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26 mai 2013

Canada is ‘treading water’ on its S&T performance

By Léo Charbonneau. Buried in the flurry of other news emanating from Ottawa on Tuesday was a damning report by Canada’s Science, Technology and Innovation Council, or STIC. The council concludes in its “State of the Nation” 2012 report that Canada “continues to tread water as a mid-level performer in science, technology and innovation” and says the country needs to “aim higher.” Maclean’s columnist Paul Wells described the report as “devastating” and an indicator of “long-term government failure.” Read more...

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26 mai 2013

Provinces would rather pay students than universities

By Alex Usher. What 2013 provincial budgets mean for the higher education sector. There is a pattern emerging in provincial budgeting for higher education over the past couple of years which deserves more attention than it has been receiving. Though some new net money has been reaching universities and colleges, within the sector as a whole governments seem far more interested in funneling money to students than providing support for institutions themselves. There are three important caveats regarding the budget data presented here need to be made. The first is that what provinces budget for higher education often has only a vague relationship with what actually gets spent. Last year in Quebec, for instance, what eventually got allocated to institutions was a good $120 million less than what was budgeted. Read more...

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26 mai 2013

Entrepreneurs create jobs, so how are we helping?

By Stephen Daze. Canadian universities get a near-failing grade for the way they support campus entrepreneurs. It’s no surprise that global leaders are increasingly looking at entrepreneurship as a way to grow jobs and stimulate economies. In Canada, approximately 68 percent of net new jobs are created by small- and medium-sized enterprises (Statistics Canada), and from 1980 to 2008 all net new job growth in the U.S. came from firms five years or younger (Kauffman Foundation). The reality is that large firms shed jobs and new firms (young firms run by entrepreneurs) drive job growth. Complementing this is the growing interest in entrepreneurship as a career choice. A Kauffman-funded study of youth aged eight to 21 cites 40 percent of respondents interested in entrepreneurship as a career option. The question is: What are we doing to stimulate interest in entrepreneurship and provide support to young entrepreneurs? Some would see this as an opportunity not to be missed. Read more...

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26 mai 2013

B.C. makes free online textbooks available

By Rosanna Tamburri. A government agency is recruiting faculty to review and eventually to write texts for the most popular courses. Postsecondary students in British Columbia may get a bit of a break when it comes time to buy their textbooks this fall. In the first move of its kind in Canada, the B.C. government said it will make available up to 20 free and open online textbooks for some of the most popular first- and second-year university and college courses. There’s no guarantee that faculty will choose to assign the new textbooks, but proponents of the project are hoping that rigorous quality control measures and a little nudging from students will win them over. The textbooks also will be available to institutions, faculty and students across Canada to use at no charge. Read more...

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26 mai 2013

Five Ways for Collegs and Universities to Get Smart About Energy

By David McDougall. Increasing numbers of colleges and universities are making a commitment to foster sustainability on campus. This strategy aligns well with university missions that include public service, thought leadership and pioneering new technologies. But at the end of the day, the most compelling reason is financial. Energy makes up only a small percentage of a university’s operating budget (about 3.5 percent on average), but in terms of raw dollars, America’s colleges and universities spend almost $7 billion in energy and utilities. Cutting energy costs even by 10 percent means $700 million dollars to reinvest in student programs, facility improvements, and other initiatives that benefit the entire campus community. Read more...

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26 mai 2013

Adapt Courseware releases Intro to Sociology

College and university students around the country can now have access to Adapt Courseware’s new Introduction to Sociology offering, which presents curriculum in an adaptive framework that responds based on each student’s behavior, knowledge, and aptitude. Adapt Courseware, the provider of comprehensive adaptive online curriculum resources that individualize each student’s learning experience, is continuing to develop introductory level general education offerings, enabling institutions to create efficiencies and scale large course sections, while at the same time measurably improve student learning outcomes, satisfaction, course completion, and retention. Read more...

