The Cities Project at the Martin Prosperity Institute focuses on the role of cities as the key economic and social organizing unit of global capitalism. It explores both the opportunities and challenges facing cities as they take on this heightened new role.
The Martin Prosperity Institute, housed at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, explores the requisite underpinnings of a democratic capitalist economy that generate prosperity that is both robustly growing and broadly experienced.
Colleges and institutes play a lead role in strengthening regional capacity to innovate and work with industry partners to enhance competitiveness in the sectors and communities they serve. They conduct leading-edge applied research projects with industry partners to provide market ready solutions.
Whether it’s the creation of a rapid oil containment cling pad to clean up small scale oil or fuel spills, the development of intelligent textiles to meet consumer specific needs, or building award winning cutting edge web technology, colleges and institutes help small- and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) innovate and grow by focusing on improvements in technologies, processes, products and services.
The Government of Canada’s Tri-Council College and Community Innovation (CCI) Program administered by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council in collaboration with the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research is making a real difference in growing the capacity of colleges and institutes to engage in industry-driven applied research and providing SMEs with the expertise required to be more innovative and productive.
Ontario is committed to helping every child and student achieve success and well-being. The primary goal of the province’s education system is to enable students to develop the knowledge, skills, and characteristics that will lead them to become personally successful, economically productive, and actively engaged citizens.
Researchers acknowledge that the need to engage in problem solving and critical and creative thinking has “always been at the core of learning and innovation” (Trilling & Fadel, 2009, p. 50). What’s new in the 21st century is the call for education systems to emphasize and develop these competencies in explicit and intentional ways through deliberate changes in curriculum design and pedagogical practice. The goal of these changes is to prepare students to solve messy, complex problems – including problems we don’t yet know about – associated with living in a competitive, globally connected, and technologically intensive world.
This paper introduces two new concepts to the debate on job quality: the low-wage gap and low-wage intensity. These two measures provide information on the depth and severity of low wages. Using Labour Force Survey microdata, we discuss trends in these two measures, along with trends in the incidence of low wages over the 1997-2014 period. For example, in 2014, 27.6 per cent of all employees aged 20 to 64 years earned less than two-thirds of median hourly wages for full-time workers aged 20 to 64 years (or $16.01 per hour), our low-wage cutoff. In this same year, the low-wage gap was 21.0 per cent, which means that the average low-wage employee earned approximately 79.0 per cent of the low-wage cutoff (or $12.66 per hour). Consequently, low-wage intensity, defined as the product of the incidence and the gap (scaled by 100) was 5.8. This is down from an intensity of 6.3 in 1997, which was the result of a slightly higher incidence (27.9 per cent) and a higher gap (22.7 per cent). This paper also provides these results by gender, age, educational attainment, industry, occupation, employment status and province. These detailed results help identify which groups face the highest rates, greatest depths, and largest intensities of low-wage employment in Canada. Furthermore, this paper explores the implications of a $15 minimum wage on the low-wage gap in 2014. Finally, to provide a brief sensitivity analysis, we discuss (1) the results for low-wage employment in Canada using a different cutoff (two-thirds mean hourly wages for full-time employees aged 25 to 54 years) and (2) comparisons of our results to those of CIBC’s Employment Quality Index and the OECD’s low-pay data.
Why go to university? When asked, today’s students are openly careerist and materialist. In a 2012 survey by the Higher Education Research Institute in Los Angeles, almost 90 per cent held that “being able to get a better job” was a “very important” or “essential” reason to go to college. The rationales of being “very well-off financially” and “making more money” were almost as popular.
This report is a companion to a study that found that high school grade point average was a stronger predictor of performance in college-level English and math than were standardized exam scores among first-time students at the University of Alaska who enrolled directly in college-level courses. This report examines how well high school grade point average and standardized exam scores predict college grades by the urbanicity of students’ hometown and timing of college entry. Among recent high school graduates from both urban and rural areas of Alaska, high school grade point average was a better predictor of college course grades than were SAT, ACT, or ACCUPLACER scores. It was a more powerful predictor of college performance among students who entered college within a year of high school graduation than among students who delayed college entry. For students who delayed college entry, high school grade point average was a better predictor than were standardized exam scores in English, but that was not always the case in math.
The purpose of this study was to document the implementation of an intergenerational literacy program that incorporated authentic literacy activity with the goal of raising low-English literacy levels of the parent and the English emergent literacy levels of their non-English speaking young children.
In this study, the authors’ determined the individual learner characteristics of educators enrolled in online courses that influenced social presence (affective social communication). Findings reveal that the number of online courses taken, followed
by computer‐mediated communication proficiency, are significant predictors of social presence. Recommendations for the effective use of online learning recognize that instructors must deliberately structure interaction patterns to overcome the potential lack of social presence of the medium. Similarly, quality instructional design and course development strategies need be incorporated with supportive pre‐course instructional activities provided to acquaint novice learners with online learning
expectations.
Key words: online learning, social presence, learner characteristics, computermediated
communication
Résumé
Les compétences et les acquis d’expérience des adultes sont méconnus et peu valorisées dans la société contemporaine axée sur l’écrit, les savoirs scolaires et les diplômes. En raison de leurs conditions de vie précaires, de leur difficulté d’accès au monde de l’écrit et de la faible reconnaissance de leurs acquis d’expériences, nombreux adultes non diplômés sont exclus des
décisions publiques et de la résolution des problèmes vécus dans leur communauté. Le but de la recherche était d’identifier et de comprendre les compétences et les pratiques des adultes non diplômés durant la résolution d'un problème environnemental. On voulait répondre aux questions suivantes : Quelles sont les ressources (cognitives, affectives, sociales…) et les pratiques que les adultes non diplômés mettent à profit durant la résolution d’un problème environnemental ? et Les adultes non diplômés, malgré leur faible niveau d’alphabétisme, sont-ils capables de proposer des solutions efficaces à un problème
environnemental ?
