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Category: Government

How We Choose to Respond to Crises

I was thinking the other day that next Thursday (27/02/25) is not only going to be the Ontario election—about which, more tomorrow—but also because it will be the 30th anniversary of the legendary 1995 federal budget. If you’re under 45, a lot of what I am about to tell you is going to sound very odd. But it is all true, and it all matters. This country was a hot mess in the early 1990s. The summer 1990 unemployment rate

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February 18, 2025 3 Comments

That NIH Thing You’re Hearing About

If you’re in the higher education field, you have probably heard a lot in the last four days about the Trump regime reducing funding to the National Institutes of Health (NIH)—roughly the equivalent of our Canadian Institutes of Health Research, only with a budget four times larger even after adjusting for population size. Specifically, the Trump administration is limiting the amount of overhead costs that institutions can recover from government. Cue much shouting in the US about adverse impacts, destruction

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February 11, 2025 No Comments

What People Get Wrong about the New CCAA Law

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about Justin Trudeau’s record. A couple of people wrote in to chide me that I had not included the passage last year of Bill 59, a piece of omnibus legislation which among other things prevents postsecondary education institutions from using the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act (CCAA). I know a lot of professors—and perhaps more importantly, faculty unions and their provincial/national associations—think that this was a “Good Thing” because “Look What Happened at Laurentian.” To

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February 5, 2025 2 Comments

Ontario in 2029

Back in 2022, just after the last provincial election, I wrote a piece looking forward a few years and predicted that the years 2023-25 were going to be chaos for Ontario postsecondary institutions. And I was right, although I can’t claim to have anticipated any of the specifics. Given that we are now going back into an election, I thought I would try to look into a crystal ball and look at what the province’s postsecondary system will look like

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February 3, 2025 No Comments

Taking Donald Trump Seriously and What it Means for Canadian Higher Education

If there is a unifying element to Canada, it is a desire not to be American. Sometimes, this leads us down some pretty juvenile pathways; for instance, the impossibility of having serious discussions about health care because anyone against the clearly inadequate status quo simply must be in favour of “American-style private care.” But sometimes, like right now, this unity is a pretty handy political asset. A maniac is in possession of our southern border. He wants something from us. It’s not trade

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January 28, 2025 5 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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