The Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business, also known as the University of Waterloo Stratford School and formerly the University of Waterloo Stratford Campus, is a

satellite campus A satellite campus or branch campus or regional campus is a campus of a university or college that is physically at a distance from the original university or college area. This branch campus may be located in a different city, state, or countr ...

of the

University of Waterloo The University of Waterloo (UWaterloo, UW, or Waterloo) is a public research university with a main campus in Waterloo, Ontario Waterloo is a city in the Canadian province of Ontario. It is one of three cities in the Regional Municipality ...

located in

Stratford, Ontario Stratford is a city on the Avon River within Perth County in southwestern Ontario, Canada, with a 2016 population of 31,465 in a land area of . Stratford is the seat of Perth County, which was settled by English, Irish, Scottish and German im ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. Founded in June 2009, the University of Waterloo Stratford School is part of the

Faculty of Arts A faculty is a division within a university or college comprising one subject area or a group of related subject areas, possibly also delimited by level (e.g. undergraduate). In American usage such divisions are generally referred to as colleges ...

, established to provide programs that focus on

digital media Digital media is any communication media that operate in conjunction with various encoded machine-readable data formats. Digital media can be created, viewed, distributed, modified, listened to, and preserved on a digital electronics device. ' ...

interaction design Interaction design, often abbreviated as IxD, is "the practice of designing interactive digital products, environments, systems, and services." Beyond the digital aspect, interaction design is also useful when creating physical (non-digital) produ ...

, digital technologies, content creation and user experience within a business context.

History

On 16 October 2006, the city council of the City of Stratford authorized Mayor Dan Mathieson to sign a memorandum of agreement with the

Stratford Festival The Stratford Festival is a theatre festival which runs from April to October in the city of Stratford, Ontario, Canada. Founded by local journalist Tom Patterson in 1952, the festival was formerly known as the Stratford Shakespearean Festival ...

and the University of Waterloo to explore the possibility of having a liberal arts college located in Stratford. The Province of Ontario granted $10 million to the University of Waterloo Stratford Stratford Campus on 26 March 2008. The following day, Waterloo-based enterprise software company

OpenText OpenText Corporation (also written ''opentext'') is a Canadian company that develops and sells enterprise information management (EIM) software. OpenText, headquartered in Waterloo, Ontario Waterloo is a city in the Canadian province of ...

announced that they had committed $10 million to the project. 6WellingtonStCampus

On 22 January 2009, the federal government announced that it was pledging $10.7 million over five years for the Corridor for Advancing Canadian Digital Media - now known as the Canadian Digital Media initiative under the Canadian Digital Media Network (CDMN) – a joint initiative between Communitech and University of Waterloo Stratford Campus. In June of the same year, the first ever

Canada 3.0 Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world ...

forum in Stratford, ON was hosted by the University of Waterloo Stratford Campus and CDMN. The event was the official launch of the University of Waterloo Stratford Campus. The official opening of the campus took place on 20 September 2010 at its temporary location at 6 Wellington St., Stratford, Ontario. The first class of the Master of Digital Experience Innovation (MDEI) – an interdisciplinary, professional one-year program - began at the temporary campus the following year. On 1 August 2011, Dr. Christine McWebb, Professor in the Department of French Studies, UW becomes the Director, Academic Programs and on 1 October 2011, Ginny Dybenko, the former Dean of the Wilfrid Laurier School of Business & Economics, becomes the Executive Director of the University of Waterloo Stratford Campus. In January 2012, a part-time Master of Digital Experience Innovation option was added. The program integrated a Project Management Professional certification component into the curriculum for all students. The first class of the Honors Bachelor of Global Business and Digital Arts program began their studies on 5 September 2012 at the new campus located at 125 St. Patrick St. On 16 October 2012 the building was officially unveiled to the community. On 15 November 2013 it was announced that University of Waterloo Stratford Campus would receive approximately $1.75 million in federal funding to strengthen the Stratford Accelerator Centre over the next five years. The centre provides mentorship and coaching for tech-related startups, including those launched by University of Waterloo Stratford Campus faculty and students. Stratford Accelerator Centre relocated to University of Waterloo Stratford Campus in spring 2014. On 1 July 2018, the University of Waterloo Stratford Campus became the Faculty of Arts' newest school, with its new name "Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business". The designation of school enabled the School to hire its own full-time faculty members, develop its own research and academic programming.

