As the provincial government releases new strategies for strengthening international student recruitment and retention, concerns have arisen about the stresses on international students.
Confederation College president Jim Madder delivers his state of the college address on Wednesday; May 24; 2017
(Leith Dunick; tbnewswatch.com)
Thunder Bay school might be celebrating its 50th anniversary, but it's certainly not standing pat says, President Jim
Madder.
This study addresses the research question of how instructor transformational leadership behaviors and transactional leadership behaviors affect student outcomes of cognitive learning, affective learning, student perceptions of instructor credibility, and communication satisfaction in distance education. An overview of the theoretical underpinnings of the study is provided, as well as the tested hypotheses. A summary of the methodology, including sampling procedures, instrumentation, and data collection processes is presented, along with the procedures used for data analysis. Multiple linear regression was used to examine the relationships among the specified variables. Results support all four hypotheses, indicating that instructor transformational leadership behaviors are a more significant predictor of cognitive learning, affective learning, perceptions of instructor credibility, and communication satisfaction than instructor transactional leadership behaviors. The implications of the findings as well as the limitations of this research and suggestions for future research are discussed.
Canada’s businesses agree completely with the Prime Minister regarding the potential of our Aboriginal peoples to contribute to our collective economic prosperity. In fact, members of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce identified the participation of
the Aboriginal peoples in our workforce as one of four priority areas in addressing the barrier to their competitiveness posed by their difficulties in finding workers with the skills they need.
The Canadian Chamber has focused on the significant difficulties Aboriginal peoples face in completing elementary, secondary and post-secondary education and in obtaining and retaining employment. In this paper, we take a different approach to this issue by highlighting productive initiatives to improve the workforce participation of Aboriginal peoples and the competitiveness of employers. We will also offer recommendations to the federal government and Canada’s businesses
on measures both can take to provide Aboriginal peoples and communities—as well as businesses—with the tools to make these
success stories the norm.
There is a growing body of research demonstrating that there have been major changes in the work and working conditions of university teachers in many countries over the last few decades. In some cases this has led to the increasing employment of non-full-time university instructors, and questions have been raised, especially in the United States, concerning the working conditions of part-time faculty and the implications of these changes on educational quality. The number of full-time faculty at Ontario universities has not increased at the same pace as the massive growth in student enrolment, raising questions about whether universities have employed non-full-time faculty in larger numbers and whether the balance between full-time and non-full-time instructors is changing. However, very little empirical research has been conducted on non-full-time instructors in Ontario. This study offers a preliminary exploration of the issue by addressing four key questions:
a) What categories of non-full-time instructors are employed by Ontario universities?
b) What are the conditions of employment for non-full-time instructors?
c) Has the number of non-full-time instructors employed by Ontario universities changed over time?
d) Has the ratio of full-time to non-full-time instructors employed by Ontario universities changed over time?
The research method focused on the collection and analysis of publicly available information through a detailed review of collective agreements and related documentation, and the analysis of institutional data on employment. Most institutions do not report data on non-full-time instructor appointments.
impact on education at all levels. In the past, new technologies such as the telephone, radio, television, cassettes, satellites, and computers were all predicted to bring about a revolution in education. However, after the initial hype, these new technologies left a marginal impact on the general practice of education, each finding a niche, but not changing the essential process of a teacher
personally interacting with learners.
However, the Internet and, especially, the World Wide Web are different, both in the scale and the nature of their impact on education. Certainly, the web has penetrated teaching and learning much more than any other previous technology, with the important exception of the printed book. Indeed, it is possible to see parallels between the social and educational influence of both mechanically printed books and the Internet on post-secondary education, and these parallels will be explored a little further in this chapter.
The application of the Internet to teaching and learning has had both strong advocates and equally strong critics. Electronic learning has been seized upon as the next commercial development of the Internet, a natural extension of ecommerce.
John Chambers, the CEO of the giant American Internet equipment company, Cisco, described education as the next Internet “killer application” at the Comdex exhibition in Las Vegas in 2001 (Moore and Jones, 2001). Chambers linked several concepts together: e-learning is necessary to improve the quality of education; e-learning is necessary to improve the quality of the workforce; and a highly qualified technology workforce is essential for national economic development and competitiveness.
The goals of Education for All (EFA) are centrally concerned with equality. If children are excluded from access to education, they are denied their human rights and prevented from developing their talents and interests in the most basic of ways. Education is a torch which can help to guide and illuminate their lives. It is the acknowledged responsibility of all governments to ensure that everyone is given the chance to benefit from it in these ways. It is also in the fundamental interests of society to
see that this happens – progress with economic and social development depends upon it.
In February 2014, Getting Smart and Fuel Education™ (FuelEd™) came together to release Fueling a Personalized
Learning Revolution in Secondary Education. The paper highlighted how personalized, blended learning can improve access to high-quality learning opportunities by focusing on various experiences of high school students in districts across the country.
