Monday, November 30, 2009, marked the launch of Academic Transformation: The Forces Reshaping Higher Education in Ontario, a book questioning the sustainability of Ontario’s postsecondary system written by Ian D. Clark, Greg Moran, Michael L. Skolnik, and David Trick. The book, part of the Queen’s School of Public Policy Series and published by McGill-Queen’s University Press, was sponsored by the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario (HEQCO).
The formal presentation opened as John Fraser, Master of Massey College and the Honourable Frank Iacobucci, Chair of HEQCO welcomed the audience to the launch and introduced the authors.
Sustaining the quality of undergraduate education will require substantial change.
Ian D. Clark, professor in the School of Public Policy and Governance at the University of Toronto and former President of the Council of Ontario Universities explained how the authors arrived to this conclusion. Watch the full video here.
Greg Moran, former Provost and Vice-President, Academic at the University of Western Ontario offered his insights into some of the strategies that the government and institutions should consider in transforming the postsecondary education system. Creating teaching-focused universities, the promotion of teaching-only faculty positions and the improvement of college-university transfers are but a few of the strategies that the authors suggest. Watch the full video here.
It is simply not affordable to have undergraduates taught only by faculty who devote the same amount of time to research as to teaching.
Asked whether the authors were proposing that teaching-only faculty do no research, Michael L. Skolnik indicated that this was not what the authors were recommending. He suggested that teaching-only faculty will continue to do research to keep up in their fields and to improve their teaching and learning. Listen to the full audio clip here.
With over 100 representatives in attendance from Ontario’s colleges, universities, government, private organizations and postsecondary education associations, the launch was a huge success. We would like to thank all those that attended and helped out with this event!