Not at all, according to Dave Zwieback, the Head of Engineering at music analytics company Next Big Sound (acquired by Pandora) and author of Beyond Blame: Learning From Failure and Success. Zwieback has spent decades leading engineers in companies operating in high-stakes, pressure-cooker industries, such as technology, financial services and pharma, where it’s commonplace for someone to take the fall when critical systems fails.
On Saturday, April 1, I attended a conference at the University of Toronto for Black university students aspiring to become medical doctors. Student panelists shared their stories of being either the only or one of very few Black students in their classes at the university's medical school. What struck me was that in a city and country as diverse Toronto and Canada, there are not more Black medical students. Throughout the day it was evident how the
representation of Black students at university reflected the poor outcomes for Black students in the education system throughout the Greater Toronto Area.
This paper proposes a new measure of skills mismatch that combines information about skill proficiency, self-reported mismatch and skill use. The theoretical foundations underling this measure allow identifying minimum and maximum skill requirements for each occupation and to classify workers into three groups, the well-matched, the under-skilled and the over-skilled. The availability of skill use data further permit the computation of the degree of under and over-usage of skills in the economy. The empirical analysis is carried out using the first wave of the OECD Survey of Adult Skills (PIAAC) and the findings are compared across skill domains, labour market status and countries.
The closing of residential schools did not bring their story to an end. The legacy of the schools continues to this day
day. It is reflected in the significant educational people and other nd more troubled lives. The legacy is also reflected in the intense racism some people harbour against Aboriginal people and the systemic and other forms of discrimination Aboriginal people regularly experience in Canada. Over a century of cultural genocide has left most Aboriginal languages on the verge of extinction. The disproportionate apprehension of Aboriginal children by child welfare agencies and the disproportion- ate imprisonment and victimization of Aboriginal people are all part of the legacy of the way that Aboriginal children were treated in residential schools.
Meaningful technology use in education continues to improve given an increase in access to available technologies and professional development. For educators, professional development has focused on approaches for technology use that foster content-specific best practices and improve student learning in traditional classroom formats. Meaningful technology integrations are not, however, limited to traditional classrooms. In fact, the push for distance and online education in postsecondary contexts has complicated the issue; faculty must develop and balance content-specific practices with technology
pedagogies for asynchronous learning environments to maximize opportunities for student learning. In this article, the authors discuss the findings from a secondary review of research and theoretical applications for faculty development. One model for faculty training based on these findings is posited.
Back in 2010 Ontario’s Liberal government began a bold experiment. It launched a plan to bring in full-day
kindergarten for four- and five-year-olds over the next five years.
At the time, the $1.5-billion plan was dismissed by then-Progressive Conservative leader Tim Hudak as a “frill” or
“shiny new car” that Ontarians could not afford.
Now the results of a new study by researchers at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE) provide strong
evidence that the experiment is paying off in spades.
As an instructional technologist at the University of Washington’s School of Social Work, Tom Baer is no stranger to
working with faculty who struggle to understand the role of instructional designers. It’s not unusual for him to encounter instructors reluctant to give up their go-to lecture or PowerPoint Presentation, unsure of online learning’s effectiveness or resistant to a change in teaching style.
Enrollment in online courses at colleges and universities continues to grow, along with the need for IDs who help design curriculum and implement digital tools. IDs work closely with faculty members and subject experts to create measurable learning objectives, produce course content and craft engaging activities. But during the process, faculty may give IDs the cold shoulder for fear of having to give up control or appearing less knowledgeable in front of their students.
I had coffee a few weeks ago with another displaced administrator at my university. Like me, he had arrived within the past decade to build something new and different. To some extent, he had succeeded. But, also like me, he had been informed that his leadership services would no longer be required beyond this year.
When he invited me, he asked if I would be uncomfortable meeting in one of the more popular campus coffee spots. "It’s in the shadow of the main administration building," he warned via email.
Mount Royal University (MRU) has a long-standing history of student-centered leadership and learning. We are known to be an institution that cares about the success and the health of our students, and we have strong services that support mental health promotion and respond well to mental health issues and concerns. In addition to excellent service providers, MRU has many positive practices and policies in place to support students. Recent trends suggest that the prevalence of mental health issues is on the rise among young adults. More students are entering into university with pre-existing mental health conditions, more are seeking help, and often issues are complex and multifaceted. Given that rates of mental illness are on the rise, and given that our student population has reported stress levels higher than other students at post-secondary institutions in North American, a review of our student mental health practices and procedures was warranted.
