Feb 26 2018

No Academic Temp Worker Solution

Category: Policy Reports — Bob Hanke @ 9:51 am

No Temporary Solution

Ontario’s shifting college and university workforce
by Erika Shaker and Robin Shaban
February 8, 2018

While post-secondary institutions are places of learning, they also employ thousands of people across a broad spectrum of job classifications. This report explores the extent to which workers in Canada’s post-secondary institutions are experiencing precarity. More precisely, it asks whether employment on university and college campuses in Ontario is becoming more precarious, for whom and for what reasons. 

This report combines quantitative analysis of Labour Force Survey (LFS) data with qualitative accounts of the lived experience of precarity from post-secondary employees. Overall, the LFS data analysis suggests that 53% of post-secondary education workers in Ontario are, to some extent, precariously employed. Specifically, the report identifies a rise in work categories that are more precarious (e.g., research assistants and teaching assistants) alongside a decline in others that have traditionally been less precarious (e.g., librarians). 

To read the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives report, click here.

To read “Ontario campuses see increase in precarious jobs, study shows” in the Toronto Star, click here.

 

 

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Jan 04 2009

Quality at Risk: An Assessment of the Ontario Government’s Plans for Graduate Education

Category: Policy Reports — Bob Hanke @ 2:04 pm

March 12, 2007

The government’s plan to expand graduate education by an additional 14,000 students by 2010, although laudable, has put the quality of graduate education at risk. Ontario universities are not hiring enough faculty to ensure graduate students a quality education. Ontario universities need to hire 2,205 additional faculty to reach 1995-96 graduate student-faculty ratios. The government is not providing enough operating funding, not enough graduate-student financial assistance support, and not enough funding to address overdue repairs and expand space requirements. The report demonstrates that failing to involve faculty in the expansion planning leads to oversights.

Keywords: graduate; enrolments; faculty; hiring; hires; funding; maintenance; space; expansion

To read the full report, click here.

Jan 04 2009

Quality in the Balance: Undergraduate Education in Ontario at Risk

Category: Policy Reports — Bob Hanke @ 1:53 pm

May 14, 2007

The quality of undergraduate education in Ontario remains at risk despite the government’s five-year, $6.2-billion Reaching Higher plan, which pledged enough funds to hire more professors. There has been no improvement in student-faculty ratios, however, because inflation-adjusted, per-student funding is still well below the 1990s. Faculty hiring has not kept pace with enrolment increases, so in 2003-04 Ontario had a student-faculty ratio of 27 students to each full-time professor, while American peer institutions had a 15 to one ratio. Ontario needs 11,000 more professors by the end of the decade and needs to make a commitment to recruit full-time, tenure-stream faculty.

Keywords: Reaching Higher; student-faculty ratio; ratio; per student funding; funding; faculty; hiring

To read the full report, click here.