Last week, Gordon Stubley, Academic Director of WatPD Engineering, and Judene Pretti, Director of the WatPD program, hosted a student forum about the upcoming WatPD Engineering program. The forum allowed students to voice their concerns about the upcoming WatPD courses.
In the last issue of The Iron Warrior, Eric Cousineau, VP Education of EngSoc, wrote a detailed article that described the implementation of the WatPD program. To recap, here are the essentials: WatPD is practically guaranteed to arrive in time for the winter 2011 work term, although Senate Undergraduate Council is having a final vote about its implementation in a meeting on October 18th. Once WatPD has been implemented in the engineering department, students will have 3 options:
1. Students who passed PDEng 15 and PDEng 25 by January 2011 can do their remaining 3 courses in PDEng or WatPD.
2. Students who passed PDEng 15 by January, but not 25, can either:
b. Take PD 20, PD 21, and then two other PD courses.
3. Students who have not passed any PDEng course by January can either:
a. Take PDEng 15, PDEng 25, and then follow the choices from option (1)
b. Go straight to the PD courses (i.e. PD 20, PD 21, and three other PD courses).
However, it should be noted that once a student opts for the “PD” option, the student cannot go back to PDEng.
The student forum had a wealth of information about the WatPD Engineering program, including the structure of the system, and descriptions of the various courses that undergrads have the opportunity to take. In particular, PD 20 will focus on critical thinking, judgment, and assessment of situations in the work place; PD 21 will build on its precursor, and focus on problem identification and problem solving strategy. Students who have completed PD 20 and 21 (or PDEng 15 and PDEng 25) will have the opportunity to take 3 of the following elective courses for their remaining workterms:
- PD 3 : Communication
- PD 4 : Teamwork
- PD 5 : Project Management
- PD 6 : Problem Solving
- PD 7 : Conflict Resolution
According to WatPD staff, WatPD contains more interactive learning material than PDEng courses. For instance, students taking the upper year PD courses learn through material such as Emotional Intelligence Questionnaires, “What the Experts Say” video clips, and other videos that act out conflicts, and conflict resolution strategies in the workplace. The WatPD staff also had impressive statistics which claimed that over 70% of students (across every faculty) thought that the workload in the PD courses was manageable. Moreover, over the past year, more than 90% of students passed the PD elective course they took.
WatPD should be implemented by Winter 2011, and PDEng is expected to be removed by Winter 2012. However, enrolment for your next “professional development” course (whether it is PDEng or WatPD-Eng) must be done by mid-October.
Fortunately, WatPD staff have a taped version of the student forum. If you missed the forum, but still want to listen to the WatPD staff’s answers to some of your fellow students’ questions, be on the lookout for the tape; it should be released sometime next week. For more information about WatPD, including how and when to make your choice between WatPD and PDEng, which WatPD staff you can contact for help, and details about the WatPD course and curriculum, visit the WatPD-Eng website at http://www.engineering.uwaterloo.ca/watpd-engineering/.
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