Home

Informing the Future of Higher Education

Featured

Women in Academia

Welcome to the Women in Academia Project HEQCO is pleased to announce the release of a multi-part research project designed to explore current and historical gender disparities among faculty in Ontario universities. Despite advocacy efforts, collective bargaining, targeted funding and legislation, gaps in representation, promotion and earnings for women academics persist. These inequalities are especially […]

Quick Stats

How many Ontario students applied to the province’s colleges and universities during the last decade? How many enrolled? How many graduated? Find the answers to these and other good questions in Quick Stats, a compendium of data on Ontario’s postsecondary system. Note: All visualizations begin in 2013 and go up to the most recent year […]

Latest

Student Services at Queen’s University: An Evaluation of the Supported Learning Groups Pilot Program

Research Summary: Additional course support at Queen’s has mixed results in improving grades, engagement and retention As class sizes grow and budgets are squeezed, instructors at Queen’s University are finding new ways to improve learning. One approach, known as Supported Learning Groups, pairs upper year undergraduate students who have completed the course with students who […]

Changing Times, Changing Places: The Global Evolution of the Bachelor’s Degree and the Implications for Ontario

Research Summary: Global trends in bachelor’s degree: What can Ontario learn? The time-honoured bachelor’s degree has undergone some serious tinkering if not transformation over the last decade, driven by enrolment growth, constrained funding, demands for increased student mobility and greater alignment with the labour market. Some countries have shifted from three-year to four-year degrees while […]

Special Needs Students and Transitions to Postsecondary Education

Research Summary: Special needs students: Improving pathways to higher education Special education in Ontario and elsewhere is under intense scrutiny as calls for greater equity push schools toward more inclusive policies and practices, including those that improve the likelihood of special needs students pursuing postsecondary education (PSE). While there have been a number of promising […]

Categories

Fiona Deller – Will Ontario keep apace or set the pace?

Some call it disruptive, some call it welcome but change is afoot in higher education. From rising enrolments to economic constraints, from the promise of technology to the pressures of international competition, the game is changing and the challenge for postsecondary education is to keep apace, or better yet, set the pace. It must be […]

Categories

Harvey P. Weingarten – Tooting Our Own Horn

HEQCO is an organization built on the principles of inquiry, performance assessment, evidence and research.  So, it seemed only appropriate that we subject our own performance to a critical review and rigorous evaluation by an informed outsider. To that end, we commissioned an outside expert to review HEQCO.  The reviewer selected was Lorne Whitehead, an […]

@ Issue Paper No. 12 Teaching and Learning Centres: Their Evolving Role Within Ontario Colleges and Universities

Research Summary: Teaching and Learning Centres at Risk of Being Unable to Meet Needs of Students and Educators Teaching and learning centres are responsible for improving teaching effectiveness at institutions across Ontario, through workshops, instructional resources and ongoing professional development.  But a new @Issue paper by the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario (HEQCO),  Teaching and […]