The World of Higher Education Podcast Listen now →

The World of Higher Education Podcast Listen now →

Category: Politics

The “Skills for Jobs Blueprint”

I don’t pay as much attention as I should on this blog to matters British Columbian, mostly because I don’t get out there often enough.  But the province’s “Skills for Jobs  Blueprint” cries out for some critical treatment, because frankly it’s not all that smart. Turn back the clock a bit: in April 2014, the BC government rolled-out a series of policies that were collectively branded as the “Skills for Jobs Blueprint”.  Much of it consisted of relatively sensible changes

Read More »
February 4, 2015 No Comments

Another Australian De-regulation Update

So the last time we tuned into antics in Canberra, the government was trying to pass a fairly ambitious piece of legislation that would completely de-regulate tuition fees while (more or less) maintaining the HECS system, which means post-graduate contributions are always tied to income, and thus do not become too onerous.  The government was also going to cut institutional grants by about 20%, but keep the “demand-driven” system in which government dollars follow students no matter how many students attend.

Read More »
January 28, 2015 No Comments

Free Community College in Canada?

As Canadians, we have a tendency to pay an excess amount of attention to developments in the US.  For instance, people are already asking whether the Obama free community college model would work in Canada.  But this is actually two questions.  The first is whether or not someone could make community college free; the second question is whether that someone could be the federal government? Let’s take the second question first: could the federal government be the ones to do this in

Read More »
January 15, 2015 2 Comments

That Obama Free Community College Proposal

I was going to start on a series about growth in non-academic staff numbers today, but the news out of Washington late last week was too spectacular, so I’m bumping it.  Did Obama really say he wanted to make community college free? Well, yes he did.  But he might not have meant it the way we all heard it.  And whatever happens, it’s unlikely to occur any time soon. Let’s start with what he actually said (White House fact sheet,

Read More »
January 12, 2015 No Comments

The Canada Apprentice Loan: Adventures in Federalism

As I noted a few months back when writing about the 50th anniversary of the Canada Student Loans Program, CSLP was at the heart of one of the federation’s key moments in fiscal federalism.  In 1964, Lester Pearson was running into opposition in Quebec on two of his major policy initiatives: the Canada Pension Plan and the Canada Student Loans Program.  A deal on both was eventually struck: any province could “opt-out” of a federal program and receive a compensating “alternative payment”, so

Read More »
January 9, 2015 No Comments
Load More

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.

Subscribe

Search Posts

Search Publications

Social Media

Linkedin Youtube Spotify

Recent Posts

More thoughts on...