Posts from March 2016

Registration is now open for the OCUFA Status of Women Committee Workshop, designed to academic women build their leadership skills. The event will be held in Toronto on Friday, April 29, 2016. Building on the success of last year’s workshop, Shari Graydon will again be facilitating a small, interactive workshop, this time focusing on the theme of “Increasing your Persuasiveness”. The […]

Only a few spaces are left for the annual Worldviews Lecture on Media and Higher Education , featuring Rajani Naidoo, Chair in Higher Education Management and Director of the International Centre for Higher Education Management at the University of Bath. Professor Naidoo will deliver a lecture titled, “Beyond the Competition Fetish: Higher Education for Global Wellbeing.” Prof. Naidoo contends that universities everywhere have a competition fetish. There is […]

The 2016 Federal Budget was released on March 22, 2016. It contains significant new funding for Canada’s research councils and university research generally. University revenues are most affected by provincial investments and policies, but this federal budget is largely good news for Ontario institutions. Like its Ontario counterpart released earlier this year, the Trudeau government’s […]

On Thursday, March 17, 2016, the University of Ontario Institute of Technology Faculty Association (UOITFA) reached a tentative agreement with the employer . The university administration and UOITFA released this joint statement: “The University and the UOIT Faculty Association are pleased to advise that they have reached a tentative agreement. Details of the agreement will remain confidential until both parties have conducted […]

On February 25, 2016, the York University Faculty Association (YUFA) ratified a new collective collective agreement with their employer. The three-year deal contains important enhancements to equity, particularly for transgender and Aboriginal faculty members. The deal establishes a new Transgender Health Fund, worth $30,000 a year. This provision provides support to transgender faculty members by […]

Registration is now open for the annual Worldviews Lecture on Media and Higher Education, featuring Rajani Naidoo, Chair in Higher Education Management and Director of the International Centre for Higher Education Management at the University of Bath. Professor Naidoo will deliver a lecture titled, “Beyond the Competition Fetish: Higher Education for Global Wellbeing.” Universities everywhere have a […]

On March 8, 2016, over 20 representatives of Ontario’s faculty associations met with MPPs and Cabinet Ministers as part of OCUFA’s annual Advocacy Day at Queen’s Park. In all, 30 meetings were held, each a chance to discuss OCUFA’s priorities for 2016: faculty hiring and good academic jobs; better data on Ontario’s higher education sector; […]

Presentation slides and complete audio recordings of every session from OCUFA’s “Challenging precarious academic work” conference are now available online . People who missed out on the conference the first time around can access and download the complete conference proceedings. The conference was a unique meeting of activists, researchers, and policymakers all interested in ending precarious work in our […]

From February 20-21, 2016, OCUFA held the 148th meeting of its Board of Directors in Toronto. While the meeting was an opportunity to review progress on OCUFA’s priority areas –university governance and funding; options for university pension plans; and contract faculty and faculty complement – the meeting provided an excellent opportunity to discuss growing concerns […]

The new up-front grant program for Ontario students is grabbing headlines, but what else does the 2016 Ontario Budget do for universities? When it comes to operating funding, the picture continues to darken. Just as it has for the past four years, the level of operating grants to universities will barely change. And in the […]