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Monday, March 6, 2006

  • Catholic university heads meet
  • Kitchener ground-breaking next week
  • Phone numbers change this summer
Editor:
Chris Redmond
credmond@uwaterloo.ca

100 years of Lou Costello


Catholic university heads meet

Presidents and rectors from Roman Catholic universities in Latin America, Africa, Europe, Asia and North and South America will descend on St. Jerome's University for a week-long series of meetings that start today.

All are members of the Administrative Council of the International Federation of Catholic Universities, an organization of large and small post-secondary institutions around the world. This is the first time that the council has met in Canada.

The IFCU dates from 1924 and currently has some 200 member institutions around the world, including ten in Canada. They range from America's Georgetown, Marquette and Villanova to St. Peter's Pontifical Institute in Bangalore, India, and Uganda Martyrs University in Kampala.

Says the organization's web site: "Every Catholic university is unique, with roots in a specific country and region with a culture unlike any other. While these institutions are often compared, each has its own history, assets, problems and objectives, its specific way of finding a niche in the field of education, research and services and also of honoring its academic, cultural, social and spiritual commitments. . . . "From all the materials of the world, non-Catholics, and even non-believers, all work with us to carry out joint research, partnership and exchange projects. In the chorus of voices that calls for knowledge and justice, that champions universal science and awareness, the International Federation of Catholic Universities has its own, one with a specific tone."

The IFCU has its offices in Paris. Among its events this year will be a conference "Catholic Higher Education and Globalisation in Latin America", to be held in Brazil in April, and the IFCU's General Assembly in Bangkok in July.

A free public lecture will be offered in conjunction with the meetings, tonight at 7:30 in Sweeney Hall of St. Jerome's. Noel Sheth will discuss the interfaith dialogue between Hindus and Christians in a lecture titled "Hindu Avatara and Christian Incarnation: A Theological Comparison."

Sheth, the former president of Jnana-Deepa Vidyapeeth Pontifical Institute of Philosophy and Religion, India, is a graduate of Harvard University, a Jesuit priest and a professor of Indian philosophy and religion. He argues that both Hindus and Christians believe in the incarnation of God in the world -- a belief encapsulated in the Hindu concept of "avatara" -- and that members of each tradition can learn much from a Hindu-Christian dialogue.

The lecture is jointly sponsored by the Master in Catholic Thought program at St. Jerome's and the St. Jerome's Centre for Catholic Experience. Admission is free and the public is welcome.

Kitchener ground-breaking next week

Politicians, academics and heavy machinery will come together to break ground next week for UW's second branch campus. The ceremony at the future "health sciences campus" on King Street in downtown Kitchener is scheduled for Tuesday morning, March 14.

Says an invitation that was distributed Friday: "David Johnston, President of the University of Waterloo and Carl Zehr, Mayor of the City of Kitchener invite you to come and see 'What's Going Up at King & Victoria'. Please join us for the official groundbreaking ceremonies of the University of Waterloo School of Pharmacy and Downtown Kitchener Health Sciences Campus.

"The UW School of Pharmacy will attract and shape future leaders in the health care sector. With its focus on breadth, diversity, and co-op experiential learning, there will be no other place like it in North America.

"In the true pioneering spirit of our Region, this is an outdoor event. Please come dressed for the weather. Hot beverages will be served."

The event will start at 9:30 that morning at the campus site, the northwest corner of King and Victoria Streets. Everyone is welcome.

WHEN AND WHERE
International Celebration Week cuisine: Thailand and Malaysia today in Mudie's, Greece and Spain in REVelation, Greece at South Campus Hall, German at Renison College.

On-campus part-time job fair for summer and fall jobs, 11:00 to 2:00, Student Life Centre great hall.

E-Merging Learning Workshop at Centre for Learning and Teaching Through Technology, 11:30, details online.

Canteach information session about teacher education in other countries, 12:00 to 4:30, Tatham Centre room 1112.

Wendo self-defence course for International Women's Week, 12:00 to 3:00, Student Life Centre multi-purpose room.

Career workshop: "Work Search Strategies" 3:30, Tatham Centre room 1208, registration online.

Athletic awards reception rescheduled from February 16, today 4:30, University Club.

