Thanksgiving lunch last week at Waterloo's United Arab Emirates campus was “created to bring some Canadian culture” to students who may never have seen Canada, reports Ralon Nazareth, co-op and recruitment specialist at the UAE outpost. It was the first event organized by the newly organized student council, and everybody was “very impressed”, Nazareth adds. “I am currently working with them to oversee their proposal for a Hallowe'en event.” In line for turkey, along with a few of the UAE-based students, is Don Grierson, long-time faculty member in civil engineering, now retired but lending a hand this term as he teaches two courses in engineering and one in math.

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A virus for you and one for your computer

As sharp as ever, the staff in UW's Health Services are ready to stick it to you, with the announcement that seasonal flu shots are now available for "high risk" people and soon will be offered to a larger population. Anybody in the “high risk” group can visit the clinic (it's in the white building overlooking the pond across from the Student Life Centre) and see a nurse between 2 and 4 p.m. today, this Friday, or Wednesday and Friday next week. Among the people who might be on campus and are officially classified as "high risk": UW police, daycare workers and Optometry students currently in clinic; persons 65 years of age or over; those with diabetes or other metabolic disease, chronic cardiac or respiratory conditions (asthma), cancer, kidney disease, blood disorders or anyone whose immune system is weakened; anyone who lives, works or volunteers in a nursing home, retirement home or chronic care facility; people who live in the same household as, or are in close contact with, a person who is at increased risk of the flu’s more serious effects. For the "healthy" population — everybody who's not classified as high risk — the flu immunization clinic is scheduled for November 17-19 in the Student Life Centre.

Okay, don't believe everything you read. Especially, don't believe it if what you read in your e-mail is “Dear Nexus myWaterloo Horde Webmail Account Owner, This is to inform you that we are currently carrying out scheduled maintenance and upgrade our Webmail service and as a result of this, our mail client has been changed and your original password will reset.” What comes next, of course, is a request for your password. "I have a feeling people are going to fall for this phish," writes one student among the (probably) many who received the message this week, and forwarded it to security expert Jason Testart in information systems and technology. "Time for another reminder," Testart suggested. "Never email your UWaterloo password (or any password) to anyone, under any circumstances!"

Application requirements, program details, funding and research opportunities at both Canadian and foreign universities — they're all up for discussion today and tomorrow as the Career Action Centre hosts Professional School and Post-Degree Days in the Student Life Centre. Displays and booths are in operation from 11:00 to 2:00 both days. The emphasis is on education, health, pharmacy and social work programs today, with 56 institutions to be represented, according to Elisabeth Adrian of Career Action. Tomorrow, 48 institutions will visit Waterloo to talk to students about law, engineering and MBA programs as well as traditional academic master's and PhD studies. Detailed lists of the visiting institutions are online

The information systems and technology department put out a request for proposals this week aimed at a pilot cellphone project in the Mackenzie King Village residence. “To date,” says the RFP, “the University has not identified a need driven by pedagogy, business, or safety, to enhance indoor cell service in all campus buildings, including student residences. However, it is clear that students expect their cell phones to work while on campus, and in particular there is a quality of life element to being able to talk to friends and family from one’s residence. Having recognized how students wish to communicate with their friends and family, and the importance students place on their personal communications, the University is seeking to enhance indoor cellular service in all student residences. While the initial focus of the pilot is to be on a student residence, the University believes that enhanced indoor cellular service in all campus buildings may become strategically important for research and teaching purposes. For this reason, the University believes it may be best to offer and control this service as a component of general IT services, thus retaining control over a technology with potential strategic importance. However, cellular technology is outside the traditional areas offered by campus IT, and it is unclear whether existing expertise and support processes can be leveraged. One of the objectives of the pilot is to determine the support effort, and ability to leverage existing IT infrastructure and expertise.”

