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Daily Bulletin



University of Waterloo | Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

Wednesday, June 17, 1998

  • Men and women are all Warriors
  • Year 2000 conference next week
  • The Feds, the library, other news
  • The events of the day
  • Gazette pauses for the summer
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Men and women are all Warriors

UW's interuniversity teams will all be the Warriors next fall, as the "Athenas" name for women's teams is being consigned to sports history. And the Warriors, men and women alike, will compete under this new logo, which uses the traditional Greek helmet but with a little more flair.

"These changes have resulted from one year of consultation and development with key constituencies and senior administration," says a statement from the department of athletics and recreational services. "We felt it was an appropriate time in our history to unify both the men's and women's sports under one umbrella -- that being Warriors," says athletics director Judy McCrae. "It is definitely a positive new direction and a change that is fully supported on campus," her announcement says.

[CR
logo] The new interuniversity logo includes a stylized version of the existing helmet image that provides more depth than the previous "flat" design. Colour has also been added. The Warrior logo is the work of Steve Brooks in athletics.

A new image for the campus recreation program is also being introduced. Changes to the campus rec logo include the introduction of two stylized figures and the words "Campus Recreation". The logo is described as "dynamic and representative of the range of activities offered". It was designed by Melissa Smith of UW's graphics department.

The new logos will be used on everything from game jerseys to promotional items. According to the athletics marketing manager, Bob Copeland, "these changes are an important component in our overall marketing strategy. We needed to update our image as a department, and the new logos will provide us with a lot of positive momentum." He said the changes introduced by the department of athletics and recreational services "complement the recent image makeover" of UW itself, referring to the new logo introduced in September 1997.

The Warrior and Athena names were introduced for UW sports teams in 1960, "to recognize the profound influence the ancient Greeks had on Western culture and to represent the strength and bravery UW athletes would need for athletic competition". The Greek helmet has been used as the sports logo ever since then, but redrawn repeatedly over the years.

Year 2000 conference next week

UW will host a one-day conference on the Year 2000 issue next Tuesday, for people from many branches of government, education and business. It's sponsored by UW's InfraNet Project as well as Communitech and local municipalities.

Parking office closed

The parking services office will be closed tomorrow and Friday for an upgrade to the Parking Office Management System software. "If you have any emergency parking concerns during this time please call the office at ext. 3100," says manager Elaine Koolstra. "Permit sales will resume on Monday, June 22." The kiosks will be open, and enforcement carried on, as usual.
Title of the event, to be held in the Davis Centre, is "Preparing CTT for the Year 2000: Our Y2K Clock is Ticking". Between 150 and 200 people, from Waterloo Region and the Toronto area, are expected.

Says Shirley Fenton of InfraNet: "The main goal of the conference is to have speakers who do business in or provide services to the CTT area (from different business and government sectors) give a case study on how they are addressing Y2K issues. We currently have representatives from all levels of government, service companies such as Ontario Hydro and Bell, and the financial/insurance, legal, service and retail, software business and education sectors ((Mutual Life, Gowlings, Home Hardware, MKS, and UW).

"Our keynote speaker, Peter Broadmore, has just completed a report on the Y2K readiness of countries around the world for the Federal Government. He will speak on 'The Year 2000 Challenge: Are we Making Progress, Making Work or Marking Time?' Speakers will be allotted 45 minutes to present a case study of their company."

The Year 2000 "challenge" is the inability of older computer software to tell whether "00" means 2000 or 1900. Everything from credit card expiration dates to maintenance schedules for automated equipment can be affected. "Do not assume that it's not your problem because your computers are fixed or you have none," the flyer for next week's event tells local business people. "You must also consider and address your utilities, telephone, transportation and security systems, plus financial and emergency services. How will your suppliers and customers be affected?"

The Feds, the library, other news

I guess my Macintosh wasn't the only computer on campus to restart itself after one powerful flash in yesterday afternoon's thunderstorm. Some of the Math Faculty Computing Facility's central computers went down during the storm, as did the old VM system operated by information systems and technology. Martin Timmerman of IST happily notes that "many computer systems continued to operate just fine since they are protected by UPS systems. This includes systems such as the TRELLIS system for the TriUniversity Group of Libraries and the parallel database server for financial systems. It also includes the primary campus name server, the primary campus news server and the info web server. . . . Power fluctuations and brief power outages such as yesterday afternoon can mean significant effort for computer systems personnel to restore systems to a running state." He observes that "Computers are electronic equipment, and if you go around your house unplugging TVs and VCRs during a thunderstorm, then you should also consider unplugging your computer. I myself have never done that and have been fortunate until now. But power fluctuations can be very unkind to electronic equipment."

