There is a door in my house – maybe you have one of these too – that cannot be painted. In recent renovations, I had to explain to the workmen that the data on the door is too valuable and must be preserved. You may have guessed that the door in question is where we’ve […]
Tag: Skills
Skills
Who would have ever predicted that a career as an elementary French teacher would eventually lead me to working for an educational publisher as a researcher and change agent? However, as someone who was nearing the completion of her doctoral studies, conducting research as opposed to teaching in the classroom did seem like the next […]
Higher education in the United States is at a tipping point. The cost of a college education has spiraled out of control, leaving deserving students priced out of a bright future and putting the nation at risk of losing much-needed talent. Many states are reducing funding for publicly supported colleges, driving the price of securing […]
Learning outcomes have been a key part of my professional life in higher education for the past 25 years. I completed a degree in social work at McGill University way back in the 80’s and haven’t been a social worker for a very long time. While I still can remember some content I learned (remembering […]
Higher education graduates need to be prepared with the knowledge, skills and dispositions necessary to be leaders and contributors at all levels of society. What stands in the way of this outcome? One barrier is the grading systems we employ, contributing to the problem of graduates who are not well prepared for a global 21st […]
A top priority for the new federal government must be to bolster Canada’s modest economic growth and ensure it is inclusive so more than just those at the top end of the income distribution enjoy the benefits. Ageing of the work force combined with the recent anemic pace of productivity growth will likely only produce […]
When I started my undergraduate program in 2007 I thought that the lecture halls and seminar rooms were the sites in which I would learn the skills needed to succeed in the world. As a result, I opted not to take part in many extra-curricular activities in my early years, focusing my energy towards academics […]
There is much discussion regarding what skills universities should teach their graduates and what skills employers believe recent graduates should possess, but what do students think they should get out of university? The Canadian University Survey Consortium surveyed over 18,000 graduating students from 36 universities across Canada and asked them this question. From a […]
As Yogi Berra said, “Predictions are hard, especially when they are about the future.” But if there is any issue that should dominate the future of higher education, it’s quality – quality of the student experience, quality of our graduates, quality of our postsecondary institutions and quality of our higher education systems. Ultimately, quality is […]