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26 mai 2013

Administrators and Faculty Split on Online Learning’s Value

By Kylie Lacey. 7 percent of academic leaders surveyed believe online education results in the same or superior learning outcomes as in face-to-face classes. The number of students taking at least one course online is on the rise; the 2012 Survey of Online Learning conducted by the Babson Survey Research Group and released this year indicated that number surpassed 6.7 million for the fall 2011 semester.
That said, there is a divergence between higher ed administrators and faculty on the value of online learning. Seventy-seven percent of academic leaders surveyed believe online education results in the same or superior learning outcomes as in face-to-face classes.
However, only 30.2 percent of chief academic officers think their faculty accept online learning as valuable and legitimate. This figure has decreased from the recorded statistic in 2004. With 69.1 percent of chief academic leaders saying online education is a key part of their long-term strategy, faculty must learn to embrace it. Read more...

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26 mai 2013

India to lobby foreign agencies for improving university rankings

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By Prashant K. Nanda. India is set to lobby international ranking agencies and seek their expertise on improving the poor showing of the country’s higher educational institutes in the global league tables.
The human resource development (HRD) ministry and the Planning Commission consider the absence of the country’s best institutions from the top 200 an embarrassment, especially for a country that’s supposed to be a knowledge economy.
As a first step, the HRD ministry and the plan panel will lobby London-based Times Higher Education (THE), which publishes the World University Rankings every year.
“You can call it a lobby or dialogue or engagement, but we want to engage with THE and other ranking agencies to improve our standing,” said an HRD ministry official, who did not want to be named.
In the THE World University Rankings of 2012-13, there were only three Indian institutes in the top 400 and the best of them was the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) at Kharagpur, which was at 226-250. The other two were IIT Bombay and IIT Roorkee. In the Academic Ranking of World Universities conducted by China’s Shanghai Jiao Tong University, only the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, figured in the top 500. Read more...

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26 mai 2013

The $7,000 Computer Science Degree — and the Future of Higher Education

By Martha C. White. While a new report puts the average debt load of new college grads at a stomach-churning $35,200, the Georgia Institute of Technology is rolling out an alternative program experts say offers a beacon of hope for both students and employers: A three-year master’s degree in computer science that can be earned entirely online — and that will cost less than $7,000. The school is partnering with Udacity, a for-profit provider of MOOC (massive open online course) education, and AT&T, which is contributing $2 million and will provide connectivity tools and services. “We believe this program can establish corporate acceptance of high-quality and 100 percent online degrees as being on par with degrees received in traditional on-campus settings,” a statement from the school says. Read more...

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26 mai 2013

IREG’s first quality certificates to rankings systems

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By Bianka Siwinska. IREG, the Observatory on Academic Ranking and Excellence, this month granted the first quality certificates to university ranking systems – QS World University Rankings and Poland’s Perspektywy University Ranking – marking the beginning of a new era for this interesting field. The two ranking systems received ‘IREG approved’ quality certificates at the “IREG Forum on University Rankings – Methodologies under scrutiny” conference that was held in Warsaw, Poland, from 16-17 May and attended by 130 rankings experts from 32 countries. The event was co-hosted by the Perspektywy Education Foundation and the Polish Academy of Sciences. The audience reacted enthusiastically to the news, seeing the emergence of a credible rankings watchdog. Audits of other rankings are on the way. The growing use of university rankings is an important phenomenon of higher education in the 21st century. But while rankings have found a lasting place in the academic landscape, both on the national and global levels, they still face a wall of accusation and misunderstanding.
“National and international university rankings serve as an effective and useful tool providing information to prospective students, contributing to improvement of the quality of higher education, and monitoring higher education reforms,” said Jan Sadlak, president of IREG.
Given the key role of rankings in higher education the world over, rankings must also be accountable. It was for this reason that the IREG Observatory came up with the idea of auditing rankings. The IREG Observatory is an international non-profit association of ranking organisations, universities and other bodies interested in university rankings and academic excellence. Its purpose is to strengthen public awareness and understanding of issues related to university rankings and academic excellence. Read more...

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