Deconstructing the Waterloo Brand
Innovation. Entrepreneurship. Ideas that change the world.
These are some of the words and slogans that Waterloo uses to build its brand as the number one university in Canada. The university uses this brand to attract students, with the promise of a degree from a prestigious school that helps them become successful in the real world. Advertisements boast of the strongest academic students, founders of startups, and individuals who conduct world-changing research. These success stories reinforce the idea that students who attend the university will be successful.
The brand, however, is like a book cover; it looks good in theory, but it doesn’t tell the whole story. From my experiences here as an undergrad, I believe that the brand conveyed isn’t an accurate representation of the typical student’s experience. There are some things about the brand that I believe need to be said, from the perspective of an actual student.
On the school’s website, there’s the following excerpt explaining the university’s values:
At Waterloo, experiential learning takes place within a research environment. Learning that transcends disciplinary, institutional and international boundaries encourages students to address real challenges in new and innovative ways. The opportunity to learn in such a dynamic and relevant way attracts the best and brightest students from across Canada and around the world . . . Imbued with a spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship, Waterloo is changing the world we live in, earning a place among the most respected and recognized universities on the planet.
The “best and brightest”
Waterloo claims that their students are the “best and brightest”, but how does the school define these students? The most obvious answer would be grades: students who do well are assumed to have mastered the course material. It also plays a significant role in selecting potential students during the admissions process.
In recent years, there has been a trend of increasing admission averages. As a personal anecdote, I was admitted to the ECE program in Fall 2010 with a high 80s average. At the time, the admission average was simply listed as “individual selection from the mid 80s”. If I applied for Fall 2016 admission with the same average, I would only have a 7 % chance of getting in.
It’s obvious that factors such as demand for the program are reflected in the new averages. However, the implications on the students’ abilities are unclear. Firstly, how do we know if the students are genuinely bright? In a pool of students with similar averages, it’s unlikely that their abilities will all be equal. Secondly, can it be assumed that students are smarter than those who applied in previous years? Curriculums and competition for programs vary by year, so it’s hard to make a direct comparison.
The “best and brightest” label is not only formed on a questionable basis, it places students on a pedestal: they’re assumed to be hardworking individuals who consistently earn good grades in their courses. However, the reality is many of these “best and brightest” struggle just the same. There’s numerous reasons speculating why this is the case, such as high school being too easy, or grades being inflated. Grades are also a source of competition: opportunities such as grad studies require a certain average to get in, and some faculties such as Engineering release student ranks at the end of each term. Such competition often leads to imposter syndrome, with students being unable to recognize their own achievements because someone is superior to them.
The overabundance of “innovation”
Being primarily known for its STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) programs, Waterloo frequently draws attention to this heritage in its marketing. Advertisements often make references to innovation in areas such as scientific research and new discoveries, inventions, and Velocity, the university’s startup incubator. Waterloo alumni have founded several successful ventures, such as Thalmic Labs, Kik, and MappedIn.
In the past five years, over 2200 startups have been launched in the city. While these achievements are to be celebrated, it’s clear that the people behind them are in the minority; not all students/staff can afford to partake in these achievements. People who don’t do so may not have the skill, interest, or time to invest in a project, being busy with academics and/or finding a co-op job. It’s rare for startups to end up as the next Facebook or Instagram; they often fail for a myriad of reasons, some outside of the entrepreneur’s control. Because these stories are applicable to very few, students are stuck with a brand that doesn’t really resonate with them.
In addition to its frequent usage by the university, there is also a tendency for entrepreneurs to describe their projects as “world-changing” or “innovative”. These terms are used so frequently that I feel they’ve become clichéd and lost their meaning. This isn’t to say that innovation should be discouraged, but that it should be approached more moderately. The idea of needing to be innovative can breed arrogance, and in some cases this leads to “innovation for the sake of innovation”, rather than genuine interest in the project.
The halo effect
The main issue with the brand is that it exemplifies the halo effect, where a person’s impression of something will be influenced by an impression in another area. Over the years Waterloo has cultivated a reputation as a source of bright and capable students. Many companies praise the capabilities of co-op students, and hire students every term. Thus, people have come to view all students from the school in a positive light, and that they’re all equally capable.
Focusing on the success stories and “innovation” is done for one single reason: it brings money to the university. When the university shows that its people are making impact in the world, they are more likely to obtain additional grants for research/entrepreneurship, and more students will apply for their programs. Yet by focusing so much on these success stories, the university overshadows the stories of adversity, fear, and failure. Posts like these are all too common in the university’s subreddit, and point to serious mental health issues within the student population. From my personal experience, counsellors in engineering are almost always booked weeks in advance, leading to many students not getting help in a timely fashion.
Another pillar of Waterloo’s identity is co-op. Co-op allows students to try different areas of work, and allow them to gain real work experience in the process. However, the application process has proved to be a double-edged sword. After writing and sending out resumes/cover letters, many people are bound to end up with a pile of rejections. The extremely fortunate ones are not only announcing their interviews/offers on Facebook, but have trouble deciding on which offer to accept. There’s also a prevailing mentality that California jobs are superior to jobs found elsewhere, which leads to people applying to those jobs purely for the reputation (known as “Cali or Bust”). This is often used as a point of comparison among classmates - those who secure California jobs are looked up to, and those who don’t are left feeling inferior. The mentality has become such an obsessive devotion that people expect a California job to solve all their problems, not realizing that such a job brings its fair share of problems as well - high living costs/taxes, poor gender diversity, and expensive healthcare, to name a few.
Dangers of the brand
Because Waterloo’s heritage lies in STEM, the brand tends to focus on those fields extensively. This has the effect of excluding individuals not in those fields; there’s no talk of innovation in fine arts, for example. But the danger of the brand is that it risks painting a false picture of the school: students are essentially being told to put on a brave face and sing the school’s praises, hiding their inner demons from their peers and the outside world. Few people are willing to admit struggles for fear of being looked down upon by peers. By fourth year many students end up lifeless, devoid of the passion they once had. These problems are not unique to Waterloo, and in fact are quite widespread throughout universities in general.
Ultimately, I believe these problems will continue to persist for some time. STEM degrees are currently in high demand, and while the university continues to receive money from students/grants, they will continue to play up the “innovation” message. However, innovation should not come at the cost of mental health, nor should decisions be made primarily on monetary grounds. The university has solved many problems before, and hopefully mental health will be one of them.