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University of Waterloo Students Win Facebook's Hackathon
- x711li_yc 14y agoWaterloo seems to be killing it this week (BufferBox acquisition, virtual brain, Facebook Hackathon)
- kymchiho 14y agoIndeed, big things in the pipeline!
- strider_g3 14y agoyeayea, waterloo ;)
- shuw 14y agoMaybe I'm getting old (closing on 30) and nostalgic but the new generation of Waterloo students are making me proud and seem to be going further than my classes. Although, I'm also gaining a little pride myself. I did was a research assistant at CTN and built the first UI tool for building the brain model. And I just joined Facebook and had the Waterloo students win the hackathon next door on my second week :)
- otoburb 14y agoMy understanding is that Waterloo has been a Microsoft and RIM software talent poaching ground for over a decade. The Waterloo Engineering and CS programs are known for their extremely high quality and rigour. The recent string of higher profile alumni successes reinforces this reputation and serves as a beacon for Canadian high-school graduate intake. Now if only they would do something about the concrete jungle they call their campus :)
- timothya 14y agoI agree that it's mostly a concrete jungle, but there are some new buildings going up. The new Quantum Nano Centre just opened a few months ago, and it looks pretty spiffy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAZXcVLMMG0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAZXcVLMMG0
- mindcruzer 14y agoNo kidding. The buildings are getting nicer but there is almost no green space left on campus.
- guyzero 14y agoWaterloo was a MSFT poaching ground when I was an undergrad in 1992... well before RIM was even on the scene. Macleans magazine has consistently ranked it the best engineering school in Canada. They've been winning ACM programming contests since the math building had the dinosaur pit (http://ist.uwaterloo.ca/cs/redroom/ http://ist.uwaterloo.ca/cs/redroom/). As for campus being ugly... hey, you can't have everything.
- acchow 14y agoIt has now become a Google/FB/MSFT/Amazon poaching ground.
- stevenameyer 14y agoWhile Waterloo has been a talent poaching ground for Microsoft and RIM for a while, and more recently for Google, Facebook and the likes. The thing i think that really gets overlooked is the startup community in the area. With an incubator residence on campus (http://velocity.uwaterloo.ca/ http://velocity.uwaterloo.ca/) Another new incubator in the region (http://hyperdrive.communitech.ca/#applyNow http://hyperdrive.communitech.ca/#applyNow) An organization dedicated to helping startups in the are (https://www.communitech.ca/ https://www.communitech.ca/) The recent successes of companies like BufferBox and Kik, have showed that startups can succeed and thrive in the area.
- kymchiho 14y agoGreat links, it's a solid place to kickstart an idea.
- a3camero 14y agoI talked to an MS recruiter a couple years ago who said they hired more graduates from Waterloo than any other school.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- mtw 14y agoWinning for Waterloo hackathon or global hackathon? it's not clear in the article
- psobot 14y agoFacebook's global university hackathon.
- Permit 14y agoThere were 17 teams apparently, here's a better article: http://thenextweb.com/facebook/2012/12/01/facebook-university-hackathon-2012-winner-university-of-waterloo/ http://thenextweb.com/facebook/2012/12/01/facebook-universit...
- cbhl 14y agoTechnically, they've won both. To qualify for the global hackathon, they had to win the local one first.
- AYBABTME 14y agoCongrats on the win, and cool publicity... but how can I get in there at 12k$ a year, plus a rent and food and other expenses. How much will it pay off, versus my education at the University of Ottawa? Given that I learn much more by myself, reading reference books, taking online courses with coursera, doing projects by myself. Is there any return on investment that I could expect from an education there, instead of my current university?
- JL2010 14y ago>doing projects by myself. Probably not given that limitation. I didn't go to UofW but I spent about a year in Waterloo on an internship. In terms of the experience that you'll get out of it, one of their biggest assets is probably the type of students that they draw - if you won't be working and learning with/from them, then it probably won't be worth it.
- AYBABTME 14y ago'by myself' I meant of my own initiative/not part of a course. I love working/learning from other people.
- amackera 14y agoI'm a uwaterloo alumni. I have to say that the single greatest reason to attend a university such as Waterloo is to meet like-minded people who are as passionate as yourself. Learning is not just about knowledge, it's about building experience.
- paulgb 14y agoWaterloo has a co-op program where you switch off every four months between working and school. The co-ops can be very well compensated, so many students graduate with little or no student debt.
- speg 14y agoCame here to say this. I finished w/ $40k in the bank but the experiences gave me so much more.
- xspectre 14y agoGood job Waterloo. Water Water Water - Loo Loo Loo!
- supersaiyan 14y agoit's Water Water Water - Wu Wu Wu
- wensi 14y agoProud to be a UW student!
- eloelz 14y agoas a Waterloo grad this year, gratz!
- 10dpd 14y agoFor the last year I've been aware of the impact of Waterloo in tech and have conducted some research into why this might be so. Two things I've discovered: 1. Academic staff own any IP resulting from their research, making it very attractive and easy to recruit top academics. Almost all other universities assume ownership of IP. 2. An intern program that requires students to take an internship every other semester, enabling students to gain valuable experience within top-tier tech companies. It would be great to hear of any other reasons for their success.
