meeting a brand-new experience. It's the first day of the work term for co-op students who are off campus in the spring. Many of them are starting work with new employers, and for more than a few, the ones who've just finished term 1B, it's the first co-op job of their Waterloo careers.

(Is there anybody who started at a new job this morning and has already found the employer's Internet connection and checked in on this Daily Bulletin? If so, please drop me a note and I'll mention you in tomorrow's edition.)

Now, about spring registration

Here are some excerpts from the spring registration newsletter issued by the registrar's office:
Your registration is complete once you have paid or made arrangements with the Financial Services Office regarding payment of fees and you have had your course selections finalized. We would encourage you to Pay Your Fees as early as possible, so that you can avoid possible long line-ups during Registration (May 1-3).

If you are unable to forward your payment by mail, the cashiers will be available in Needles Hall in the cashier's office, 1st floor, Needles Hall, until April 30th. On May 1st the cashiers will move to the second floor, NH. The following schedule must be followed:

Late fees will not begin until May 6th.

The new University of Waterloo photo identification card was introduced in the fall 1995 term. New students and those who have an old photo identification card should get their new cards in the Student Life Centre May 1-3 from 9:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m.

For your convenience, on-line Drop-Add Centres will be available as follows beginning Wednesday, May 1, 1996:

To borrow books from the library, you must have a valid ID card. To register your ID card, go to the circulation desk of either the Davis Centre or Dana Porter Library.

And about the new fiscal year

The first bits of the long-awaited Financial Systems Project are becoming public this week: new "accounting flexfields", popularly known as 31-digit account numbers, that contain much more information than UW's long-used nine-digit numbers.

Roy Wagler of the data processing department, one of the key people in the FSP, says that by today all departments will have received a list of their old account numbers with the corresponding AFF numbers. "Please use the new AFF's on any forms requiring an account number. If you are unsure of the new AFF, old account numbers will be accepted early in May. Also, if you don't have the new version of a form, the old forms will be accepted."

The FSP has phone and e-mail help lines available. Telephone help-lines are ext. 5328 for the Financial Systems Project in general, and ext. 5232 for research accounts in particular. The electronic mail address is fsp-help@mc4adm.

Later this month, Wagler said, training will start for the next, more dramatic part of the FSP: on-line inquiry, by which departments will be able to get instant information about the state of their budgets, rather than having to wait for monthly statements. "We expect to start rolling out inquiry for our users" over the next few months, he said.

Over the next year, other aspects of the FSP will be along, including the ability for departments to do transactions electronically (and instantly) that now require paperwork.

Monthly budget statements will still be issued for the next while, although they will eventually be obsolete as information is available electronically.

More about computing courses

Short courses offered by the department of computing services during May and June cover Windows 95, Unix, the World Wide Web (maybe I'll finally learn something about Java?), and general matters such as "Modem Access to UW Computers". Each course is an hour or two in length, hitting the high points of a specific topic -- Excel, PowerPoint, Web searching, HTML frames, Microsoft Access. Registration is free for faculty, staff and students. Full information is available from DCS either on paper or through UWinfo (look under Organizational Units, then Computing Services).

And I'll drink to that

The staff association is running a tour to four Niagara-area wineries on Saturday, May 25. The bus trip includes tastings at each establishment, lunch (and a trolley tour) at Pillitteri Estates, and a chicken barbecue at Vineland Estates. "All wineries have retail outlets that provide an excellent opportunity to purchase some varieties not available from the LCBO," says a flyer from Pat Martin in the staff association office. She says there are still some tickets available, at $54 for association members and one guest per person, $56 for others. She can be reached at ext. 3566.

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

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