On Saturday, April 15, we lost Dr. Raymond Legge, distinguished professor emeritus and an extraordinary and irreplaceable member of our Waterloo Engineering community.
For over 35 years, Dr. Raymond Legge’s exemplary record of scholarship, teaching and service has helped to elevate the University of Waterloo’s reputation as one of the world’s preeminent engineering schools.
Throughout his career, Dr. Legge remained an active and involved professor who inspired the next generation of engineering leaders. His teaching excellence has been recognized many times, including as a two-time recipient of the Sanford Fleming Foundation Faculty of Engineering Teaching Excellence Award and a three-time recipient of the Faculty of Engineering’s Distinguished Performance Award.
Dr. Legge’s dedication to educating the next generation of engineers frequently went beyond the classroom. Serving in several senior administrative roles within the Faculty, Dr. Legge has significantly shaped Waterloo’s prominent engineering curriculum. He has served on over 50 committees across Waterloo and has personally supervised more than fifty doctoral and master’s students – many of whom are now leaders in the engineering profession.
His extraordinary research contributions are equal to his distinguished career as an educator. Dr. Legge’s world-class research program at Waterloo is one of the first to be singularly focused on biotechnologies development. His pioneering contributions have advanced many applications of global import, from biosensors to environmental monitoring and remediation, to green bioprocesses and biological water treatment. His 370+ journal and conference publications in these areas have been cited more than 8,250 times.
Prestigious awards from professional societies such as the American Water Works Association and Canadian Society for Chemistry are further testaments of the high esteem in which his peers hold him.
We will miss Dr. Legge and how he enriched the lives of our faculty, staff and students during his time on campus.
As an expression of sympathy, condolences for the family and memorial donations may be made to the “Raymond L. Legge Engineering Pride Award” at the University of Waterloo. This scholarship is aimed at helping exceptional engineering undergraduates who contribute to the 2SLGBTQ+ community.