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Category: One Thought to Start Your Day

The Country 100 Ranking

You may have seen a spate of headlines recently, such as this one in University Affairs, about how Canada is considered #5 globally in terms of higher education according to a new “Country 100” ranking done some outfit called Measures HE. Cue minor celebrations: woo woo! Someone thinks we are top ten! Etc. The troublemakers who make up the readership of this blog have questions, I am sure. Naturally, I am here to answer them. First, who is “Measures HE”? It is a data consultancy formed by two guys who used

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May 12, 2026 No Comments

Everybody Hates John Tibbits

Note: I am writing this piece early on Friday morning, the day after this story broke. It is possible some details may have emerged over the weekend to render some aspects of this blog incorrect. Apologies if so. On Thursday, the government of Ontario dismissed the Board of Governors at Conestoga College on grounds of financial mismanagement and replaced them with a single appointed administrator.  This was grounds for schadenfreude among many folks who believe that John Tibbits and Conestoga

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May 11, 2026 No Comments

Canadian Research vs. German Research

Hi all. I’m in Germany this week along with the members of our University Vice-Presidents Network having a blast networking with German institutions and hearing from some of the sharpest commentators on the German higher education scene, including Frank Ziegele, author of one of my favourite books of 2025, Authentic Universities (podcast interview here) and Jan-Martin Wiarda, my sort-of German equivalent in the sense of being a prominent education blogger, (albeit much more journalistically-inclined than I am). It’s been a

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May 6, 2026 2 Comments

2026 Provincial Budgets

Last Wednesday, Newfoundland and Labrador became the tenth province to deliver its budget, and that means it’s time for my annual review of provincial budgets. Spoiler: while it’s the usual mixed bag across most provinces, Ontario is the epicentre of this year’s stories. And not in a bad way. Let’s start with overall budgeted provincial transfers to institutions, shown below in Figure 1. Growth this year after inflation is a stunning 6.5% – a rise not seen in 20 years.

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May 5, 2026 No Comments

Mid-Year Update

So, last week, the federal government delivered its Spring Economic Update, a kind of mini-budget for people who can’t wait until November for their fix. I am sure you are wondering what, if anything, changed for post-secondary education. I’ll break it into five topics. First, there’s nothing in there on research apart from yet another round of tweaks to the Scientific Research & Experimental Development Tax Credit. No surprise there. Second, there is nothing in there rectifying or even hinting

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May 4, 2026 No Comments

One Thought to Start Your Day

One Thought to Start Your Day is our founder and CEO Alex Usher’s popular daily blog, brimming with up-to-the-minute insights and informed opinions on today’s higher education industry.

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