The Faculty of Applied Health Sciences hosted representatives of Uganda Christian University last week, celebrating a new “collaboration to build education and research capacity in the areas of public health, water-health, and health informatics”. A Memorandum of Understanding was signed by Frederick Kakembo, associate dean of the School of Research and Post Graduate Studies at UCU; Edward Mukooza, Executive Director of the International Christian Medical Institute; Susan Elliott, dean of AHS at Waterloo; George Dixon, vice-president (university research); and president Feridun Hamdullahpur.

The Sexuality, Marriage, and Family Studies department at St. Jerome's says it will be holding its second annual SMF Symposium on December 10 at St. Jerome's. “The symposium,” writes Jenn Wunder, project manager for the event, “is a one-day conference that highlights student and faculty research dealing generally with issues of social justice, personal/professional ethics, and responsible citizenship. The theme of this year's symposium is ‘Ethical Intersections: Research, Theory, and Practice’. We would like to invite proposals for papers or poster presentations addressing this year’s theme within any area of sexualities, relationships, and families.” There's more information online.

The staff association has told its members that it's looking for a representative on the Staff Training and Development Committee and an alternate rep on the Employee Assistance Program committee. • Space in the Physical Activities Complex main gym may be “tight” for Saturday morning's Convocation ceremony, when Governor General David Johnston comes to receive an honorary degree from Waterloo, but there are no special tickets or admission restrictions, the registrar's office says. • The student accounts office, informally known as the “cashiers” on the first floor of Needles Hall, will be closed today for a staff training activity.

And . . . the end is nigh: the December examination schedule was officially published yesterday.

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Arts celebrates its 50th on Friday

The faculty of arts — by many measures the largest of Waterloo's six faculties — “has now been a vital part of the University of Waterloo community for 50 years”, says Michael Steffler of the dean's office, who's helping to organize a lively day of anniversary celebrations this Friday.

The first arts professors arrived at Waterloo in the summer of 1960 and the first 54 students met them in September, after a few months of frantic planning. The university decided that spring to create its own arts faculty after hopes of “federation” with Waterloo College — now Wilfrid Laurier University — collapsed. By the fall of 1960, Keith Thomas of English, Bill Dyck of Germanic and Slavic, and others were teaching the first courses in an improvised BA program. “Arts I”, known almost from the beginning as the Modern Languages building, would open in 1962.

Now five decades have passed, and arts boasts that it's not only the largest but "the most diverse of UW's six faculties. With a strong traditional foundation, we offer programs in the following core areas: creativity and performance; memory, identity and culture; local and global engagement; society, science and technology; business, policy and management; and cognition and behaviour. Our 17 academic units offer nine doctoral programs, 17 master's programs, and 24 honours programs, including the largest arts co-operative education program in the world. Research in the Faculty of Arts is focused on knowledge acquisition, mobilization and broad impact on local, regional and global communities.”

Says Steffler: “To celebrate this momentous occasion there are a number of events being held by the faculty throughout the fall, highlighted by October 22nd’s day-long activities.” In particular, look for a crowd in the arts quadrangle at noon on Friday, as the Arts Student Union will be distributing pizza provided by the faculty's dean. It's free to arts students; others needn't go hungry, but will be charged $1 per slice, with proceeds going to the United Way campaign.

Then from 2:30 to 3:30, staff members, faculty, retirees and alumni are invited to “a cupcake and refreshments reception” in the Festival Room of South Campus Hall, “to catch up with old friends and reminisce on 50 wonderful years.” Steffler notes that there will also be a silent auction benefiting the United Way, involving some 20 orange scarves (orange is the official colour of arts) knitted by staff members and their families. In the course of the day a number of arts departments are holding open house or other special events, including lectures aimed at alumni and visitors.

Finally comes a by-invitation dinner at Federation Hall, with proceedings starting at 4:30 p.m. This event replaces the originally announced evening program in the Humanities Theatre. Highight of the evening will be presentation of this year's Arts in Academics Awards (given to one alumnus in each faculty and college, who has gone on to excel in the academic community) and the Alumni Achievement Award (awarded to one arts alumnus every year to recognize extraordinary accomplishment in career and community). Full details of the day's activities are, of course, online.

CAR

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