President

Hey everyone! I hope your term is going well; I know it’s a busy time with midterms and interviews, on top of everything else, so I’ll get right to it.

Elections

The election to choose our next set of Vice Presidents is happening! We are electing the positions of Vice Presidents Communications, Academic, Student Life, and Operations and Finance. Please take the time to get informed and vote in the election. Links to all the candidates platforms can be found on our website, as well as dates of the candidate forums. Voting will be from November 7th to 11th, and the results will be announced on November 12th at TalEng.

Council

Our next council meeting is coming up on November 2nd. It will take place in CPH 3607 starting at 5:30pm. Currently on the agenda are nominations for the Paul and Paula Plummer award and Q&A period with the Vice Presidential candidates. Any additional items for the agenda items can be submitted by emailing speaker.a@engsoc.uwaterloo.ca prior to October 29th. Different items that can be brought forward include:

• Executive Mandates: A mandate is a defined as a command or authorization to act in a particular way on a public issue. In the case of the Society this means the general members dictating something for the Executive to work on.

• Society Stances: As members, you can bring forward a stance on a specific issue encountered by undergraduate students.

• Discussion Items: You’re welcome to bring forward any items that you think the Society should discuss.

Meetings are open to all undergraduate engineering students. Feel free to come out and join the discussions.

Updates

Syllabus Bank – After many terms, I’m happy to announce that we have received final approval from the Faculty to start an online syllabus bank! This will be a new service incorporated onto the EngSoc website and is be intended to assist students when they’re selecting electives. Course descriptions and reviews are already available online, but this service will provide a more in depth look at the topics covered in the course. If you have any syllabi for your past or current electives, please send them my way! I will be working with my webmasters for the remainder of the term to get it up and running.

Student Experience Survey – The last time the Faculty ran an experience survey was in 2014, and it was mainly focused on the academic side of things. While academics is the reason we’re all here, it is not the only thing that affects our student experience. This week, I am meeting with Peter Douglas, the Associate Dean Undergraduate, and Robin Jardin, the Student Relations Officer, to review the existing questions and format. During this meeting, I hope to set the groundwork for incorporating other aspects of student experiences including lab spaces and other facilities, support services available such as Engineering Counselling, and EngSoc events and services. By understanding what students think about these aspects, the Engineering Society Executive will be better equipped in the future to address student concerns and work towards improving the student experience as a whole.

If you have any aspects that you think should be included in this survey, or you have any feedback on these initiatives, feel free to email me! I am very open to hearing from you about the undergraduate experience for students and how it can be improved. Feel free to contact me at president.a@engsoc.uwaterloo.ca to give your ideas or to set up a meeting to chat!