The onset of economic downturn in late 2008 and early 2009 has had a varied effect on the Canadian economy. While much has been made about Canada’s relatively stable performance during this time, persistently high levels of youth unemployment since the downturn reveal that for a large number of Canadian youth, the impacts of recession have been deeply felt. Panelists and participants at the symposium Employment Challenges for Youth in a Changing Economy pointed to a need to uncover what the specific impacts of downturn have been, why high youth unemployment rates persist, and what can be done by policymakers, the private sector, and academic and community institutions to help youth realize their full potential.
OUSA asked students about their experiences of living in the community where their university is located: from how far they felt their municipality sought to engage students, to their housing situation, and their use of public transit.
Overall, students responded positively regarding many aspects of their experiences. For example students were broadly positive about the range and quality of off-campus housing available, and many of the students who relied on public transit to commute to school felt it was meeting their needs.
The Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations (OCUFA) welcomes the opportunity to provide feedback on the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities’ summer roundtable discussion guide. The issues and proposed changes outlined in the guide would have a significant impact on university faculty and will require the support of the 17,000 faculty OCUFA represents if they are to be successful.
Background/Context: Spirituality refers to a way of being that includes the capacity of humans to see beyond themselves, to become more than they are, to see mystery and wonder in the world around them, and to experience private and collective moments of awe, wonder, and transcendence. Though there is growing interest in spirituality and education, there is little evidence that it is intentionally included in most public school classrooms.
Purpose and Focus: The author’s personal experiences as a classroom teacher, adult early recollections of spiritual experience, and children’s responses to literature with spiritual themes are used to illustrate three points: (1) Although practice of spiritual discipline may help teachers to be more sensitive to spiritual experiences, it does not necessarily follow that they know what to do with them in the classroom. (2) Early recollections of spiritual experi-ences and reflection on what these mean for classroom practice may be a way of helping teachers learn how to identify and support spirituality in the classroom. (3) Teachers need to recognize that children’s spirituality is part of their being in the world, and honoring it in the classroom requires providing opportunities for its expression within the ordinary events of classroom life.
The development of essential employability skills (EES) has become an increasingly critical component of the postsecondary curriculum. Today’s graduates must be able to demonstrate a range of skills such as communication, teamwork and problem solving, and use these skills within diverse employment contexts. Although essential skill learning outcomes have been a part of Ontario’s postsecondary college curriculum for more than two decades, there is a distinct gap in research on the development and assessment of these skills. Reports on skill gaps, employment trends and EES assessment in education have led some educators to speculate whether electronic portfolios (ePortfolios) can be used to address the development and assessment of EES — and help shine a spotlight on EES for postsecondary students.
In Ontario, every winter, students in grade 8 must choose between taking applied or academic courses in their core subjects for grade 9. The decisions they make will have a long-term impact.
The choice will affect their options during the rest of their years in high school, and after they graduate. It may also
have an impact on their chances for success.
It is not clear that grade 8 students and their families have all the information they need to make these important decisions.
Perhaps even more important, international evidence suggests that the fact they have to choose at such an early age may contribute to greater achievement gaps, and greater inequality.
What are the key factors associated with attrition specifically at a Canadian community college?
One of the many lessons learned from the early years of distance education is the fact that you cannot simply pluck an instructor out of the classroom, plug him into an online course, and expect him to be effective in this new and challenging medium. Some learned this lesson the hard way, while others took a proactive approach to faculty training. All of us continue to refine our approach and discover our own best practices.
The University of Guelph (U of G) is committed to creating a campus founded on the principles of equity and inclusion. As part of this commitment, the University has undertaken a review of salary equity among the faculty, with a particular focus on gender equity. In addition to gender equity, U of G attempted to identify salaries that were unusually low compared to what could be expected based on various characteristics of faculty members. The review was overseen by the Office of the Provost, with support from the Office of Institutional Analysis and Research, the Office of Faculty and Staff Relations, and the Office of Diversity and
Human Rights.
A main goal of this themed issue of Teachers College Record (TCR) is to move the conversation about PISA data beyond achievement to also include factors that affect achievement (e.g., SES, home environment, strategy use). Also we asked authors to consider how international assessment data can be used for improving learning and education and what appropriate versus inappropriate inferences can be made from the data.