The UW Federation of Students has expressed its dissatisfaction with the Ontario Undergraduate Student Alliance by dropping its membership in the provincial student lobby group from full to associate level. Full membership in OUSA -- which UW helped to found just a few years ago -- costs the Feds $27,000 per year. Since this is the first time any student group has taken such action, the membership fee must be negotiated, said Feds president Christian Provenzano. "But the most we'll pay is 25 per cent (of the full fee)," he added. "We feel OUSA has the potential to be an effective lobby group. We need provincial representation, and didn't want to pull out completely. If we see productive change by November, we'll pay the balance of the fees." Among the Feds' concerns about OUSA are poor communications with membership, inability to use the media effectively, and failure to produce meaningful documents or results. Andrew Boggs, new OUSA executive director, has vowed to embark on a process of re-evaluation and rebuilding.

Apology from Bell

This letter from the Field Services division of Bell Canada appears in today's Gazette:

"Pursuant to the service interruption during the week of April 27th, 1998, Bell Canada's investigation has concluded that the incident was related to a system software issue, that can in no way be attributed to any actions of the University of Waterloo IST Department.

"Bell Canada would also like to acknowledge the assistance and support of the IST Department and their staff in the restoration of the voice mail service to the campus community.

"Bell Canada and the University of Waterloo IST Department thank the faculty and the user community for their patience."

Papers and archives documenting the life of Canadian writer Luella Bruce Creighton have been donated to the UW library by her daughter, Cynthia Flood. The "five linear feet" of documents contain material from Creighton's school days at the University of Toronto, including the dinner program from the 1926 graduating class, autographed by her professor E. J. Pratt, as well as letters and journals related to her writing career and personal life. Married to Canadian historian and author Donald Creighton, she was part of a circle which included Edna Staebler, Marjorie Campbell, Harold Innis and Ramsay Cook. Her best-known work, High Bright Buggy Wheels, a historical novel published in 1951, deals with the life of an Ontario Mennonite woman.

UW recruitment publications picked up three awards in the recent Prix d'Excellence Publications Competition sponsored by the Canadian Council for the Advancement of Education. The CCAE is holding its annual conference at Wilfrid Laurier University this week, and awards were presented at a banquet Monday night. A gold award went Mary Beth Huehn, graphic designer in UW's graphics department, for her design of the civil engineering recruitment posters, and a bronze award was presented to her colleagues Melissa Smith and Chris Hughes for design and photography work on the geography recruitment posters. In another category, a brochure for earth sciences, developed by Michael Hunt of the faculty of science, received a bronze award from CCAE.

The events of the day

Well, it's a dampish day (but with a forecast high of 26) for the annual library staff barbecue at noontime. As I walked to the office this morning, a pair of ducks were patiently sitting on the wall by the patio on the west side of the Dana Porter Library, just outside the staff room, clearly wondering what time the party was going to start.

A brown-bag session on "TV or Not TV: The Impact of Television on Children" starts at 12 noon in Math and Computer room 4059; it's sponsored by the Employee Assistance Program and stars Judith Van Evra of St. Jerome's University.

An auction of reclaimed bicycles starts at 12:30 in the Student Life Centre atrium, sponsored by the bike centre ("a division of turnkey enterprises", the flyer says).

UW's joint health and safety committee will meet at 1:30 in Needles Hall room 3001. Among the agenda items: the smoking room in the General Services Complex; injury reports; indoor air quality and perfume; safety inspections.

A celebration of the "renewed" lounge on the third floor of the PAS building is set for 3:00. "Dessert and refreshments will be provided," a flyer says, plus "words of appreciation" for the many people who did work and helped raised money to renovate the space.

The Contemporary School of Dance has its spring concert at 7:00 tonight in the Humanities Theatre.

Gazette pauses for the summer

So, this morning's Gazette is the last issue for the spring term. Publication will resume after Labour Day, by which time we hope to have a new graphic look (and maybe even an electronic page composition system).

For the next three months, the Daily Bulletin will go solo as the campus-wide information vehicle. As much information as possible will be appearing here, including a few things that readers would normally find in the Gazette.

Here's a special request for departments -- especially those where there are lots of people without easy computer access -- to print off copies of the Daily Bulletin each morning and post them on bulletin boards or other locations where staff, students and faculty will see them. Several departments do that already.

CAR


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