While Canada leads other OECD member countries in postsecondary education (PSE) participation rates, there still remain underrepresented segments of the population which are less likely to pursue PSE. Ontarians who come from low-income households, have parents with no PSE, live in a rural area, identify as an Aboriginal person, and/or have a disability are less likely to enrol in PSE (Norrie & Zhao, 2011).
Youth from some ethnic and racial groups are also less likely to pursue PSE, particularly university (Abada, Hou, & Ram, 2008).
This paper focuses on early intervention programs as one approach to support underrepresented youth to complete secondary school and make the transition to PSE. These programs are intended to provide youth with the resources, support and information necessary to avoid dropping out of school and to increase their chances of participating in PSE (Chambers & Deller, 2011). Early intervention programs can originate within the elementary and secondary school systems, colleges, universities, community centres or other community-based organizations.
The first section of this report is a literature review summarizing the key thinking on the role of early
intervention programs in supporting access. Much of what we know in Canada about these programs is
drawn from the American context, where research on the topic has been extensive. As a result, the
literature review draws heavily from American sources, making links to the Canadian context where
possible.
This article reviews notable rends in the leadership evelopment field. In the ast two decades, such luded the proliferation
of new leadership development meth- ods and a growing recognition of the importance of a leader’s emotional resonance with others. A growing recognition that leadership develop- ment involves more than just devel- oping individual leaders has now led to a greater focus on the context in which leadership is developed, thoughtful consideration about how to best use leadership competencies, and work/life balance issues. Future trends include exciting potential advances in globalization, technolo- gy, return on investment (ROI), and new ways of thinking about the nature of leadership and leader- ship development.
Gina Hernez-Broome, Richard L. Hughes, Center for Creative Leadership
When teachers think the best, most important way to improve their teaching is by developing their content knowledge, they end up with sophisticated levels of knowledge, but they have only simplistic instructional methods to convey that material. To imagine that content matters more than process is to imagine that the car is more important than the road. Both are essential. What we teach and how we teach it are inextricably linked and very much dependent on one another.
This special report features 11 articles pulled from the pages of The Teaching Professor to help you discover new ways to build connections between what you teach and how you teach it. The report offers tips on how to engage students, give feedback, create a climate for learning, and more. It also provides fresh perspectives on how faculty should approach their development as teachers.
It’s been said that few things can enhance student learning more than an instructor’s commitment to ongoing professional development. Here’s a sample of the articles you will find in Effective Strategies for Improving College Teaching and Learning:
• Faculty Self-Disclosures in the College Classroom
• A Tree Falling in the Forest: Helping Students ‘Hear’ and Use Your Comments
• Understanding What You See Happening in Class
• Can Training Make You a Better Teacher?
• Striving for Academic Excellence
Although there is no single best teaching method, approach, or style, this special report will give you a variety of strategies to try. Those that work effectively with your students
you should make your own.
Alive in the Swamp vividly articulates the key components needed for digital innovations to be transformational in a practical, easy-to-use tool that has applicability across the spectrum, from leaders of large school systems to education entrepreneurs. As education systems across the world continue to struggle with learner engagement, student achievement and equity, this work is more relevant and necessary than ever before.
One in five Canadians will experience a mental health [glossary] problem this year1 and the onset of the symptoms of mental ill health often occur between the ages of 15 and 24.2 These numbers tell us that many students in post-secondary education will experience mental health problems while they are attending college or university.
Ontario post-secondary institutions report a large increase in the number of students with mental health disabilities registered with their Offices for Students with Disabilities (OSD) [glossary]. Some students come to university or college with a diagnosed mental health condition such as depression or anxiety. Other students develop symptoms of mental ill health gradually while they are at school and may not realize that they need professional help.
If you are reading this Guide, you may be a student who has already been diagnosed with a mental health disability, be in the process of being diagnosed, or perhaps you are a parent/guardian of a student. Our goal is to help simplify the post-secondary experience for students with mental health disabilities by providing “need-to-know” information that is accessible and relevant. The Guide is written in a question-and-answer format and is addressed directly to students with mental health disabilities – so we use “you” throughout the text.
