Top Ten
August 10, 2011
Hamilton to invest $47 million in McMaster health campus
The City of Hamilton and McMaster University have struck a deal for a downtown health campus. On Tuesday city council voted to commit more than $47 million over 30 years to the proposed facility, currently the headquarters of the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board. The funding includes a $20-million contribution to the capital costs, leasing and operating costs over 30 years, and interest on a $10-million loan from the Future Fund. Hamilton Spectator
StFX endowment fund receives top marks in CAUBO survey
According to the newly released Canadian Association of University Business Officers Investment Survey, St. Francis Xavier University is second in the country based on 10 year rate of return performance data. The university placed second for one-year performance and first on two-year performance. StFX's endowment has achieved a 10% rate of return in the past decade, surpassing the 4.4% average for Canadian university endowments. In 2009 StFX re-evaluated its investment practices after its endowment fund devalued by 43% in 2008. StFX News
Ontario undergrad confirmations for August highest in last decade
New statistics from the Ontario Universities' Application Centre show 90,029 secondary and non-secondary students have accepted offers of admission, the highest figure recorded for August since 2002. The number of acceptances among high school students rose by 2% to 69,314, and among non-secondary students the number increased by 4.6% to 20,715. OUAC Undergraduate Confirmation Statistics -- August 2011
Ontario teacher ed confirmations drop for August
OUAC figures show that as of August 4, there are 7,704 confirmed acceptances for teacher education at Ontario universities, down 6.5% from the 8,241 confirmations recorded in August 2010. An increase in confirmations was the highest at Queen's University, where the rate rose by nearly 10%. Teacher Education Confirmation Statistics -- August 2011
Trend in business schools incorporating design thinking into curriculum
The University of British Columbia's Sauder School of Business and the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management, along with a growing number of business schools worldwide, are shaking up the traditional, analytical curriculum by adding design thinking to their curricula. The concept of design thinking entails a collaborative process in which a group of people observe behaviours, draw insights from them, develop ideas, and test them out. Rotman and Sauder have founded environments similar to that at Stanford University, which pioneered the design thinking environment at its d. school, to teach both undergraduate and MBA students. Both Canadian business schools have not only partnered with schools worldwide to advance design thinking in business education curricula, but they have also paired with local businesses and organizations to use design thinking to solve complex issues. Globe and Mail
Majority of PSE students worry about how to finance education, survey finds
According to the 2011 TD Canada Trust Student Finances Survey, 58% of responding PSE students feel either anxious (34%) or stressed (24%) when they think about how they are going to pay for school. Nearly two-thirds expect to graduate with debt, with one-quarter expecting to owe more than $25,000. Nearly 70% say they work during the school year, with 56% working more than 11 hours a week to make ends meet. 96% of respondents say having a PSE qualification will help them stand out in today's job market, and almost half say it's vital. While 28% believe practical training at a trade school or a college degree is sufficient to be competitive in the job market, 31% feel an undergraduate degree is necessary, while 36% say an undergraduate plus master's degree is necessary. TD Canada Trust News Release
CGS releases data on Professional Science Master's programs
According to the US-based Council of Graduate Schools' first Professional Science Master's Enrollment and Degrees Survey, almost 4,400 applications were received for fall 2010 admission and 48% were accepted. PSM programs in biology/biotechnology received the most applications, representing 31.4% of all applications received. 55.5% of full-time enrolees were men, while total enrolment was divided more evenly between men and women. Of the 1,102 PSM degrees awarded by respondents in the 2009-10 academic year, men earned the majority of the degrees granted in mathematics and statistics, physics and geological sciences, and computational sciences. Women earned the majority of degrees awarded in "other" fields (which include chemistry, forensic science, nanoscience, and national defence), medical-related sciences, and biology/biotechnology. Council of Graduate Schools News Release
Coker College freshmen required to take fitness assessment
All first-year students at South Carolina's Coker College this year will take a mandatory "fitness assessment," in which they will receive their body mass index score, do a one-mile run/walk, and see how many push-ups and sit-ups they can do in a few minutes. As part of Coker College 101, students must participate in at least 4 COBRAFIT activities. Noting South Carolina's obesity and diabetes rates, Coker's president says the institution must face the issue by teaching its students, faculty, and staff how to lead healthy lives. In 2009 Lincoln University came under fire for its fitness requirement; the institution modified the requirement following outcry at news that it threatened 25 students' graduation eligibility. Last August 2 siblings sued Cégep de Lévis-Lauzon over its fitness test. Inside Higher Ed
Latin American nations pushing more students to study overseas
More Latin American students are studying abroad, and governments in the region are using some of their newfound wealth to boost the numbers further through generous scholarship programs. For example, this year the Brazilian government announced plans to award 75,000 scholarships to local students to study abroad by 2014. The scholarships, as well as another 25,000 expected to come from the private sector, are exclusive to fields of national interest such as engineering, science, and technology. The Chronicle of Higher Education (free access)
Search, e-mail remain most popular Web activities, US research finds
Search and e-mail continue to be the 2 online activities that are nearly universal among adult Internet users, according to a new report from the Pew Research Centre. 92% of online adults use search engines to find information online, and the same number use e-mail. Since the Pew Internet Project started measuring adults' online activities in the past decade, these 2 behaviors have consistently ranked as the most popular. Today, approximately 6 in 10 online adults partake in each of these activities on a typical day; in 2002, nearly half of online adults used e-mail each day, while only 29% used a search engine daily. Read the report