Stratford School

The University of Waterloo Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business is located at 125 St. Patrick Street. The building is a three-storey, 42,000 square-foot space that features digital media labs, user research labs, sound suites, project rooms, open-concept collaboration spaces and

software Software is a set of computer programs and associated documentation and data. This is in contrast to hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. At the lowest programming level, executable code consists ...

for

design A design is a plan or specification for the construction of an object or system or for the implementation of an activity or process or the result of that plan or specification in the form of a prototype, product, or process. The verb ''to design'' ...

photography Photography is the art, application, and practice of creating durable images by recording light, either electronically by means of an image sensor, or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. It is employed ...

video production Video production is the process of producing video content for video. It is the equivalent of filmmaking, but with video recorded either as analog signals on videotape, digitally in video tape or as computer files stored on optical discs, hard dri ...

, app development and

web development Web development is the work involved in developing a website for the Internet (World Wide Web) or an intranet (a private network). Web development can range from developing a simple single static page of plain text to complex web applications ...

Christie MicroTiles Wall

Located in the centre of the University of Waterloo Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business is its Christie

MicroTiles MicroTiles are discontinued modular rear projection cube units designed, developed and marketed by Christie Digital. The building-block nature of the system made the configuration of the overall screen area and shape flexible. This allowed for si ...

wall which is the tallest display of its kind in the world. It is three-storeys high, with 150 MicroTiles that can reproduce 115 percent of the NTSC colour gamut, exceeding typical LCD flat panels by more than 50 percent. The wall is used to showcase student content, highlight creative accomplishments and provide an open source canvas for digital media research. The University of Waterloo Stratford School's Christie MicroTile wall was the Gold Winner in the

Education Education is a purposeful activity directed at achieving certain aims, such as transmitting knowledge or fostering skills and character traits. These aims may include the development of understanding, rationality, kindness, and honesty. Va ...

and

Healthcare Health care or healthcare is the improvement of health via the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, amelioration or cure of disease, illness, injury, and other physical and mental impairments in people. Health care is delivered by health profe ...

category of the 2013 Apex Awards.

Engage: UX + Gamification Research Lab

Located in the University of Waterloo Stratford School, it is used by students and faculty for research, experimentation, prototype development and commercialization as it pertains to UX and gamification.

Stratford Accelerator Centre

was located at the University of Waterloo Stratford School, beginning in 2014, the Stratford Accelerator Centre focuses on accelerating the growth and maturation of early-stage technology and digital media companies. The Accelerator Centre further provides mentorship to undergraduate and graduate students on campus

Administration

Christine McWebb is the Director of the University of Waterloo Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business. The University of Waterloo Stratford School operates under the same

bicameral system Bicameralism is a type of legislature, one divided into two separate assemblies, chambers, or houses, known as a bicameral legislature. Bicameralism is distinguished from unicameralism, in which all members deliberate and vote as a single grou ...

as the University of Waterloo; a system that consists of a

Board of Governors A board of directors (commonly referred simply as the board) is an executive committee that jointly supervises the activities of an organization, which can be either a for-profit or a nonprofit organization such as a business, nonprofit organi ...

and a

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

, as legislated by the University of Waterloo Act, 1972. The School shares the same President and Chancellor as the University of Waterloo. The Office of the Chancellor is currently held by

Dominic Barton Dominic Barton (born 1962), known as Bao Damin ( zh, 鲍达民) in China, is a Ugandan-born Canadian business executive, author, and diplomat. He is the current chairman of the private investment firm LeapFrog Investments as well as the chancellor ...

, global managing partner of McKinsey & Company. In March 2011,

Feridun Hamdullahpur Feridun Hamdullahpur (born ) is the chancellor of International Business University. Previously, he was the president and vice-chancellor of the University of Waterloo. Hamdullahpur was named the sixth president of the University of Waterloo in Mar ...

was announced as the sixth President of the university, having been interim president since October 2010.

Academics and Programs

The University of Waterloo Stratford School prepares students for careers in the area of digital media and design. Students are brought together with faculty, researchers, cultural organizations, business and entrepreneurs through coursework and project-based learning.

