For many young women and girls in Canada, their opportunity to participate equally in Canadian society and their right to lead successful and fulfilling lives may be disrupted by acts of gender-based violence. Acknowledging the serious impact of such violence on young women and girls, the House of Commons Standing Committee on the Status of Women (“the Committee”) agreed on 8 March 2016, to conduct a study on violence against young women and girls in Canada.
The Instructional Skills Workshop (ISW) is an internationally recognized, peer-based, educational development program involving 24 hours of structured intensive instruction designed to strengthen instructors’ skills in planning, teaching, feedback and critical reflection through a student-focussed process. For over 30 years, the ISW has been offered at more than 100 institutions worldwide as a method of facilitating the development of student-centred, reflective instructors (Day, 2004). Although based on best pedagogical principles for teaching adult learners (Day, 2005), little empirical research has been performed to assess the impact on faculty of participating in the ISW (Macpherson, 2011). Research performed to date has typically shown that individuals who participate in this workshop report that it is transformative to their teaching in the classroom (Macpherson, 2011). The present study sought to extend these findings by conducting a pre-post analysis of ISW and non-ISW participants. The goal of this research was to investigate the influence of the ISW on developing a student-centred approach to teaching in university and college faculty.
Mental health is a growing concern for all Canadians. To date, it is estimated that approximately 20% of Canadians will experience some sort of mental illness in their lifetime1. It also remains a pressing issue for students across Canadian campuses as institutions continue to signal a rise in the number of mental health cases.
Canada's post-secondary institutions are not producing enough graduates with the right skills to drive future economic growth, warns the head of one of the country's largest banks.
CIBC chief executive Victor Dodig told The Canadian Press in an interview Tuesday that much of the country's eventual economic success will be generated by entrepreneurs who commercialize new ideas and technologies.
This report describes a study exploring the impact of academic community-based learning (CBL), course community-service learning (CSL) and other in-course learning activities (ICLA) on student learning. Informed by Kolb’s (1984) experiential learning cycle, the study used a survey instrument, adapted from several existing survey instruments, examining students’ self-reporting in a number of areas such as:
• Student engagement
• Depth of learning
• Perceptions of course environment including teaching quality and course workload
• Educational outcomes
The study, conducted over a two-year period (July 2011 to July 2013), surveyed 485 York University undergraduate students enrolled in a variety of introductory and upper-year courses across various academic disciplines. In addition, faculty members who taught these courses were also invited to take part in focus group sessions. The focus groups provided additional qualitative data about instructors’ motivations, strategies and challenges associated with incorporating experiential
education approaches to their teaching and instructors’ perceptions of how CBL, CSL and ICLA impact student learning and
experience.
In 2008-09, Lakehead University undertook a study to examine the effectiveness of its Gateway program, an academic intervention program offered to a select population of incoming students. The Gateway program at Lakehead is designed for students who exhibit academic potential but who do not meet the traditional entrance requirements of the university at the time of application. The program not only provides access to a university education but also provides support for success. The
intentional and holistic programming provided to students admitted through the Gateway program includes special academic support programming and mandatory academic advising.
Veteran researchers present five strategies—like maintaining success files and allowing choice—to help struggling students develop a positive attitude needed for success.
This paper replicates the work of Giles and Drewes from the 1990s.They showed a catch-up effect whereby graduates of liberal arts undergraduate programs, although at an early-career disadvantage compared with graduates of applied programs, had higher incomes by mid-career. Working with the Panel 5 Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics (2005–2010), the catch-
up no longer exists.
Do your school reform efforts frequently sputter or stall? In this indispensable sequel to the
bestseller Motion Leadership, Michael Fullan shares the real-life strategies and results of educators who have
used motion leadership to propel entire organizations and systems forward. Success stories from the
US and around the world illustrate how educators can use a small number of specific actions to
generate momentum for lasting change. Motion Leadership in Action addresses:
• Creating and leading movement in the right direction and at the right time
• Implementing a "ready-fire-aim" mindset
• Emphasizing the importance of collaboration
• Forging relationships while handling resistance
• Establishing your change stance in order to get better results
Colleges are under increasing pressure to retain their students. Federal and state officials are demanding that those who enter their public institutions— especially students from underrepresented groups— earn a degree. Over two dozen states disburse some state funding on how many students an institution graduates, rather than how many it enrolls. Students and families are more anxious than ever before about crossing the degree finish line, as the financial burden of paying for college has increased significantly in recent years. And retaining students is becoming more crucial to the university bottom line. As recruiting and educating students becomes increasingly expensive, colleges hope to balance the resources they use to recruit students with revenue generated when those students are retained.
Australia’s vocational education sector is a mess. Tightening regulation and tweaking some of the settings will contain the damage, but these measures alone will not address deeper problems in the sector. Real, sustained improvement requires rethinking the funding and regulatory models but also the purpose and idea of vocational education.
In their aptly named book on organizational management, Jeffrey Pfeffer and Robert I. Sutton write about Hard Facts, Dangerous Half-Truths, and Total Nonsense. A hard fact is something for which there is solid evidence. A dangerous half-truth is when this fact is superficially applied. And total nonsense is often the outcome of not knowing the difference.
We can gain insight about the current state of school leadership by applying this organizational thinking to two of education’s hard facts: The principal is crucial to school success, and professional learning communities are more effective than individual professionals working in isolation. In doing so, we should remember that the danger in the half-truth is not just that it is incomplete or misleading, but that its proponents are unaware that it is not true.