There are two major forces driving education today. The first is the economic reality that forces schools to
make the most effective use of dollars to improve student outcomes. The second is the exponential growth in digital tools — and subsequently digital content — that provides the foundation to transform and improve how instructors teach and how students learn. Let's address the economic driver first. For far too long the education sector has lagged behind the private
sector in adopting efficiencies and capabilities derived from technology. Virtually every other sector in the economy has been computerized, modularized and transformed over the past 30 years. Although there have been leaders for change, as witnessed by the efforts we applaud in this Yearbook, change has been difficult and delayed. The recent recession has only forced this issue to the forefront.
The second driver is technological. Digital content, more sophisticated assessment tools and myriad personal and mobile computing devices are emerging and taking center stage — all aimed at improving student achievement and preparing students to thrive in the careers of a digital economy. These emerging technologies, led by a cadre of educational technologists, are leading us down the right path. This Yearbook aims to help the education community continue on the right path. The first part of the Yearbook takes a look at IT spend, funding opportunities and top trends of the 2010-2011 school year to shed some light on what technologies are top of mind and how to fund them. The second part highlights 50 education innovators that have led the way and provided best-practice models to imitate. This look at what was done, who is doing it and where we are going is intended to provide inspiration and guidance to education leaders on their own innovative quests in education.
The Accord on the Internationalization of Education emerges from the Association of Canadian Deans of Education (ACDE), a network of deans, directors, and chairs of faculties, colleges, schools, and departments of education from across Canada. ACDE members are committed to “national, public discourse on the importance of public education in developing and sustaining a civil society (ACDE General Accord, 2006a, p.1). This Accord is the product of a shared commitment across members of the ACDE network, and is intended to speak to a diversity of stakeholders and audiences, within and external to the university communities from which it emerged. In particular, the Accord seeks to stimulate discussion of critical issues and institutional responsibilities in the internationalization of education, and to give careful consideration to representations of marginalized individuals, groups, and communities.
Most, if not all, faculty and graduate students will agree with Dr. Joli Jensen’s statement that “academic writing is a perplexing burden, a source of constant anxiety, self-doubt, and confusion” (p. 4). When we and our colleagues discuss our own writing struggles or those of our graduate students, we recognize that there are many potential issues underlying writing problems: research design issues, lack of knowledge of other scholarly literature, underdeveloped academic writing skills, an
emerging identity as an academic writer, and ineffective writing processes and practices. Jensen, the author of Write No Matter What: Advice for Academics, claims that her book focuses solely on “offering academic colleagues process-oriented strategies for overcoming writing obstacles” (p. 88). In fact, we find that Jensen offers more than just process strategies in that she also details the affective and psychological barriers to writing; the things that happen in writers’ heads when they have carved out time for writing but still struggle.
Abstract:
Student participation in applied research as a form of experiential learning in community colleges is relatively new. Ontario Colleges today participate at different levels with different numbers of projects and faculty involved. A few colleges in Ontario are more established in doing applied research including having basic infrastructure for research and having defined in which disciplines they will conduct research. This study took place in a college with a more established applied research program with the study goal of hearing and listening from the students and their teacher/research leaders as to their perceived benefit from the research program. The findings showed that the students found the program very beneficial and that student learning in areas considered important for the workplace was occurring that would not have been possible in the regular classroom.
This paper reports the results of a study of provincial level arrangements for coordination of planning and operations between university and college sectors in Canada. The data are drawn from a survey of senior government and sector officials in which respondents were asked to describe existing arrangements for coordination and to comment upon the importance attached to, and priority issues for, coordination; characteristics of effective structures for coordination; and their satisfaction with existing arrangements. The findings indicate that inter-sector coordination is perceived as an important issue; that coordination structures are most developed in the provinces in which there is the strongest mandate for articulation between sectors; and that efforts are under way in most provinces to refine and improve structures for inter-sector coordination.
