The University of Waterloo Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business looked back on 10 impressive years of success and looked ahead to an even more impressive future.
The Stratford campus celebrated their 10 year anniversary in the current location on St. Patrick Street with an open house event on Friday. All three levels of the campus were packed with students, alumni, faculty, staff, and industry professionals.
Greg MacIntyre, digital media manager for the Stratford school, provided StratfordToday an impromptu tour of the facility, showing work spaces and highlighting some of the achievements by students past and present.
As was the goal from the beginning, the Stratford site is not simply a satellite location of the University of Waterloo, its affiliated university. Rather than providing similar programs, they provide unique programs, including Global Business and Digital Arts (GBDA).
GBDA was conceptualized 10 years ago to produce graduates with aptitudes that can dominate the workforce. It combines creative design, technology, and business into one unique and interdisciplinary undergraduate program.
“Designers can do great designs,” MacIntyre explained to StratfordToday. “But if that doesn’t translate to the bottom line then it’s just eye-candy.”
By producing graduates who can design, pitch, build, and grow successful businesses, they can enter the workforce and dominate – which they have done. As many of the administration would say, graduates have gone forward to get jobs in top companies, some even starting successful local companies.
The school was the brainchild of Mayor Dan Mathieson, then University of Waterloo president David Johnston, and then CEO of OpenText Tom Jenkins. Mathieson had the desire to bring a university presence to the city and after bumping shoulders with Johnston and Jenkins, the idea took shape.
In a video prepared for the anniversary, Mathieson explained that it was Johnston that took a study on the future economy in Canada and used it to form their school. On the upper axis of this chart was jobs in the future economy. On the outer axis was money in the future economy. There were two things off the chart at the top right corner.
“One was the oilsands,” Mathieson said. “I was smart enough to know that Stratford did not have a play for the oilsands. The other was digital media. David looked at me and he said ‘Dan, that’s where we’re going. We’re going to be digital media.’”
Now, the GBDA program sees students learn both the creative side of digital media, while also learning the ins and outs of the business world.
Many graduates have gone on to do incredible things. One student, Ariana Cuvin, designed the Canada 150-logo that was used across the nation during Canada’s 150th birthday. She was in just her second year of GBDA.
Other students have won prestigious global awards for the work they do in design and business planning. The school reports that 98 per cent of their graduates find employment in their respective fields.
Noah Pratt is an area-native, growing up in different townships in Huron-Perth. He graduated from the program in 2021 and now works for the school as a lab instructor and media technician.
He applauds the program, saying that the world is so big and GBDA is so good at directing students into the path that they need to be in.
“The three big pillars of the program are creativity, business, and technology,” he said. “If you have an interest in any of those, it’s just about following them as best as you can.”
While not able to attend, Dr. Vivek Goel, University of Waterloo’s president and vice-chancellor, appeared via video. He said that the university will play an increasingly important role for the University of Waterloo – and by extension Stratford as well. The school will enhance and scale its programs.
Dr. Christine McWebb, director of the Stratford campus, announced that the school is developing two new programs, a Master’s and a program in user-experience (UX), research, and design. They have also opened six research labs for user-experience, design, extended reality, and gaming.
A notable issue that was discussed by graduates, staff, and faculty was a lack of student housing. That is the number one concern for the administration moving forward, McWebb said. They are in conversations with the City of Stratford and the University of Waterloo to expand their facilities.
That being said, McWebb thanked the faculty members for their good work and looked ahead to the future.
“After 10 years, I can’t tell you how curious I am as to what the next 10 years look like.”
