Archive for the ‘Education Policy Context’ Category
The most expensive copyright insurance policy in Canadian history
April 22, 3012
The new fees are likely to be passed along to students, who will ultimately bear the burden of the copyright arrangement with higher tuitions… Universities already pay millions of dollars for these licenses with the money flowing to database companies, publishers, and authors… it defines copying as including “posting a link or hyperlink to a digital copy”, yet linking to content can hardly be described as copying materials. Moreover, the licence comes packed with onerous restrictions such as blocking the ability to store articles in online services.
Tags: ideology, rights, standard of living, youth
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Is all-day kindergarten really a leg up?
Feb. 14, 2012
According to its advocates, all-day kindergarten… offers a crucial leg up for disadvantaged children. For this reason alone, it’s essential to our economic prosperity… In 2002, the U.S. government launched the massive Head Start Impact Study to determine how well the program worked. The final report… found that the modest gains achieved by Head Start students wore off by the end of Grade 1 – they wound up no further ahead than those who weren’t in the program… the benefits of early childhood education have been vastly overstated. It’s not a magic bullet.
Tags: budget, poverty, standard of living, women, youth
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Older students not eligible for Ontario tuition rebate
Jan 15 2012
That’s the fine print many failed to notice about Queen’s Park’s $430 million rebate plan that gives $1,600 back to university students and $730 back to community college students whose annual family income is below $160,000: it does not apply to students who have been out of high school for more than four years… mature students are excluded, as are part-time students, graduate students and Ontario students enrolled outside the province… Because people with children and aboriginals both tend to be older when they enter post-secondary education, both groups appear worse off under the rebate plan.
Tags: budget, participation, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Education Policy Context | 1 Comment »
Should Ontario keep funding separate Catholic schools? No.
Jan. 3, 2012
Ontario is in the anachronistic position of being the only province that publicly funds one type of religious school (Catholic) to the exclusion of all others. Massive, wasteful duplication and the religious segregation of students are some of the results of this system. Recent events have also shown Catholic doctrine is incompatible with the equality rights in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms while other religious groups, now seeking access to public schools and public funding, have pointed out the blatant hypocrisy of Ontario’s education policy.
Tags: budget, ideology, multiculturalism, rights, tax
Posted in Education Policy Context | 1 Comment »
Most students called ineligible for tuition rebates
Jan. 4, 2012
less than 50 per cent of all students in the university sector and one-third of college students will benefit. The CFS presented a petition to the legislature signed by 40,000 students proposing that the $423-million to be spent annually on the rebate program be applied to all tuition fees. This would reduce tuition costs for everyone by nearly 15 per cent… (and) the current application process to determine who is eligible is elaborate and also costly.
Tags: budget, ideology, poverty, standard of living, youth
Posted in Education Policy Context | 4 Comments »
Ontario’s publicly funded intolerance
Dec 14, 2011
The various groups that have come out against Ontario’s proposed anti-bullying law are doing a fine job of proving the argument that the province has no business funding a separate Catholic school system… a group called Ontario Catholic Parent Advocates, is saying quite plainly that Bill 13 would require Catholic schools to accept homosexuality. And that they shouldn’t have to… The Catholic Church has a right to its beliefs. But the fact that taxpayers continue to fund schools that want to teach those beliefs looks ever more ridiculous as stories like this play out.
Tags: ideology, rights, tax, youth
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Legal Education Reform
November 25, 2011
Instead of a curriculum taught largely through professors’ grilling of students about appellate cases, some schools are offering more apprentice-style learning in legal clinics and more courses that train students for their multiple future roles as advocates and counselors, negotiators and deal-shapers, and problem-solvers… Some are exploring ways to reduce tuitions and make themselves more sustainable. Potential business models include legal degrees based on two years of classes, followed by third-year apprenticeship programs.
Tags: participation, rights, standard of living
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Ottawa needs to step up to PSE plate, too
November 23, 2011
Since the late 1990s, full-time enrolment at colleges and universities has increased 25 per cent. Enrolment in graduate studies soared 42 per cent between 1998 and 2008. But federal funding for postsecondary education has decreased dramatically since the late-1970s. The Canada Social Transfer gives money to the provinces but does not require them to use federal postsecondary funding for postsecondary purposes… The CFS’s central recommendation is for the federal government to bring in a Post-Secondary Education Act modeled after the Canada Health Act.
Tags: budget, participation, youth
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Setting education priorities
Nov 04 2011
The most intractable educational challenge is not really an educational issue at all: it is the enduring problem in Ontario (and Canada) of poverty. Schools and teachers cannot resolve this deep social problem (they have no control over unemployment, low wages and inadequate housing)… The impact of a caring, perceptive mentor on the life of a struggling student (whether poor or middle class) can be immense and the government should support this practice across the province… [and] encourage every creative attempt to deepen student “engagement” in elementary and secondary classrooms.
Tags: ideology, poverty, standard of living
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University tuition fees rise again: StatsCan
Sep 16, 2011
Statistics Canada said the average annual tuition fee for undergraduate students is $5,366 for the new 2011-12 school year, up 4.3% from last year. That follows a 4% in tuition for the 2010-11 school year… Not only did Ontario see the biggest year-to-year rise in tuition fees, it also had the most expensive overall cost at $6,640 for undergraduates. Perhaps not surprisingly, post-secondary tuition has emerged as an issue in the current election campaign in Ontario… Ontario has the most expensive graduate programs with an average tuition of $7,578 and Newfoundland has the lowest at $2,456.
Tags: budget, ideology, standard of living, youth
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