The Sustainability of the Ontario Public Postsecondary System: Putting Together the Pieces of the Puzzle

Visit our sustainability page to read more of HEQCO’s research on this topic. Sustaining the quality of higher education goes beyond simply balancing the books As Ontario universities and colleges struggle to deal with rising expenses and stagnant revenues, academic quality risks being compromised, argues a new report by the Higher Education Quality Council of […]

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Harvey P. Weingarten — Why is the “Q” word in our name?

Why did those who created this agency include the word quality in its name, even though it resulted in one of the clumsiest acronyms — HEQCO — on the face of the earth? I think it’s because they were smart and prescient. They understood that there are a million questions one could ask and research […]

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Jackie Pichette and Lena Patterson — Learning with Lynda(.com)

Educators around the world are being called on to pull up their socks and save the economy: to “bridge,” “plug” or “prevent” the skills gap by equipping students with the technical and transferable skills needed to meet tomorrow’s economic needs. But which technical and transferable skills, exactly? Well, we know that employers are looking to […]

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Harvey P. Weingarten — Quality assurance: A simple concept that we overly complicate

If you were to read all that is out there about quality assurance in higher education, you might be left with the impression that quality assurance is a complicated, nuanced, arduous, complex concept and process that defies rigorous measurement, and that will take a decade or more to get it right. I am fond of […]

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Jackie Pichette — What’s in a badge?

A robot can handle investments, my brother’s phone can recognize his face, and I can earn a digital badge for participating in a webinar … Welcome to the digital economy. As routine, repetitive tasks are taken over by technology, employees in this third industrial revolution are expected to orchestrate product development, innovate and learn on […]

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It’sNotAcademic – The podcast: Episode nine with Val Walker

Welcome to the latest episode of It’sNotAcademic the podcast. It’s an often heard complaint. University and college graduates lack the skills that employers seek. They don’t have what it takes to thrive in today’s rapidly changing workplace. To look at this issue, the Business Council of Canada brought together representatives from some of Canada’s largest […]

The Impact of Incentives, Communications and Task Demand on Postsecondary Student Participation in Online Research

Monetary incentives effective in boosting student participation in research studies When it comes to persuading postsecondary students to participate in voluntary research studies, monetary incentives work best, according to a new study commissioned and published by the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario (HECQO). Encouraging participation in research is an ongoing challenge across sectors, but […]

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It’sNotAcademic – The podcast: Episode eight with Brenda Small

Welcome to the latest episode of It’sNotAcademic the podcast. Two years ago, Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission issued 94 calls to action, or recommendations, urging all levels of government to implement policies to acknowledge and redress the harm caused by residential schools to Indigenous people. Several of the recommendations urged governments, schools and postsecondary institutions […]

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OUSA’s Victoria Lewarne and Marc Gurrisi — PSE’s ‘Skills Awareness Gap’

Despite the fact that we are a student and a recent graduate of a postsecondary program, we admittedly have difficulty articulating our skills and competencies. And we’re not the exception. While we can confidently state that we have comprehensive reading and writing skills, this only skims the surface. Competencies such as critical thinking, problem solving, […]