There is widespread interest among a variety of stakeholders, including parents, teachers, policy makers, and the general public, about what and how well students are learning in educational systems around the world and how well educational systems are preparing students for life outside school (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, OECD, 2009). Student achievement is often monitored at the national level, but nations are increasingly interested in cross-national educational comparisons as well. Perhaps in response to increasing globalization in both social and economic terms, stakeholders want to understand their country’s education system within a broader international context (OECD, 2009; 2010). What are its relative strengths and weaknesses? Is it preparing citizens to participate in a globalized economy? Is it valuing high quality learning opportunities and distributing them equitably among children and youth? Is it sufficiently resourced in terms of personnel and materials? Are teachers prepared and supported to work with diverse and high needs student populations?
Chief Student Affairs Officers (CSAOs) are senior-level student affairs per-sonnel. In 2011, 33 CSAOs responded to a national survey and provided a professional perspective on field development, student services, as well as predicted five-year trends for student affairs. In 2013, 17 CSAOs responded to the same survey and provided further information on these topics. Results indicated that attitudes towards diversity and technology remained stable be-tween 2011 and 2013. We established that CSAOs have less positive attitudes towards research, evaluation, and assessment than they do towards commu-nication and leadership. Here, we discuss at length the implications of these finding, as well as the potential for research into student affairs. In addition, we examine the continued professionalization of the CSAO field and note that research into CSAOs should be proactive instead of reactive.
Universities will have to prepare students for multiple career changes and a longer working life if they are to contribute to reducing the global inequality that is a major focus of this week’s discussion at the World Economic Forum in Davos, says the principal of McGill University.
The question of how to hold Ontario’s universities accountable to the needs of students is a relatively complex one. One must be careful to balance the need for academic freedom with the public’s (and especially students’) right to be assured that its considerable investments into postsecondary institutions are being used effectively and appropriately. OUSA’s Accountability paper offers recommendations to improve quality assurance and strategic goal-setting in Ontario’s universities. In essence, it
describes students’ vision of to whom, for what, and how universities should be held accountable.
In the span of a week, the future of three Alberta colleges was set. On February 22, Minister of Advanced Education Marlin Schmidt announced that Grande Prairie Regional College (GPRC) had been approved for degree-granting status, with a view to becoming a university. On March
1, Premier Rachel Notley appeared at an event to announce that Red Deer College (RDC)
also had been approved to grant its own degrees. That same day, the education minister again
went before the cameras to confirm that the Alberta College of Art + Design (ACAD) had
achieved university status.
Many schools are emphasizing typing and programming skills to prepare their students for the workplace of the future, but it isn’t just about being able to code.
Tour any IT department and you will find a web of servers and routers that store and disseminate information while firewalls and security systems keep the information safe. To most of us, this tech world is something we know we need and rely on, but have little knowledge of in terms of how it operates.
Should this disconnect of layman understanding of the tech world continue on a wide scale we could see a debacle in the workforce with a lack of qualified technicians. Luckily, there are schools and companies confronting this for new generations of students.
The rise of online and hybrid courses at the higher education level increases the need for distance learning infrastructures to nourish online faculty preparedness and student online learning success. One part of the distance learning infrastructure is incorporating the use of educated and trained instructional designers to assist faculty in developing robust and quality online courses. Developing online courses with an instructional designer is a very laborious process, but the results can outweigh the struggles that faculty encounter when doing it on their own. The authors explain what is involved in an established sixstep
course development model for developing, reviewing, and delivering a quality online course.
We have heard a lot of talk about MOOCs, or massive online open courses, over the last couple of years. On the plus side, MOOCs often draw enormous enrollments and are easy to sign up for and use; all you need, it seems, is an Internet connection and an interest to learn.
On the down side, they have significant attrition rates – about 90 percent of those enrolled never complete a course – and, according to their most alarmist critics, these courses may even threaten the jobs of college professors nationwide.
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.
Canada has enjoyed exceptional and sustained economic growth for the past 15 years – strong commodity prices have created a currency advantage in export markets, the R&D collaboration between universities and the private sector is strong, post-secondary education attainment is one of the highest amongst OECD countries, the overall unemployment rate has fallen, and the number of small and medium enterprises have risen in the last decade. However, as international competition for talent and capital continue to intensify, now may be the time to review one of the critical elements for any economy – skills and learning.
Here’s a question to ponder in the wee hours of the morning – or right now. How can a government respond to the following societal dynamic?
1. A persistent and growing demand for more availability of public postsecondary education.
2. Fewer public dollars to sustain or grow public postsecondary education, especially in Canada
with the insatiable financial appetite of the health care system.
3. A political imperative to minimize tuition increases.
4. Greater scrutiny and accountability around everything governments and public institutions do.