Posts from December 2011

That Ontario universities hire 6,000 new professors to restore the student-faculty ratio to 2001 levels. That the Ontario government increase per-student funding to its universities, which is the lowest in Canada and 25 per cent lower than in 1990. Ontario needs to invest in quality, not just in new spaces! That Don Drummond, due to […]

According to Statistics Canada, there were more than 44,000 full-time faculty at Canadian degree-granting institutions in 2009-10 .   The increase over the previous year is 5.9 per cent – but only if 1,800-plus faculty members who teach at the six Alberta and British Columbia institutions reporting for the first time are included. Among universities reporting in the previous year, faculty numbers grew by only 1.5 per cent. […]

Almost without exception, unemployment rates in countries across the OECD rose during the “Great Recession” , no matter the education level. But while still high, unemployment rates — and the amount they rose — were lower for those with college and university education. The percentage of people with higher education who are employed tends to be highest in the Scandinavian countries, the Netherlands, and Switzerland – around […]

Soaring enrolments mean that more teaching has to be done at Ontario’s universities, but it cannot be done on the cheap, OCUFA Vice-President Kate Lawson told a conference at McMaster University, December 8.         Government underfunding has meant constrained finances for Ontario universities, she said, and that context makes a discussion around the expansion of […]

As more high school graduates opt for college or university education, Ontario’s attainment rate for higher education has risen from 44 per cent in 1999 to a 56 per cent in 2009, in the context of government forecasts that 70 per cent of jobs in the knowledge economy will require a postsecondary credential. In 2009, […]

In response to an inaccurate and inflammatory article published by Globe & Mail columnist Margaret Wente , OCUFA President wrote a letter to the editor. An extract was published on the Globe & Mail Website. The full text of the letter is reproduced below. Dear Editor; As usual, Margaret Wente seems more interested in her favorite talking points than in actually understanding the issue. Her column “Pension Ponzi a Raw […]

A tentative agreement was reached last Saturday morning at 1 am in the negotiations between the Ryerson Faculty Association and the university. A ratification meeting has been scheduled for December 15. Members of the Northern Ontario School of Medicine Faculty Association ratified their new agreement on November 28. The agreement contains scale increases of 1.5 per cent […]