I like to name and shame people who are playing fast and loose with numbers. Usually, this involves taking one “true” data point and then using it to make a point which is unwarranted by the data in context. A couple of examples caught my eye last week. First up: “Students have at most a 1 in 4 chance that the person at the front of the classroom is a full-time faculty member”. This is the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternative’s
I’ve been doing some work on financial data of higher education institutions around the world, and specifically looking at what’s been going on at top research institutions compared to everyone else. And I thought maybe you all would be interested in what I’ve found for Canada. For the purpose of this document, I have separated the six institutions in Canada which always come top in the Academic Ranking of World Universities (aka “Shanghai Rankings”) – that’s Toronto, UBC, McGill, McMaster,
You may have seen the results of a poll out last week from Abacus Canada for Universities Canada, one which purports to look at “how Canadians feel about universities”. I suspect you will hear a lot of this poll over the next few months, especially with respect to research and the Naylor report. But it’s always worth approaching these things with a skeptical eye, so let’s spend a little time looking at the poll and how the questions were put together to
Last week Statscan sent me a consultation form asking my opinions about their ideas on how to change UCASS (the University and College Academic Staff Survey, which like most Statscan products containing the word “college” does not actually include the institutions most of us call “colleges” i.e. community colleges). I’ve already said something about this effort back here to the effect that focussing so much effort on data collection re: part-time staff is a waste of time, but the consultation guide makes
One of my distractions over the past summer has been to learn more about Chinese universities. And, fortunately, this is becoming a lot easier as Chinese universities are starting to put more of their data online. Today, I just want to take you through a bit of a tour of China’s top universities (roughly the equivalent of the US Ivy League), which are known as the “C9”, most of which now put their financial data online. So let’s start just
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.