Master of Digital Experience Innovation (MDEI)

Offered at the University of Waterloo Stratford School, this programme began in fall 2011. It is made up of both recent university graduates and working professionals that want to expand their skills. MDEI is a professional degree that offers project-based learning and a multidisciplinary set of courses, complete with the education portion of the Project Management Professional certification. The MDEI is offered on a full-time or part-time basis. The full-time program occurs over three consecutive terms: fall, winter and spring, while part-time students take two courses per term over 24 months, with a final project in the last spring term of their program.

Honors Bachelor of Global Business and Digital Arts (GBDA)

The Global Business and Digital Arts programme began in the fall of 2012. It is unique to the Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business. Students are involved in hands-on projects with industry partners and have access to the latest digital technologies. In addition, they complete a paid practicum and are able to earn the educational hours to qualify for the Certificate in Associated Project Management accreditation. On 21 June 2018, Canadian Design Firm Rossul had named the Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business "Best Canadian Undergraduate UX Design University".

Housing

Students live off-campus in the Stratford community. The University of Waterloo Off-Campus Housing Office does not provide resources to students.

Activities and Events

Canada 3.0

In 2008, the inaugural Canada 3.0 conference was hosted by the University of Waterloo Stratford School in Stratford, Ontario with over 1,500 attendees discussing how to make Canada a world leader in the digital economy.

Discovering Digital Media Days

Discovering Digital Media Days is an annual program that delivers interactive programming for high school students who aspire to be leaders in Canada's growing digital economy. Students interact with industry experts, develop their own digital designs, build business skills and discover the creative and commercial potential for digital media. Hilary Mason at University of Waterloo Stratford Campus

Hilary Mason at University of Waterloo Stratford Campus

Gamification 2013

Gamification Gamification is the strategic attempt to enhance systems, services, organizations, and activities by creating similar experiences to those experienced when playing games in order to motivate and engage users. This is generally accomplished thro ...

2013 was hosted by University of Waterloo Stratford School and entertainment. There were academic research presentations, talks on gamification implementation and commercialization, workshops, and demonstrations of successful gamification initiatives in the areas of health care, marketing, education, and entertainment.

uXperience Design Camp

Taking place from 16 to 17 November 2013, Design Camp was an experiential User Experience (UX) bootcamp that focused on creating viable solutions to real life problems utilizing the principles of user experience (UX) design. Software developers, engineers, computer scientists, psychologists, designers, UX professionals and students took advantage of the experience of mentors and usability testers to acquire the knowledge they needed to pitch their demos to a panel of judges. The winning idea was given support for commercialization.

CODE

The Stratford School was a host site for the Canadian Open Data Experience (CODE) Hackathon from 28 February – 2 March 2014. It was where participants from across Canada turned federal

Open Data Open data is data that is openly accessible, exploitable, editable and shared by anyone for any purpose. Open data is licensed under an open license. The goals of the open data movement are similar to those of other "open(-source)" movements ...

into interesting and beneficial applications. The University of Waterloo Stratford School hosted Inspiration Day with an information session on the use of

Big Data Though used sometimes loosely partly because of a lack of formal definition, the interpretation that seems to best describe Big data is the one associated with large body of information that we could not comprehend when used only in smaller am ...

and the power of combining it with

Data Visualization Data and information visualization (data viz or info viz) is an interdisciplinary field that deals with the graphic representation of data and information. It is a particularly efficient way of communicating when the data or information is num ...

Accelerator Centre Lunch and Learn Programs

The Accelerator Centre located at the University of Waterloo Stratford School provides lunch and learn sessions on relevant topics such as networking, how to secure funding for your business and public relations.

SOCDOCS

The University of Waterloo Stratford School is a partner of SOCDOCS, a film documentary festival that offers teachers and students a creative opportunity to make visual and audio statements through the digital vehicle of choice on social justice issues such as poverty, war, homelessness, environment, sex discrimination, addiction, slavery, or prejudice.

ESQ Camps

Throughout the summer, University of Waterloo Stratford School camps teams visit communities to engage kids in hands-on engineering and science activities. The camps have won a national award for engineering and science outreach.

External links

Official website

Stratford Accelerator Centre website

University of Waterloo website

Canadian Digital Media Network website

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Waterloo Stratford Campus, University Of Educational institutions established in 2009 Stratford Education in Stratford, Ontario Digital media education 2009 establishments in Ontario University of Waterloo Stratford