Two organizations have recently made themselves more than eligible to be inducted into the hall of shame when it comes to the sexual abuse of powerless children. And the negligent bystanders who knowingly ignore the immorality of it all and those who spend too much energy on not knowing, continue to be a large part of the problem.
Background/Context: Schools have attempted to address stratification in black and Latino students’ access to higher education through extensive reform initiatives, including those focused on social supports. A crucial focus has been missing from these efforts, essential to improving the effectiveness of support mechanisms and understanding why they have been insufficient: how students experience these reforms.
This week, we released a study examining the relationship between the supply of graduates from six regulated professions – medicine, law, teaching, architecture, engineering, nursing – and the labour demand for these graduates. The historical evidence provided in that analysis is clear – we never get it right! We either oversupply or undersupply.
a b s t r a c t
This study examined the trajectories of depressive and anxious symptoms among early-career teachers (N ¼ 133) as they transitioned from their training programs into their first year of teaching. In addition, perceived school climate was explored as a moderator of these trajectories. Multilevel linear growth modeling revealed that depressive and anxious symptoms increased across the transition, and negative perceived school climate was related to more drastically increasing symptoms. Results suggest that this career stage may be a time when teachers are particularly vulnerable to declines in mental health, and speak to some within-school features that may be related to teachers’ experiences.
Metrics are used throughout Ontario’s postsecondary education system—for determining university funding, judging institutional performance, and gauging student perceptions. But metrics are not always the best tool for evaluation, and often have unintended consequences.
As industries evolve and demographics change, the need for education continues to grow.
We, as a global society, spend quite a bit of money on higher education – BMO Capital Markets estimates that the United States alone spends approximately US$1.7 trillion on educational services – including about US$600 million on post-secondary education – and GSV Advisors estimates that worldwide spending is quickly approaching US$5 trillion.
That’s a lot of cash. And yet, as we spend more money on education, and as universities create new degree and certificate programmes, employers are asking for graduates with different skills than the ones we teach and some students struggle to get jobs, leaving many unemployed or underemployed.
Political pollsters like to talk about the distinction between "hard support" and "soft support." Hard supporters will vote for a candidate no matter what. Soft supporters are known by another name: swing voters. They are the people who say they’ll vote for a certain candidate but often change their minds.
The idea of training Ph.D.s for diverse career tracks has hard and soft supporters, too, but some professors may not realize which group they’re in. They may believe they’re behind graduates who search for jobs beyond the professoriate. But the actions of these faculty members — or their inaction — can suggest otherwise.
In writing, there’s an adage that says, "Show don’t tell." The millennial students in my creative-writing classes are
immersed in a world that constantly tells them things, and then tells them those things are important. When I walk
into our classroom, I am just another voice telling them things.
It’s hard to differentiate my voice from the thousands of others talking at them — the 24-hour news cycle, the spam
emails, or the Twitter feed of a world leader or a pop star. Faced with such an incomprehensible volume of data, it
can be overwhelming to try separating the truly important from the things falsely labelled "important." Detachment
becomes a survival strategy.
No one has ever criticised a hammer for being a hammer; it is an invaluable tool when that is what you need. But it is useless or destructive if used for the wrong purpose, and university rankings can be the same.
There are three main problems that make international rankings a poor mechanism for assessing, improving or differentiating any but the top few dozen universities in the world.
Abstract
Informal mid-term feedback processes create opportunities for students and academics to have a dialogue about their progress and to make any necessary or reasonable mid-stream corrections. This article reports on an action research project designed to see what impact mid-semester feedback might have on the classroom experience. The underlying motive for the study was to generate institution-specific “proof” which might encourage other academic staff to conduct informal mid-semester informal feedback exercises with their students.
End-of-semester data shows that both students and lecturers found the exercise to be a positive
experience. Students appreciated being able to voice their problems and opinions at a time when
mid-course corrections were possible. Lecturers felt there was an improvement in
the lines of communication, resulting in a friendlier teaching and learning environment.
Three teacher education tasks are analyzed using Bateson's "levels of learning" and the distinction between reference experiences and cognitive maps (Dilts, l994). The tasks were 1) writing a risk log of classroom innovations, 2) writing articles, and 3) doing public presentations. Student feedback indicated perceived shifts in behaviors, beliefs, and identities
through both active tasking (reference experiences) and their ongoing dynamic "explanations" (cognitive mapping). The results and activities are then discussed in relation to Freeman's (1992, 1994, 1995) concept of the socialization of teachers into professional discourse and the value of communities of explanation toward continual teacher development.