Our first paper contended that the ultimate goal of blended learning is to create opportunities for student learning to be personalized along unique pathways. We described the way in which personalization revolutionizes how students learn and teachers teach in schools and districts across the country. Benefits include increased engagement as a result of powerful learning experiences, access to tools that support quality work products, and choices in learning opportunities beyond the traditional school day. This personalized approach provides students ownership of the learning experience, flexibility in path, and opportunities to progress at an individual pace.
In this follow-up paper, we shift our focus from individual classrooms and courses to explore the question of scale. Specifically, we were interested in learning how schools and districts successfully scale online and blended programs so that a growing number of students have access to the potential of personalized learning.
Social networking became the rallying cry for a generation that connects over the Internet as easily as previous generations communicated over the telephone. In fact, many Millennials entering the workforce actually prefer social media to spoken conversations.
This report analyzes the economic impact of post-secondary education (PSE) in Canada. It is one of three foundational studies by The Conference Board of Canada’s Centre for Skills and Post-Secondary Education. The report considers three kinds of economic impact: spending in the economy (either directly by PSE institutions or indirectly through tourism and other channels), human capital formation, and intellectual capital formation. The report develops a bottom-up approach to understanding impacts, from the PSE institutions to the broader economy.
The ways in which a new university, the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT), was represented in local, regional, and national newspa- pers highlight the difficulties of identity creation for organizations. Drawing on theories of organizational identity and supplemented by interviews with UOIT’s founding members, a qualitative analysis of newspaper articles about UOIT
published between 2001 and 2004 demonstrates that the words and phrases used in these articles played an important role in establishing an im- age of UOIT that continues to impact its identity. These news reports also illustrate the complex relationships that existed between UOIT and its geographical, educational, and political contexts. Although UOIT was founded as a four-year
baccalaureate degree-granting university, it was linked with its well-established neighbour, Durham College, with which it shared land and services. As a result, UOIT was viewed by some as no more than a “community college with ivory tower pretensions.”
La représentation de l’Institut universitaire de technologie de l’Ontario (IUTO) dans la presse locale, régionale et nationale met en évidence les difficultés de création d’une identité corporative. Une analyse qualitative des articles sur l’IUTO, publiés entre 2001 et 2004, étoffés par des entretiens avec les membres fondateurs de l’IUTO, démontre, en s’appuyant sur les théories
de l’identité organisationnelle, que leur contenu a joué un rôle important dans la définition de l’image de l’IUTO qui affecte encore son identité. Ces reportages illustrent aussi les relations complexes entre l’UOIT et son cadre géographique, éducatif et politique. Bien que l’IUTO soit une université décernant des baccalauréats de quatre ans, il est lié à son voisin bien établile Collège communautaire Durham, car il partage avec lui les terres et les services. En conséquence, on considère parfois l’IUTO comme rien de plus qu’un « collège communautaire enfermé dans une tour d’ivoire ».
There is a global trend toward improving programs and student experiences in higher education through curriculum review and mapping of degree programs. This paper describes an action research approach to program improvement for a course-based MEd degree. The driver for continual program improvement came from actions and recommendations that arose from an
institutionally mandated, year-long, faculty led curriculum review of professional graduate programs in education. Study findings reveal instructors’ perceptions about how they enacted the recommendations for program improvement,
including (1) developing a visual conceptualization of the program; (2) improved connections between the courses; (3) articulation of coherence in goals and expectations for students and instructors; (4) an increased focus on action research; (5) increased ethics support and scaffolding for students; and (6) the fostering of communities of practice. Study findings highlight strengths of the current program and course designs, action items, and research needed for continual program improvement.
Here in Ontario, we’re preparing students to make their mark on the world.
That’s not an exaggeration. Ontario’s colleges and universities produce talented, driven and innovative thinkers. These leaders go on to find success in global health, international trade, cross-border research partnerships and so much more. They then come back to Ontario, creating businesses and investing in the community that gave them their start. That’s the kind of future we want for more people in Ontario, and there’s no reason that a competitive, international edge can’t start earlier in one’s career.
Social Media Usage Trends Among Higher Education Faculty
The numbers surrounding social media are simply mind boggling.
750 million. The number of active Facebook users, which means if Facebook was a country it would be the third-largest in the world.
90. Pieces of content created each month by the average Facebook user.
175 million. The Twitter accounts opened during Twitter's history.
140 million. The average number of Tweets people sent per day in February 2011.
460,000. Average number of new Twitter accounts created each day during February 2011.
120 million. LinkedIn members as of August 4, 2011.
More than two per second. The average rate at which professionals are signing up to join
LinkedIn as of June 30, 2011.
All of these stats, which come from the respective companies’ own websites, serve as proof points to what we already knew: social media is growing at breakneck speed. Yet the story of social media is still being written as organizations and individuals alike continue to evaluate the benefits and drawbacks of social media in the workplace. When that workplace is a college or university, there’s a cacophony of opinions in terms of the most effective uses, if any.
For the past two years, Faculty Focus conducted a survey on Twitter usage in higher education, this year we expanded the survey to include Facebook and LinkedIn, while changing a number of the questions as well. Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn are considered "the big three" in social media, and we thank those who recommended we take a broader look at the landscape.