The transition from high school to post-secondary education presents challenges for students. Many variables have been identified as significant predictors of student achievement. Resiliency, defined as the ability to overcome challenges and adversity, may be particularly relevant during the adjustment to post-secondary education. This study assesses whether resiliency incrementally predicts student success after controlling for additional predictors. Participants were 277 undergraduate students who completed self-reports of academic skills, resiliency, personality variables, emotional intelligence (EI), and perfectionism. Students’ year-end GPA was collected from the university registrar. Hierarchical regression analysis revealed that resiliency, measured by sense of mastery, negatively predicted GPA after controlling for other predictors. The sense of mastery facet of self-efficacy positively predicted GPA; however, the adaptability facet was a significant negative predictor of GPA.
Findings suggest that self-efficacy is a salient predictor of academic success, and that strong academic skills may serve as a protective factor for poor adaptability.
What has been called “degree recognition” has become the subject of considerable attention in Canadian higher education within the past decade. While concerns similar to those that are being voiced today have arisen occasionally in the past, the scale of this phenomenon today is unprecedented historically. In response to the increased demand for degrees that began in the late twentieth century, a great number of diverse types of institutions and organizations have sought the authority to award degrees; and governments in four provinces have decided that it is in the public interest to allow some of these new providers to offer degree programs in Canada, thus ending the monopoly on degree granting formerly held by the publicly funded universities.These new providers include: public colleges and institutes; private postsecondary institutions; corporate universities in both the private and public sector; virtual universities; transnational degree programs; and special mission institutions such as aboriginal colleges.
In this follow-up study, college students who transferred to one Ontario university in 2008–2009 were compared to non-transfer students using several different measures of academic success at university. When compared to non- transfer students, college transfer students earned fewer credits each year, had lower GPAs, and were less able to earn credits from course attempts. The differences were small for students’ first and second years but larger in years three and four. Despite the
lower GPA, college transfer students were not more likely than non-transfer students to be eligible for academic suspension. College transfer students also attempted fewer courses and were much less likely to persist to Year 4. By spring 2012 (after four years of university), the college transfer students were more likely than non-transfer students to have graduated, but their degree of choice was a 15-credit three-year degree (as opposed to a 20-credit four-year honours or
non-honours degree). Policy implications are discussed.
The University of Waterloo will decide this fall whether a standardized system for course evaluations can balance
student demands for more feedback on their classroom learning with faculty concerns about the impact of bias and
evidence that such surveys may not improve student outcomes.
OUSA’s 2014 Budget Submission is focused on how the government can leverage post-secondary education to help achieve its vision of creating a fairer society. Despite the current discourse questioning the value of post-secondary education, the evidence demonstrates that attaining a post-secondary credential can significantly change a recipient’s social, economic, and health outcomes for the better.
However, to be able to achieve these ends, we must ensure that access to post-secondary is fair, that students have equal opportunities for success upon graduation, and that while students are in postsecondary, their educational experience is equivalent to their increasing investment.
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.
Selon les estimations du Conference Board du Canada, la pénurie de compétences entraîne un manque à gagner annuel de 4,7 G$ pour le PIB de la Colombie Britannique et de 616 M$ pour les recettes fiscales provinciales.
• Le Conference Board a mené une enquête auprès de 854 employeurs de Colombie Britannique – ce qui couvre plus de 130 000 employés, soit 9 % des employés de la province – afin de connaître les compétences, les professions et les diplômes qui
leur sont nécessaires pour répondre à leurs besoins actuels et futurs.
• Il existe beaucoup de choses que les employeurs, les éducateurs, les gouvernementset les particuliers, notamment les étudiants, peuvent faire pour résoudre la pénurie ou l’inadéquation des compétences et préparer la Colombie Britannique à saisir les nouveaux débouchés qui lui permettront d’exploiter pleinement son potentiel économique.
We have seen considerable discussion in recent Inside Higher Ed articles about “Teaching Excellence”, whether at the individual or institutional levels. We know this concept can be problematic: a focus on Excellent Teaching can have negative side effects in promoting an individualistic and competitive environment.
I think we need to consider a shift in focus, from Excellent Teaching to Exemplary Teaching ‒ again, at both the individual and institutional levels. A focus on Exemplary Teaching could promote a collective outcome of surpassing past accomplishments in teaching and learning, by fostering professional teaching at the individual level and coopetition at the institutional level (i.e., “cooperation in creating value, competition in dividing it up”).
How do you teach the same concepts and skills to students with diverse abilities and interests? Different learning profiles? And how do you do that in real classrooms, with limited time to plan?
Differentiated instruction is one answer that has been extensively documented (see “Recommended Resources” at the end of this post).
On March 12, 2015, the government announced that Ontario would be moving forward with the transformation of its
postsecondary education sector by launching consultations on modernizing the university funding model. The purpose of this
consultation paper is to outline an engagement process and position the review within the context of the government’s overall
plan for postsecondary education. Funding universities in a more quality-driven, sustainable and transparent way is part of the
government’s economic plan for Ontario.
In early 2015 the government of Ontario announced that it would be conducting a review of the processes by which it funds universities. In order to best capture the needs of those that consume, deliver and fund higher education, the government has commissioned extensive consultation with parents, students, universities, employers, agencies, and sector experts. This submission will serve as a summary of the Ontario Undergraduate Student Alliance’s contributions to those discussions, as well as a statement of our principles in the area of funding priorities that could benefit students.