Cet article prisente Les risultats d'une itude sur Les modes de coordination, d l'ichelle provinciale, de la planification et du fonctionnement intersectoriels des universitis et des colleges au Canada. Les informations utilisies pour les fins de cette analyse ont iti obtenues d partir d'une enquete effectuie aupres des hauts fonctionnaires des gouvernements provinciaux et aupres des institutions d'enseignement postsecondaire. L'objet de cette enquete a porte sur Les modes de coordination en place, sur /'evaluation de /'importance attribuee a ces activites, sur Les questions prioritaires necessitant la coordination, sur Les caracteristiques des structures de coordination qui s'averent Les plus efficaces, et en.fin sur le niveau de satisfaction en regard des structures existantes. Les resultats de l'enquete indiquent qu 'on attache generalement une grande importance aux structures de coordination intersectorielles; que Les provinces possedant Les structures Les plus developpees sont celles ayant etabli un mandat clair de coordination; et en.fin, que toutes Les provinces sont deja engagees dans un processus qui vise a developper et d ameliorer Les structures existantes.
What is a typical budget and staff size for admissions and recruitment for private vs. public and small vs. large institutions? To answer this question and provide up-to-date benchmarks, Noel-Levitz conducted a brief, web-based poll of enrollment and admissions officers across the United States in the fall of 2013. The poll was part of the firm’s ongoing series of benchmark polls for higher education.
In 2008, the OECD launched the AHELO feasibility study, an initiative with the objective to assess whether it is possible to develop international measures of learning outcomes in higher education.
Learning outcomes are indeed key to a meaningful education, and focusing on learning outcomes is essential to inform diagnosis and improve teaching processes and student learning. While there is a long tradition of learning outcomes’ assessment within institutions’ courses and programmes, emphasis on learning outcomes has become more important in
recent years. Interest in developing comparative measures of learning outcomes has increased in response to a range of higher education trends, challenges and paradigm shifts.
AHELO aims to complement institution-based assessments by providing a direct evaluation of student learning outcomes at the global level and to enable institutions to benchmark the performance of their students against their peers as part of their improvement efforts. Given AHELO’s global scope, it is essential that measures of learning outcomes are valid across
diverse cultures and languages as well as different types of higher education institutions (HEIs).
The purpose of the feasibility study is to see whether it is practically and scientifically feasible to assess what students in higher education know and can do upon graduation within and across these diverse contexts. The feasibility study should demonstrate what is feasible and what could be feasible, what has worked well and what has not, as well as provide lessons and
stimulate reflection on how learning outcomes might be most effectively measured in the future.
The following research reports detail the results of programs or inventions designed to increase the retention of post-secondary students. This bibliography is intended as a sample of the recent literature on this topic, rather than an exhaustive list. For inclusion, articles or reports generally described experimental research studies of PSE retention programs. Preference was given to larger scale projects focused on colleges in jurisdictions outside of Ontario (in several cases, progress reports from ongoing, large-scale initiatives were also included). Where possible, links to the original research are provided.
The iconic image of the Baby Boom generation is a 1960s-era snapshot of an exuberant, long-haired, rebellious young adult. That portrait wasn’t entirely accurate even then, but it’s hopelessly out of date now. This famously huge cohort of Americans finds itself in a funk as it approaches old age. On January 1, 2011, the oldest Baby Boomers will turn 65. Every day for the next 19 years, about 10,000 more will cross that threshold. By 2030, when all Baby Boomers will have turned 65, fully 18% of the nation’s population will be at least that age, according to Pew Research Center population projections. Today, just 13% of Americans are ages 65 and older.
Perched on the front stoop of old age, Baby Boomers are more downbeat than other age groups about the trajectory of their own lives and about the direction of the nation as a whole.
Some of this pessimism is related to life cycle – for most people, middle age is the most demanding and stressful time of life. 1 Some of the gloominess, however, appears to be particular to Boomers, who bounded onto the national stage in the 1960s with high hopes for remaking society, but who’ve spent most of their adulthood trailing other age cohorts in overall life satisfaction.
At the moment, the Baby Boomers are pretty glum. Fully 80% say they are dissatisfied with the way things are going in the country today, compared with 60% of those ages 18 to 29 (Millennials); 69% of those ages 30 to 45 (Generation Xers) and 76% of those 65 and older (the Silent and Greatest Generations), according to a Pew Research Center survey taken earlier this month.
Community college systems were established across North America from the early 1960s through the early 1970s. The new systems had two principal models: in one model, the college combined lower-division, university-level general
education with technical education programs; in the other, most or all of the colleges were intended to concentrate on technical education. Ontario was the largest of the provinces and states in North America that opted for the second model. Many of the issues that planners confronted when designing these college systems have either persisted or re-emerged in recent years. This
article re-examines the debate on the design of Ontario’s colleges that took place when they were founded and considers its implications for the present.
