Archive for the ‘Education’ Category
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Drummond promises less money, reduced flexibility for cash-strapped Ontario universities
Feb 23 2012
Even with tuition increasing at around 5 per cent a year, universities are faced each year with a 2-3 per cent gap between expenditures and revenues. Most universities have attempted to close this gap by cutting budgets and taking in more students, resulting in larger class sizes and increasing reliance on part-time faculty… The danger is that the government will see the report as justifying a simple cost-cutting exercise, which will only exacerbate the universities’ unsustainable fiscal position without giving them the tools they need to attempt to deal with the challenges they face.
Tags: budget, economy, ideology, participation, standard of living, youth
Posted in Education Delivery System | No Comments »
OCUFA analysis of the Drummond Report: all cuts, no substance
Feb. 23, 2012
On the commission’s own assumptions and proposals – 1.7 per cent annual enrolment growth, 1.9 per cent annual inflation, and 1.5 per cent annual increases in post-secondary funding – per student funding will decline by 12 per cent between now and 2017-18… inflation-adjusted provincial funding per college student could fall by $790, and per undergraduate student could decline by almost $940. For graduate students, the reduction could be $2,280.
Tags: budget, economy, ideology, standard of living, youth
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Ontario universities should offer three-year degrees, classes year-round and more online learning, says provincial report
Feb 22 2012
The report — tentatively entitled 3 Cubed: PSE institutions as centres of creativity, competency and citizenship equipped for the 21st century — says post-secondary education needs to be relevant and flexible given the increased demand for college and university. The proposals would get students through university or college cheaper and faster — the report says college diplomas should be two years at most — while still offering a quality post-secondary education… The report says pilot programs for the new three-year degrees should begin in September 2013, with rollout by 2015.
Tags: budget, participation, standard of living, youth
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OCUFA to Drummond: You can’t drive Ontario forward on a half-empty tank
Feb. 16, 2012
Drummond’s chief recommendation is that government funding of universities and colleges be limited to 1.5 per cent per year… this is an effective cut to higher education funding that does not keep pace with enrolment or inflation. Ontario’s universities already receive 25 per cent less per-student funding than they did in 1990; Drummond’s recommendations will make this under-funding even worse.
Tags: budget, standard of living, youth
Posted in Education Delivery System | 1 Comment »
Drummond Report: School boards fear loss of independence
Feb. 16, 2012
School boards say Don Drummond’s recommendations, if implemented, would not only affect the quality of education but also further erode their independence… “I don’t think any minister sitting at Queen’s Park can begin to have the knowledge that we have here of our facilities, our schools”… [But} boosting class sizes slightly, as Drummond recommended, the Toronto board alone could save $40 million to $50 million.
Tags: budget, standard of living
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Larger classrooms among sweeping changes suggested to education
Feb.15, 2012
The economist advising Queen’s Park on how to wipe out the deficit suggests sweeping changes to the sector on which Premier Dalton McGuinty has staked his reputation, arguing the province has hiked per-pupil spending by 56 per cent in the past 10 years, while enrolment has plunged… He also suggests post-secondary spending grow by no more than 1.5 per cent until 2017.
Tags: budget, disabilities, economy, tax, youth
Posted in Education Debates | No Comments »
Children ask Harper to ‘Have a Heart’ and improve education on reserves
February 15, 2012
The Have a Heart campaign aims to raise awareness about the problems facing aboriginal children in government care. It’s part of a major publicity campaign surrounding a Federal Court judicial review brought by aboriginal child-advocacy groups against a Canadian Human Rights Tribunal decision to dismiss a case against the federal government.
Tags: budget, Native, participation, 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
Posted in Education Policy Context | No Comments »
Doubling teaching loads a bad idea
Feb 11 2012
No decent academic, never mind a high-flyer, will take a job here to see his teaching load doubled and research time reduced to 10 per cent. Similarly, marketable faculty now teaching here will exit the province faster than a captain can desert a listing ship… The training of doctoral students is a highly labour-intensive activity, already poorly remunerated in many universities. Doubling the teaching load will make doctoral training impossible. Finally, research brings in huge sums from public and private sources…
Tags: budget, standard of living
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National panel on native education gives Ottawa a failing grade
Feb 10 2012
… this government, the one before it, and so on, know everything that’s in this report. Native education is a disaster and always has been. Ottawa basically hands off far too little money to hundreds of reserves (regardless of their capabilities) to operate individual schools and pays no attention at all to the terrible outcomes for children. Less than 40 per cent of native students — half the rate for non-natives — graduate from high school. It’s a tragedy for them and a terrible waste of potential for the country.
Tags: budget, Native, participation, rights, standard of living, youth
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