Hi Everyone. Lots of information floating around and lots of things that I want your feedback and input on:
Thank You So Far
Thank you for filling out the WatPD survey. We had 1136 respondents! Winners for the draw of that survey have been contacted. The faculty and I will be looking the results of the survey and working with Daniel Davison the Acting Academic Director of WatPD-Engineering, to figure out what our next steps are. This survey was the result of many terms of student consultation about the annecdotal feedback and some dissatisfaction students had with certain aspects of PD.
One of the interesting things we’ve found out is that the survey host, Qualtrics, had some issues with sending out mass emails to all engineering students (the first round of send-all) on May 1-2; not all students received the email. We then sidestepped the problem by sending out the mass email in smaller batches, which has seemed to work, but if you did not receive the WatPD survey via email around May 11, please let me know.
EngSoc Teaching Award Nominations (http://bit.ly/TeachingAwardS17) Deadline: June 23rd!
Do you have an amazing prof, lecturer or lab instructor who just makes something conceptually difficult easy to understand? One who can keep your attention even when the lectures are one, two, or even three hours long? Who incorporates unconventional methods or technology to connect what you learn to real life? These are some of the reasons why you should nominate someone for the EngSoc Teaching Awards!
Our Teaching Award committee picks one winner every term based on the content and number of nominations, as well as course critique summaries to be added to the Engineering Society Teaching Award plaque in CPH foyer to celebrate great teaching. Any questions should be emailed to teachingaward@engsoc.uwaterloo.ca.
Exam Bank
Our lovely exam bank directors and the EngSoc staff have been compiling a list of exams that are available on the exam bank so that we can begin the arduous task of identifying gaps in the database and continually push for more submissions especially around midterms and finals! So far, we’ve been noticing a huge gap of little or no upper year exams. If you do have past midterms, finals or exam studying material, please send an email to exambank@engsoc.uwaterloo.ca. At ESSCO AGM 2017 (See the VP Communications update), I’ve also had the opportunity to connect to other VP Academics from schools across Ontario about their Exam Banks and we’re hoping to share best practices.
WaterlooWorks Works (with extensions)
There is the feedback I need you all to give on our biggest change point this year: WaterlooWorks. I’ve been hearing a lot about what people like and don’t like about the new website, but all of it is anecdotal at this point, and we as engineers know that while people’s opinions and observations are great, we need to back it up with numbers and statistics.
In order to capture the feedback for the entire WaterlooWorks cycle from applying to jobs to being matched, I will send out a survey through our mailing list and class reps after the end of main match at the month’s end to collect feedback. In the meanwhile, keep a mental/digital/physical list of things like: how does it compare to Jobmine, what are some new functionality that you like/dislike, what chrome extensions (or other add-ons) do you use to better your experience. Be specific with your feedback. Saying it’s great or it sucks won’t help unless we know what is and isn’t working and what suggestions you have for fixing it. In addition, EngSoc class reps have mandated that we collect this feedback in order to compile a list of issues that need to be fixed for future terms.
We, as the largest faculty of co-op students, are a substantial part of one of the largest (if not the largest) stakeholder groups in WaterlooWorks. We should be using our collective voices to give constructive feedback on an evolving system to make it better. I’m glad to say that the CECA representatives are open to receiving feedback and helping them reframe and prioritize any issues. They’re constantly working to improve the system with weekly updates. They’ve taken the feedback given by B-Soc last term and have acted upon it so that students are now able to save search criteria, making jobs searchable by multiple columns, able to upload a newer application package with the same name, clearing the shortlist between terms and many more.
Also, feel free to send me an email at vpacademic.a@engsoc.uwaterloo.ca if your questions aren’t already answered by the University’s WaterlooWorks Functionality Spotlight pages or if you want to chat with me about this.I’ve also touched base with the VPs Academic/Education from other faculties and they also will be looking to get feedback from their faculties’ students.
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