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Category: Canada

The Budget Speech Bill Morneau Should Give

“…Mr. Speaker, we know that living standards depend on productivity, productivity depends on innovation, and innovation depends on skills, technology, and competition.  So we are going to ramp up on all of them.  This won’t be easy.  It won’t be quick.  We are not doing this with an eye to the next election; it’s a marathon not a sprint.  But we have to start somewhere. Skills Let’s start with skills.  While recognizing that having a skilled labour force is a

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February 27, 2018 1 Comment

Superclusters, Cold Fusion and Perpetual Motion

When writing last week about superclusters, I neglected to go through the actual “economic impact statements” that were being touted by the clusters themselves. It seems that the Industry Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED), has to some degree accepted the statements.  And I think this is important because some of what is being suggested is pretty close to a national scandal. So, let’s take a quick look at what, allegedly, we’re getting for our $950 million in Supercluster investments.

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February 23, 2018 3 Comments

Code Red on the Naylor Report

About two and a half years ago, I said universities and scientists were headed for a catastrophic break because university Presidents were more inclined to gratefully accept whatever new dollars came their way rather than fight for research priorities.  That break may actually happen next week, for evil things are reaching my ears about Tuesday’s federal budget. To be clear: I know nothing for sure about what’s in Tuesday’s budget.  The Liberals are deliberately choosing not to leak anything that

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February 22, 2018 No Comments

The Canada Lifelong Learning Fund

In all the excitement over Christmas I forgot to write about a policy initiative which may or may not find its way into the coming budget.  It’s something called the “Canada Lifelong Learning Fund” (CLLF), and it is among the weakest ideas to float around Ottawa since the Liberals came to power. The idea comes from the Minister of Finance’s Advisory Council on Economic Growth, chaired by McKinsey Global Managing Partner Dominic Barton, which issued a paper called Learning Nation: Equipping

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February 5, 2018 1 Comment

Mind-blowing Ontario Academic Staffing Data (Part 1)

Buckle up everyone.  COU just did what universities have been telling everyone for years was impossible: publishing actual useful admin data on faculty workloads and sessionals from every university in Ontario bar the University of Toronto (speculate away as to why this is: the footnotes imply it’s because it couldn’t put together the data together properly). It’s all right here.  Read it.  It’s the best data ever put together on Canadian faculty. Oddly enough, COU published this yesterday with no fanfare

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January 23, 2018 5 Comments

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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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