All three platforms have their strengths and weaknesses, and are better used for some things than others. But how are the three being used in higher education today? It’s our hope that these survey results provide at least some of the answers while lending new data to the discussion.
Mary Bart
Editor
Faculty Focus
This study was a phenomenological study examining the experiences of faculty in an online learning environment in order to identify the factors that could produce job burnout and stress in master’s programs in education. The challenges and related stress-producing factors were also explored to identify best practices for online faculty and attributes most suited for the demands and expectations required in the online teaching environment. The study’s insights and findings are based on perspectives from online faculty who have been teaching in the modality for three or more years. These findings may be useful to stakeholders such as administrators, faculty mentors, faculty trainers, and faculty interested in employment in the modality so that identifiable and realistic criteria may be available upon which to base future hiring standards, employment practices, training, and decisions about teaching online. Insights about procedures and practices have been identified that may be effective in helping to develop initial training programs, faculty mentor supports, administrative decisions, and on-going faculty training. Based upon the findings, institutional leaders have information that could help identify best practices for online faculty and attributes most suited for the demands and expectations required in an online teaching environment. Institutions and administration can seek out and recruit the best possible online faculty who have the necessary skills, abilities, and characteristics required in this modality rather than hiring based merely upon academic credentials that would fail to identify specific attributes necessary for online teaching. Finally, those specific characteristics can then be applied to alleviate job burnout challenges online faculty would experience. The study will help institutional leaders (a) identify faculty earlier who will be better suited to the modality; (b) identify how to offer relevant, on-going faculty supports and training practices; and
(c) prevent online faculty job burnout.
This paper is an enquiry into the unpredictability of the liberally educated mind. We are all familiar with the value placed on the word critical when it figures prominently in justifications for liberal arts pedagogy, as in “a liberal arts education should foster the capacity for critical thinking.” However, de- pending on the milieu in which “critical thinking” is habituated, the mean- ing of the term may degrade into a theoretical conformity and passive assent to established routines which are inevitably expressions of disapproval. This trajectory is described as disenchantment. Its origins are traced to representations of the intellectual as a
distinctly secular creature and, in contemporary philosophical developments, associated with political liberalism—both of which, it is argued, are dominated by fear. Drawing on the recent Catholic “Communio” theology of David Schindler as a way to unveil the repressed theologies and hidden ontologies of liberal neutrality, the paper concludes with a brief examination of liberal arts scholarship that is increasingly open to various models of enchantment.
The time for meaningful transformation in Ontario’s post-secondary system is now. To meet the needs of the emerging economy, reform must focus on innovation and applied learning that vaults our province ahead of its competition
in creating the best-educated, best-prepared workforce in the world. Composed of distinct but equally valued and complementary partners, Ontario’s transformed post- secondary system will ensure that all students can reach their full potential through a broad array of theoretical and applied learning opportunities. Colleges will continue to be student focused, specializing in applied learning that leads to good jobs for graduates, addresses labour market needs and affords access to the broadest possible population. Colleges and universities will offer a range of credentials within their systems and collaborate on a multitude of programs that offer students the best of both. Expanded pathways will give students the opportunity to customize their post-secondary experience to match their interests. Online and blended learn- ing, married to leading-edge
technology, will enable students to learn anywhere, anytime, and in ways best suited to their learning styles. Students will be better prepared than ever before to meet the demands of the economy, and they will achieve their goals faster and at less cost.
In response to stronger demand for access to degree programs and changing expectations from employers due to labour market needs, the Ministry made a number of decisions about how to increase access to a broader range of degree opportunities in April 2000. One of those decisions was to allow Colleges of Applied Arts and Technology (CAATs) to offer degrees in applied areas of study. These degrees differ from research-focused degrees because they have a strong focus on preparation for entry to practice occupations. The first degree programs began development in 2001. As of the evaluation period, thirteen of the twenty four colleges in Ontario were offering college degree programs.
Under the broad research question, “Can multiple electronic learning resources improve students’ academic performance in a large first-year General Chemistry course?”, this study examines how students used a wide range of online resources during the Fall 2011 and Winter 2012 academic terms and correlates this information with their academic success, measured by their grades on two midterms, a final exam and their final course grade.
Since 1996, Professor Robert Burk has taught Carleton University’s large first-year chemistry course, CHEM 1000. The course was a full credit course and spanned the fall and winter terms. In 2010, the Department of Chemistry adjusted the curriculum and the course has since then been offered as two half-credit courses – CHEM 1001, which runs in the fall term, and CHEM 1002, which runs in the winter term. Only students who achieve a passing mark in the fall term are eligible to enroll in the winter section of the course. Course enrollment has increased from 350 in 1996 to 700 in 2011.
On the basis of national surveys conducted in 1998, 2004 and 2010, about half of Canadian adults were found to participate in further education courses annually. The vast majority of adults were participating in informal learning related to paid employment, housework and general interests. About 20 percent express unmet demand for further education. Older and working class people may have somewhat lower rates of participation in further education courses but not in informal learning. There are also suggestions of a trend toward increasing underutilization of educational qualifications and continuing underuse of computer skills in paid workplaces.