Campus Life Highlights

Grenfell College designed, installed, tested and commissioned a computer network and telephone system for the college's new residence development. This included the in-house provisioning of equipment to provide all students in the new residence with high speed access to the university's internal network and the internet, and a telephone complete with voice mail to every bed.

In December 2001, the Marine Institute was awarded ISO 9001 registration, making it the first and only public educational institute in the province, and only one of five in Canada, to receive ISO 9001 registration.

In fall 2001, the Marine Institute launched a new semi-annual newsletter, The Bridge, to keep students, faculty, staff, alumni and industry partners up-to-date on all of our activities year-round. You can read The Bridge online at www.mi.mun.ca.

The Registrar's Office implemented changes to Memorial's grading practices which were approved by Senate in May 2001. These included:

• introduction of a 4-point grade point average, considered to be the Canadian standard, and the conversion of all student records accordingly;
• introduction of integer grading, breaking with the long standing tradition of grading in multiples of five to permit grades in increments of one;
• including only the highest grade obtained in repeated courses in the calculation of cumulative numeric and grade point averages.

The Registrar's Office also introduced enrollment management Stop-Out Return project which reaches out to former Memorial students who have not graduated and who have not attended for a number of semesters, encouraging them to return to complete their program.

Memorial took major strides to consolidate and improve its Web presence. A collaborative management model comprising institutional Web policy and Web implementation committees was created, and positions were added in University Relations and Computing and Communications to provide management and technical support.

Robert Shea was appointed director of Memorial's new Department of Career Development and Experiential Learning. Mr. Shea is responsible for the leadership of the Centre of Career Development, Co-operative Education Services Centre and Volunteer Services. As well, he is editor of the Canadian Journal of Career Development, a national peer reviewed journal to be launched in this fall.

Memorial launched the Oil and Gas Development Partnership Lecture Series. On Sept. 26, 2001, Tom Zimmerman, manager of Schlumberger Oilfield Services' Technology Centre in Houston, Texas, gave the inaugural lecture entitled The Role of Technology in Meeting our Future Energy Needs.

The Faculty of Business Administration invited one of the province's most distinguished business leaders to join them in shaping the business leaders of tomorrow. Vic Young, former CEO of Fishery Products International, accepted the faculty's invitation to be executive-in-residence for a semester.

The Works is the name on the new package of recreation and leisure programs and services to which all students attending Memorial in St. John's now have access. It opened with the start of the winter 2002 semester. The Works includes most of the recreation and leisure facilities at Memorial's St. John's campus including the newly opened Field House, the swimming pool and Strength and Conditioning Centre in the Physical Education Building, the Splash facility at Long Pond, the outdoor playing fields, and access to the Aquarena for scheduled swims.

The Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Science will be based on the campus of Sir Wilfred Grenfell College in Corner Brook. The mandate of the biodiversity institute is to ensure the research and knowledge requirements of the provincial government will become a focus of the academic community within the province. Government departments, non-governmental agencies and the private sector will conduct research and Memorial University will extend its expertise on resource conservation.

Memorial's Board of Regents recommended to the provincial government that the name of the university be shortened to Memorial University. The university's name is defined by an act of the legislature and the provincial government had asked the board to provide advice on the future of the university's name in light of the change of the province's official name to Newfoundland and Labrador.

Memorial University's Board of Regents announced a reduction of 10 per cent in tuition fees for Canadian graduate and undergraduate students. The reduction took effect in September 2002. Tuition fees for students in the Faculty of Medicine and the Marine Institute, as well as fees for international students, were frozen for another year. The tuition reductions were made possible by the provincial government's allottment of $3.5 million in this year's budget specifically to enhance the affordability of university education.

University Relations moved ahead with the development of the marketing plan for Memorial. An integrated marketing plan is a holistic approach to communications and marketing, whereby the entire organization communicates a consistent "position" or brand. The marketing plan is intended to bring cohesiveness to Memorial's promotional activities and publications, with the ultimate goal of creating a brand or image that is unique to Memorial. The plan is currently being developed in collaboration with the Bristol Group, a local marketing consulting firm.

Memorial replaced its aging mainframe financial records system with SCT (Systems and Computer Technology Inc.) Banner Finance System. The system became fully operational on April 1, 2002. Departments now have access to a more integrated financial management system.

Memorial University changed the way it will do internal audits. Audits will be conducted by external experts contracted to undertake the work. The move to modernize the internal audit function will enhance the financial accountability of Memorial by contracting the service to independent experts using the most modern auditing techniques available. The change is the consequence of the closing of the university's Internal Audit Unit as part of ongoing restructuring within the financial administration operations of the university and was also undertaken in response to the changing complexity of financial systems and because newer audit methodologies have evolved.