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Category: Government

Jason Kenney, Liberal?

If you’re among the unhappy few in the habit of reading press releases from the Minster of Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC, formerly HRSDC, formerly HRDC, etc., etc.), there’s one question that will almost certainly be on your mind these days: what exactly is Minister Jason Kenney up to? After a period of quiet following the July re-shuffle, where he obtained the post, Kenney seems to have settled into a pattern of giving speeches which harp on the following themes:

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November 12, 2013 No Comments

The Problem with Cutback Narratives

Let’s discuss how we talk about cutbacks.  And let’s talk about the University of Alberta. U of A has been rather radically affected by the recent cutbacks imposed by the Alberta government.  But here’s the weird thing: apparently it’s not enough to say “we’ve had cuts of 7%”in one year”.  Instead, people feel the need to enhance that figure in many ways.  It’s not just a 7% cut, they say – “we were told by government to budget based on

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October 15, 2013 3 Comments

Where Responsibility for Financial Sustainability Lies

I often write about the unsustainability of university finances, the lunacy of its cost base, the fact that Canadian profs are better paid than in any public system of higher education in the world, etc.  Some people have concluded from this that I am hostile to labour, or to academic unions in particular. But that’s not true.  Though I do call BS on some of the sanctimonious nonsense that comes out of academic unions on the beleaguered state of their

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October 8, 2013 19 Comments

Cuts at the University of Alberta

If anybody wants to know what Ontario universities are going to look like over the next couple of years, they could do worse than check out what’s going on in Edmonton. To recap: In its spring budget, the Government of Alberta cut 7% from university operating grants.  Since then, Alberta universities have been working out how to deal with this cut.  At Athabasca, it’s meant significant layoffs.  At Mount Royal it’s meant program closures.  At the University of Alberta, so

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August 19, 2013 11 Comments

Looking Forward to 2017-18

Last week we looked at likely paths for government funding in the big four provinces.  Today, I want to look at how that might translate into actual changes at institutions. The outlook for government funding, if you’ll recall, looks like this: Figure 1 – Nominal Non-Health Dollars Available by Province, indexed to 2013. But governments only account for about 54% of total revenue.  Students make up 39% and “other” makes up about 8%, so to look forward, one needs to look

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July 29, 2013 6 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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