International Advertising Festival: "The Best International Television Ads of 2005", 8 p.m., Humanities Theatre, presented by Federation of Students.

'Working Effectively in Another Culture' 4:30, Tatham Centre room 2218, registration online.

'Envisioning Sustainability at UW' town hall meeting and talk by Jean Andrey, department of geography, organized by UW Sustainability Project, Tuesday 5 to 7 p.m., Environmental Studies I courtyard.

'Muslim Women: An Alternate Perspective on Womanhood', Tuesday 7 p.m., Math and Computer room 2034, as part of Islam Awareness Week.

Norman Nawrocki, Montréal actor, "I Don't Understand Women!" safe-sex comedy cabaret, Tuesday 7:30 p.m., Weaver's Arms pub, as part of International Women's Week.

Income tax seminar for international students Wednesday 10 a.m. to noon, Needles Hall room 3001.

Bechtel Lectures in Anabaptist-Mennonite Studies this year with James Urry, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, Thursday and Friday 7:30 p.m., Conrad Grebel University College great hall.

Rainbow Reels Queer Film Festival Friday-Sunday, Davis Centre room 1302, details online.

Roméo Dallaire keynote lecture at Graduate Student Research Conference, April 3; tickets $2 starting today at the Humanities Theatre box office (students taking part in the conference, pick up free tickets at graduate studies office, Needles Hall, or at conference registration).

Phone numbers change this summer

There will be more digits to dial on just about all phone calls starting this summer, with changes to UW's extension numbers and to Bell Canada's dialing system for western Ontario. Here's what's happening:

[*] Bell is introducing "ten-digit local dialing" throughout the 519 area code, which includes Waterloo Region. That means every time you make a local call, you'll have to dial something like 519-888-4567 (for the UW switchboard). It also means equipment such as fax machines and speed-dial lists have to be updated with ten-digit phone numbers.

"Reprogram your telephone equipment and use 10-digit local dialing starting now," Bell Canada is suggesting. It's optional for the next three months, but starting June 17, calls made without the 519 at the beginning will be interrupted by a warning message. And starting in October, calls won't go through at all without the 519.

With the new system in place, phone numbers starting with a different area code -- 226 -- will start showing up in southwestern Ontario, a system Bell calls the "overlay" method. If a 226 number is based in Kitchener-Waterloo, it'll be a local call: 226-000-0000. If it's based in, say, London, it will be a long distance call from Waterloo, just as a 519 number in London is long distance from this area, and is dialed with 1 at the beginning: 1 (519) 661-2111.

Telephone users in the Toronto area already have ten-digit dialing, and the same system is being introduced this summer in the Ottawa-Kingston area as well as Montréal and some other areas of Québec.

[*] Back on campus, meanwhile, the Telephone Services unit of IST is reporting that it's running out of four-digit phone extensions. "New buildings on campus, the addition of the School of Architecture building in Cambridge and the common dialing plan with St. Jerome's University have resulted in a significant decrease in the pool of available phone numbers," IST says.

"The solution is to move to five-digit dialing." That change will be effective on the evening of August 8, the day after the Civic Holiday.

Most existing extensions will add a 3 in front of what's there now: my phone, now 3004, will become 3-3004. (IST says the hyphen isn't going to be part of the way new five-digit extensions are written, but I kind of think it helps make things clearer.) Extensions that have "direct in-dial" service, and now start with a 4, will add an 8, so that the Student Life Centre turnkey desk will move from 4434 to 8-4434. With those changes made, IST will start assigning new extensions that begin with a 2 when additional phone lines are needed on campus.

Some special numbers: 2-2222 will reach the UW police, as an alternative to the present 4911. And 7-7777 will be the "speech attendant" that locates people when their name is spoken (currently ext. 7777).

Dialing an outside number from a UW extension will call for a 6, rather than the present 9, so that the only thing that starts with dialing 9 will be 911 for emergencies.

"The change to 5,400 extensions will take some time," Bruce Uttley of IST points out. "There will be an embargo on changes to extensions beginning Monday, June 26, until after the conversion on August 8. Any requests for phone changes in this period should be made well in advance."

CAR


Communications and Public Affairs, University of Waterloo
200 University Avenue West, Waterloo, Ontario N2L 3G1
(519) 888-4567 ext. 3004
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