- AYBABTME 14y agoI would think, massive investment from RIM back when their situation was not as bad. The influx of money helps the university finance research and various enterprises, which in turn results in yet more success stories, and yet more investments. It's a virtuous circle I guess.
- throwaway1979 14y agoI think those are two very strong reasons. However, at the end of the day, Waterloo puts its students through the meat grinder. My nephew studies there and I am blown away by the stuff he is getting taught in first and second year. The thing that surprised me was when he tried to apply to Silicon Valley start-ups, he got very limited response. I think part of it is that people don't realize how awesome Waterloo is.
- supersaiyan 14y agoI agree on the second part, I can get interviews with google/microsoft/facebook, etc, basically the big tech companies. But its far more difficult getting interviews from start ups in SV
- mcrider 14y agoAmericans tend to be ignorant about Canadian or otherwise foreign universities (I am an American who went to college in Canada).
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- icewater 14y agoWhat does this have to do with ninjas or quotes?
- goosling 14y agoicewater: Ninjaquote was our winning project for the regional Waterloo Hackathon. It was a name chosen at the (nearly) last minute, when the domain with the name that we originally wanted wasn't available. :) -- Jinny
- j-b 14y agoI was just in Waterloo at a database technical conference and most of the folks I worked with were very smart people with BMaths from UW. Google, Sybase , SAP, Oracle, Intel, etc.. all have offices to snap up the technical talent there.
- kitcar 14y agoAs someone interested in recruiting from Waterloo, but not from the school/area - where are the best places to make job postings / network?
- stevenameyer 14y agoWell if your looking to hire Co-ops from the university here is the link https://uwaterloo.ca/jobmine/employers https://uwaterloo.ca/jobmine/employers
- alexakarpov 14y agoThat!
- cbhl 14y agoBe wary the CECA has been known to give smaller employers sub-optimal advice. You'll want to get someone who understands the process to help you through it. If top students don't understand the benefits of working for your particular organization it's possible that they'll pick a safe job at a Google or Microsoft over you, and you'll get a mediocre student (or worse, none at all) after the first round of matching.
- stevenameyer 14y agoThis is very true. The system is not optimal from an employer or employee standpoint. But it is especially difficult if you are not a company with a recognized name on campus. As a student it is difficult to weed through a couple thousand job descriptions accurately.
- joebobfrank 14y agoExactly, I'm a student at waterloo, and there were over 900 job postings for Software/Computer engineers. It's pretty much impossible for a student to read through every one, so you have to make sure yours stands out.
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- melvinng 14y agoCongrats Jinny, Scott and Fravic!!
- fwilliams 14y agoHello Melvin.
- supersaiyan 14y agoActually facebook has been recruiting a lot too, they had a meetup for facebook interviewees the day before the official interviews, there were 100+ students there, I was really suprised
- tetester 14y ago"Show me the gender distribution of my friends" - 178.72% Male
- sgreenlay 14y ago178 is the number, and 72 is the percentage. Unfortunately the comma is easy to mistake for a period.
- CoolGuySteve 14y agoSounds about right for a Waterloo CS student.
- guyzero 14y agoWhile Waterloo often does seem to be about 178.72% male, parts of engineering are at parity (chem eng was 50/50 a few years back) and there are entire other faculties with lots of lovely people for you to make friends with.
- goosling 14y agoFalse. There are many women in Waterloo, of which I am one. My chemical engineering class was about 32% female, but many of the programs at Waterloo have more women than male in them.
- sliverstorm 14y agoWho says they weren't just using a 200% scale, like alcohol proof? :)
- sgreenlay 14y agoIf you are interested in browsing the source for our hack it is on GitHub: https://github.com/sgreenlay/PYLONS https://github.com/sgreenlay/PYLONS.
- ekm2 14y agoU waterloo:Expect my graduate school application in a few weeks time
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- ptrinh 14y agoIn the US, there is Drexel University which also has an awesome co-op program. Many students here had worked in employers like Fb, Google, MS, Amazon, ... and then have fulltime offers. So if you want to stay in the US and have the co-op, go to Drexel.
- DavidThi808 14y agoWill they win the Windward Code War too http://www.windward.net/code_war.php http://www.windward.net/code_war.php
- abbasmehdi 14y agoAre there details about how others did etc.? Regards, Bitter UBC grad...
- kevhsu 14y agoUIUC was 2nd. I was on this team. We did a Street Fighter browser-based game controlled by webcam. You can play against friends over the internet in realtime. MIT was 3rd with a chrome extension called "minimap" that allows you to scroll in your browser with smartphone or webcam. Also allows you to have a "minimap" next to your scrollbar that shows a preview of the entire webpage CMU got an honorable mention for a real time strategy (?) game called "The Hackers" that is based on managing a team for a hackathon. UBC was there, but I've forgotten what their hack was. Sorry! Was really tired and nervous during demos! Facebook showed me the time of my life. Eager to apply for a job there...
- graeham 14y agoUBC made a "pager" for facebook using a LCD display and controlled by an arduino. We built the hardware, case, and were able to push "pokes", wall posts, and messages to the pager. From the pager, we had two buttons that would push back to either dismiss the message or "like"/poke back.
- meangeme 14y agoScott talked about the win on CTV National News tonight, you can watch it here! http://www.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=820148&playlistId=1.1066270&binId=1.811536 http://www.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=820148&playlistId=1.1...