Many colleges speak of the importance of increasing student retention. Many even invest substantial resources in programs to achieve that end. Witness, for instance, the growth of the freshman seminar. Some institutions even go so far as to hire retention consultants who promise significant gains in retention if only you use their programs. But while many colleges have adopted a variety of programs to enhance retention, most programs are add-ons that are marginal to the academic life of the institution. Too many colleges have adopted what Parker Palmer calls the “add a course” strategy. Need to address the issue of diversity? Add a course in diversity studies. Need to address the success of new students? Add a freshman seminar. Need to address student retention? Bring in a consultant and establish a committee or office charged with that responsibility. The result is a growing segmentation of services for students into increasingly autonomous fiefdoms whose functional responsibilities are reinforced by separate budget and promotion systems. Therefore, while it is true that retention programs abound on our campuses, most institutions, in my view, have not taken student retention seriously. They have done little to change the way they organize their activities, done little to alter student experience, and therefore done little to address the deeper roots of student attrition. As a result, most efforts at enhancing student retention, though successful to some
degree, have had more limited impact than they should or could.
This paper reports the results of an analysis of persistence in post-secondary education (PSE) for college students in Ontario based on the extremely rich YITS-B dataset that has been used for other recent studies at the national level. We calculate hazard or transition rates (and cumulative transition rates) with respect to those who i) graduate, ii) switch programs, and iii) leave PSE (perhaps to return later). We also look at the reasons for switching and leaving, subsequent re-entry rates among leavers, and graduation and persistence rates once switchers and re-entrants are taken into account. These patterns are then probed in more detail using hazard (regression) models where switching and leaving are related to a variety of individual characteristics, family background, high school outcomes, and early pse experiences. Student pathways are seen to be varied. Perhaps the single most important finding is that the proportion of students who either obtain a degree or continue to be enrolled somewhere in the PSE system in the years after entering a first program remains close to the 80 percent mark for the five years following entry. Seventy-one percent of students graduate within five years of starting, while another 6 percent are still in the PSE system.
Michael Skolnik
The search for effective public policy approaches for relating higher education to the needs of the labour market was a subject of much attention in the 1960s and early 19 70s, and the verdict was largely against centralized comprehensive manpower planning. This paper re-examines the role of manpower planning in the university sector, in light of new economic
imperatives and new data production initiatives by Employment and Immigration Canada. It concludes by rejecting what is conventionally referred to as manpower planning, and offering, instead, a set of guidelines for improving the linkage between universities and the labour market within the framework of existing institutional and policy structures.
When former University of British Columbia president Martha Piper was asked in 2011 about the impact a university president has, her swift response, after nearly 10 years at the helm before her retirement in 2006 was, “not much.” As Ms. Piper returns to the university as interim president after Arvind Gupta’s hasty departure this month, would she say the same thing today?
This white paper reviews the BCcampus Competency to Credential approach to flexible learning in trades training in British Columbia. First, it considers the broader notion of competency-based education and the development of the Competency to Credential concept in response to current education and training challenges. The paper then considers at a high level how the concept may also be applied to other competency-based education and training programs, such as in health care education. In particular, though, this paper describes how the Competency to Credential approach brings system stakeholders together in a collaborative and unified effort to improve trades training and education system-wide in British Columbia and shows how a broader application to other jurisdictions and trades sectors in Canada might occur.
To exemplify the Competency to Credential approach, the paper focuses on the first two phases of a pilot project targeting certification challengers within the Professional Cook trade in British Columbia.
A meta-analysis of the transformational leadership literature using the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire
(MLQ) was conducted to (a) integrate the diverse findings, (b) compute an average effect for different leadership scales, and (c) probe for certain moderators of the leadership style-effectiveness relationship. Transformational leadership scales of the MLQ were found to be reliable and significantly predicted work unit effectiveness across the set of studies examined. Moderator variables suggested by the literature, including level of the leader (high or low), organizational setting (public or private), and operationalization of the criterion measure (subordinate perceptions or organizational measures of effectiveness), were empirically tested and found to have differential impacts on correlations between leader style and effectiveness. The operationalization of the criterion variable emerged as a powerful moderator. Unanticipated findings for type of organization and level of the leader are explored regarding the frequency of transformational leader behavior and relationships with effectiveness.
There is a significant debate in Nova Scotia respecting student finance. Students Nova Scotia is a key contributor to this debate, voicing concerns about unmet need, student debt, tuition and other fees. Like others, we do not always effectively communicate how these different factors or different policies are impacting concretely on real, individual human beings, nor have we successfully situated students’ current circumstances in time. This means many do not understand the real circumstances
of students, the debate often remains superficial, and few appreciate the negative and positive
changes that have taken place.
To demonstrate changes in the circumstances and challenges facing students since StudentsNS was created in 2004, StudentsNS has conducted a number of case studies on the resources and costs that students must meet to attend post- secondary education in Nova Scotia. These case studies are not perfect and certainly cannot capture all the circumstances of the more than 50,000 students attending post-secondary education in the province. They do, however, provide a picture of how circumstances have changed, the impact of different policy decisions made by government, and the impact of policies advanced by StudentsNS.
Whether they led a company or a country, history's best leaders understood the importance of providing the motivation and direction to achieve larger goals. Poor leaders lose the faith and trust of the people they lead, while great leaders seem to
lead without effort. The character, actions and thoughts of a leader, good or bad, permeate an organization. Your goal should be to demonstrate the best qualities of a leader while encouraging the same from those who follow you. These 35 quotes about leadership will help you think about and guide your actions.