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Category: Students

Coronavirus (9) – September & Big Classes

(Yes, I know, I said I would try to stay off Coronavirus topics.  But it’s bloody hard to talk about anything else, isn’t it?) One of the least attractive features of the modern university is the mega-classroom: the huge, 300-1000 student classes that dominate first-year courses.  These courses, point-blank, are terrible.  I mean, I know, fields of study all have entry points and there are some basics about each one that students need to master before moving on to other

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March 31, 2020 1 Comment

Coronavirus (8) – Scenario Planning

For the last three weeks, life on university and college campuses has all been about doing what is needed to save the semester and move to remote learning/remote working format.  I get the sense that this is the week when everyone’s attention is going to shift to “omg, what do we do now?”  The answer to that question will vary, of course, but if there is just one piece of advice I could give everyone, it is that the absolute

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March 30, 2020 1 Comment

Coronavirus (7) – The Decision

Yeah, I know I said I’d stay off this topic this week, but I think there is something that needs saying. It is finally sinking in that this is a long-duration crisis. Not 2 weeks long, not 2 months long: maybe half a year or more.  And that means thinking about September starts now.  We do not know exactly when this thing will unwind, nor how exactly we will phase back into normalcy.  But the frontier is moving back.  Last

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March 24, 2020 No Comments

New Enrolment Data. 2017-18. Finally.

Morning all.  There is finally enrolment data from October 2017 for the 2017-18 year.  Praise be StatsCan.  (Some of you think I am a bit hard on the people from Tunney’s Pasture.  Let’s be clear: much of the reason it takes StatsCan so long to put data together is because it takes institutions – particularly community colleges – a long time to compile and submit the data.  My understanding is that part of the reason this year’s release is a couple of years late

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February 20, 2020 No Comments

The Shifting Cost-base of Ontario’s Higher Education System

Today, I want to talk about a massive shift in the higher education cost base that has gone largely unremarked but had huge implications for institutions across the country. Let’s start by looking at Ontario undergraduate application statistics for 2020, the preliminary version of which came out a couple of weeks ago.  Figure 1 shows very little change from last year in terms of the big four application areas.  STEM is down a tad, but nothing to write home about

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February 10, 2020 1 Comment

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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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