Ten months after it was first announced, the Commission on the Reform of Ontario’s Public Services has finally published its report. The Commission, chaired by former bank vice-president Don Drummond, has made 362 separate recommendations. If implemented, Drummond’s plans would permanently change not only our public services, but our province itself. With very few exceptions, the changes Drummond suggests would not be for the better. This paper is called “Out of Step With Ontario” because that is what Drummond’s report is. In December 2011, the Angus Reid polling company conducted a survey of 2,000 Ontarians. What the survey found was that 71 per cent of Ontarians want to see spending on public services either stay the same or go up; 81 per cent support higher income taxes on corporations; 82 per cent support higher income taxes on individuals earning over $300,000 a year; and a whopping 87 per cent chose “job creation” as their preferred method of paying down the provincial deficit. In contrast, Don Drummond wants to take an axe to public services, cutting spending more deeply and for more years than the Mike Harris government did in the 1990s. He wants more privatization, which would drive down wages for workers and increase profits for investors but not provide better services or lower costs to the public. With very few exceptions, Drummond ignores options for generating revenue to pay for public services.
Lastly, Drummond forecasts a weak economy for years to come but proposes no ideas to make that economy stronger. Indeed, his “austerity” measures will slow down our economy, thereby cutting jobs and making the provincial budget deficit worse.
Drummond’s plan won’t work.
This document is a first look at what Drummond has in mind. It is not a comprehensive analysis. Instead, it provides a quick overview that looks at Drummond’s proposals from the perspective of OPSEU members. Some key points have, without a doubt, been overlooked; if so, they will be added to future editions of this document, available on the OPSEU web site.
At all levels of education — but particularly in higher education — campuses are revamping their IT environments and policies to accommodate, manage and support emerging technology trends. Desktop virtualization is an approach that addresses many of these needs. This Center for Digital Education issue brief explains how desktop virtualization can support emerging trends such as BYOD, improve access to resources, ensure user authentication and security, and increase efficiencies for the IT department.
In June 2016, the Ontario government launched its five-year Climate Change Action Plan, which builds on a bold strategy to reduce the province’s green-house gas (GHG) emissions by 15 per cent below 1990 levels by the year 2020. Universities are stepping up to the challenge by demonstrating leadership, reinforcing their role in helping meet these targets, and supporting campus-based initiatives to spark broader action.
Fifteen of Ontario’s 24 community colleges participated in a survey conducted during the 2009/10 academic year in which data was collected to determine the frequency of mental illness, mental health problems and academic challenges in students accessing campus-based counselling and disability centres. In this study, 3,536 completed surveys based on 1,964 individual students were received, representing each of the four geographic sectors of the province; the average age of the students was 28. Of all students accessing college counselling and disability services in this study, 60.9% reported having a diagnosis of one or more mental disorders. Mood (37.5%) and anxiety (24.6%) disorders were the most prevalent individual diagnoses, followed by comorbid diagnoses (24.4%). The number of sessions students attended appeared to be related to the number of diagnoses. The mental health problems of this sample were typically stress related or interpersonal in nature. College service providers reported that 67.7% of students exhibited academic challenges (most frequently difficulties maintaining concentration), although the academic challenges reported for students with diagnoses varied. In this final report, the implications for college staff training and practices are reviewed, and directions for future research are discussed.
Executive Summary
The disappearance and murder of Saint Mary’s University student Loretta Saunders in February 2014 captured national media attention. Ms. Saunders’ murder highlighted the tragedy of missing and murdered Aboriginal women in Canada. As a student, Ms. Saunders’ experience also highlighted significant gaps in the programs and services available to Aboriginal students at Saint Mary’s University. The murder of Loretta Saunders served as a catalyst for students, staff, faculty and administration to begin the process of building a better university experience for Aboriginal students.
At the Loretta Saunders Memorial Service, the President of Saint Mary’s, Dr. J. Colin Dodds, committed to establishing a Task Force to provide guidance on how the Saint Mary’s university community could enhance learning opportunities and the education experience for Aboriginal students. The Task Force completed its work during the Spring and Summer of 2014.