Daily Bulletin

University of Waterloo -- Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

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Thursday, February 27, 1997

Hockey Warriors try for gold

The playoff season begins tonight for the Warrior hockey team when they host the Western Mustangs in Game One of the OUAA Far West final series. The game begins at 7:30 p.m. at the Columbia Icefield. The three-game series continues Saturday in London and concludes with Game Three (if necessary) on Monday night back at the Columbia Icefield, 7:30 p.m.

Western is the opponent tonight because the Mustangs defeated Windsor on Tuesday night in a sudden-death semi-final. The Warriors, finishing regular season play in first place in the Far West division, enjoyed a bye in the semi-finals and move right to the three-game final series.

It's been a good season for the Warriors, who finished 18-8 and whose centre, Mike Chambers, is a nominee (for the second year in a row) for the Randy Gregg Award as Canada's outstanding university hockey player. The award winner will be known in mid-March. Meanwhile, the Warriors have a challenge ahead if they hope to take the national championship ahead of such teams as the first-ranked Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières, which finished the season 21-3-2.

Engineers take their obligation

Late this afternoon, in a closed ceremony (actually three closed ceremonies, because there are so many of them), this year's graduating engineers will make a promise and put on an iron ring. The ring, worn on "the little finger of the working hand", is a uniquely Canadian symbol, a token by which one can recognize a Canadian engineer who has deliberately taken an "obligation" to his or her new profession.

A web page maintained by student engineers at Queen's University explains the ring and ritual, introduced in 1925:

The ring itself symbolizes the pride we have in our profession while, at the time, reminds us of our humility. The humility arises from the fact that the rings were originally crafted from the steel of a bridge that collapsed ten kilometres from Quebec City. The bridge was part of the National Trans-Continental Railway linking Winnipeg, Manitoba, to Moncton, New Brunswick. Construction began on the bridge in 1900. On August 29, 1907, just as the bridge neared its completion, it collapsed under the weight of a locomotive loaded with steel. Seventy-five lives were lost in the disaster. A subsequent inquiry revealed that this tragedy was the result of an error in judgement made by the bridge's engineers. A second attempt to span the river resulted in catastrophe on September 11, 1916, when the centre span of the bridge fell while being hoisted into place. This time, ten more lives were lost. The bridge was finally completed in October 17, 1917, and has since been renamed the Pierre LaPorte Bridge. Although the rings are no longer made from the steel of the bridge, the significance of the Iron Rings remains unchanged.

The British poet Rudyard Kipling, who wrote the ritual, was also author of the touching poem "The Sons of Martha", about the tireless work of engineers:

They do not preach that their God will rouse them
a little before the nuts work loose.
They do not teach that His Pity allows them
to drop their job when they dam'-well choose.

At Waterloo the ritual is under the supervision of "Camp 15" of the independent national organization responsible for the Iron Ring. The first such ceremony at UW was held in the spring of 1963. Today's event will be followed by the (also traditional, but considerably less solemn) Iron Ring Stag.

Open house shows off tools

In its next Friday morning "open house", set for tomorrow at 10 in Davis Centre room 1302, the information systems and technology department will talk about "decision support tools" -- features of UW's new computer systems that will help managers figure out what they need to do. A brief explanation:

A goal of many of the major University information systems projects is to provide users with improved access to corporate information. Recently the University has purchased decision support software from Cognos that will enable users to perform sophisticated reporting and analysis functions from their desktops. Representatives from Cognos and IST will demonstrate these tools and provide an overview of goals, status and implementation plans.

When your books are due

The library has an early reminder: books borrowed on "term loan" over the past few months are due on April 9, and you might plan now to return yours soon, or renew them if necessary. ("You may encounter a lengthy lineup" if you try to renew books just before the due date, Alex McCulloch of user services warns.) As of this week, books borrowed or renewed on term loan are due on August 13.

On Marian Anderson's centenary

The Women's Association of UW presents Anna Ledbetter, a counsellor with health services, speaking on "How to Work with Your Dreams -- Growth and Understanding", starting at 12 noon today in Needles Hall room 3004. All are welcome to attend.

The Centre for Advanced Studies in Finance, in the accountancy school, has a visitor: Dilip Madan of the University of Maryland. Madan will give two lectures on mathematical finance -- at 3 p.m. today ("The Second Fundamental Theorem of Arbitrage Pricing Theory", Math and Computer room 5158A) and the same hour tomorrow ("Pricing the Risks of Default", Humanities room 174).

"Fed Up! An Art Show" continues today in the Student Life Centre. The show is open from 10:30 to 6, and "a small acoustic set performed by Chris Kuhl will close the show" at 6:00 in the SLC's main lounge.

The architecture school continues its Arriscraft Lecture series with a talk tonight on "From Ambiguity to Transparency: Japanese Sense of Space", by Gunter Nitschke. The talk starts at 8:00 in the "green room" of Environmental Studies II.

Staff members on the board

Writing yesterday about the current election of a staff member to the UW board of governors, I said that the other staff seat on the board, the one that isn't up for election this year, was held by Helena Hahn. Not any more, I've been reminded. Her term ended last year and she was succeeded by Sharon Adams, of the department of psychology.

CAR

TODAY IN UW HISTORY
February 27, 1980: The IBM 360/75 computer is unplugged after 13 years.

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