Archive for March, 2009
Financial crisis in the university sector? What crisis?
To look at the presidents’ paychecks, you’d never know universities were desperately short of cash
Ontario’s public universities cry poor to anyone who will listen and can produce elaborate pie charts and balance sheets to support their claims. Interestingly, none of their advocacy materials mention the increasingly rich financial compensation awarded to the senior administrators of those same institutions.
Today, as required under Ontario’s “sunshine act,” the province’s universities were forced to disclosure the taxable compensation given to senior administrators.
If you were judging only by how much senior administrators are taking to the bank, you’d think universities were richer than ever.
Two university employees made more than a half-million dollars last year. John Lyon, Managing Director of Investment Strategy at the University of Toronto, was paid a salary of $494,598.04 with $62,876.32 in taxable benefits for a total of $557,474.36. Peter George, president of McMaster University, continues to be Ontario’s top paid executive head with a salary of $524,435.14 and taxable benefits of $9,478.34.
The next highest paid president, David Johnston of the University of Waterloo, made $45,000 less than George with a total compensation figure of $488,242.66. Following close behind at $484,357.92 is Mamdouh Shoukri, president of York University. Overall, 13 Ontario university employees were compensated over $400,000 in 2008 with another 59 clearing the $300,000 hurdle.
Province wide, 10,461 university employees made the $100,000 plus list. In fairness, over half of the people on the list made less than $125,000. The grand compensation total of everyone on the list is $1.4 billion. More than half of that went to those earning more than $125,000.
Judging by the record pay cheques for senior and mid-level university executives, one could reasonably conclude that universities are flush with cash and that “business” is booming. Sadly, that is not the case. University endowments are down by double-digit percentages and pension plans are facing major deficits.
To address growing shortfalls, universities are going so far as to exploit loopholes in tuition regulations to increase fees on students, in order to pay for the excesses of the sector. The University of Toronto, for example, is the latest university to exploit a loophole in provincial regulations limiting the maximum tuition the university charges. The rules set the maximum tuition for students taking a 100 per cent course load. Traditionally, student fees are based on the number of courses taken: A student taking four courses paid for four, a student taking five paid for five.
The University of Toronto plans to make students taking three or four courses pay the same fees as those taking five. Ten Ontario universities are already exploiting this loophole to generate additional funds. Other universities are increasing “administrative fees” for services students must use in the course of their university career.
But if the situation is so dire in the Ivory Tower, why are the people at the top taking home growing, record pay cheques?
Administrators are asking low-level staff to take pay freezes and benefit rollbacks. They are increasingly cutting full-time tenure track positions in favour of contract positions. (And then, as budgets squeeze, reducing contract positions). Student services are being cut so that, for example, students can’t get the counselling and other supports they need to succeed in university.
It seems that Ontario universities are only poor when it comes time to deliver the undergraduate education that taxpayers believe their money is going to support.
It’s time for Ontario’s university administrators to follow the lead of University of Winnipeg president Lloyd Axworthy. Axworthy, realizing that he’s asking others to bare the burden of his institution’s financial situation, cut his salary by 10 per cent.
If university administrators are unable to control their excesses, then it is time for the Dalton McGuinty government to step in and force universities to spend taxpayer money on undergraduate education instead of administration.
Administrators taking a pay cut may not amount to much in the big picture, but 10 per cent of McMaster president Peter George’s compensation could, for example, save the job of an entry-level professor facing lay-off as his institutions continues to cut Liberal Arts undergraduate programs.
What do you say university presidents? Do you have 10 per cent to give back to your institutions? Or is it just everyone else who is expected to bail you out?
College presidents: gaining on their more highly paid university peers
The pay of college executives still trails that of universities, but they’re catching up
Colleges are often unfairly seen as the second tier of the higher education universe—and, as we noted last year, that extends to the compensation of college administrators, who have long been paid substantially less than their university peers
So did anything change in 2008? Yes. Ontario’s Sunshine List salary disclosure was released today, and the tally of Ontario college employees earning more than $100,000 (the threshold for inclusion on the list) is, as always, much shorter than the count for universities. However, the number of college senior administrators earning more than $200,000 has grown by nearly two-thirds, and several highly paid college heads are taking home university-president-sized paychecks.
The highest paid college president in Ontario is Frederick Miner of Seneca College. With a salary of $406,000 and taxable benefits worth $5,000, his compensation is enough to put him squarely in the upper tier of university administrators. Miner’s salary is more than that paid to the president of the largest university in the country, David Naylor of the University of Toronto. (The latter’s salary was $380,000).
Conestoga College president John Tibbits was paid $387,000. That’s more than the president of neighbouring Wilfrid Laurier University. (The president of the other university just down the road, the University of Waterloo was however paid about $101,000 more).
The presidents of five other Ontario colleges — Humber, Sheridan, George Brown, Mohawk and Algonquin — earned over $300,000. Their pay is below that awarded the presidents of large Ontario universities, but in line with the compensation given to presidents of smaller Ontario universities. For example, Dennis Mock, president of Nipissing University, Ontario’s second-smallest public university, was paid $271,000. Bonnie Patterson, president of Brock, last year received total compensation of $338,000.
The pay gap between colleges and universities appears to be larger in Western Canada. According to BC public sector salary disclosure, as compiled by the Vancouver Sun, there were 182 employees of the BC university and college system earning more than $200,000. (Data is for either 2006-07 or 2007-08). Of those 182 highly paid individuals, only two were from the college or institute system: the acting and outgoing presidents of BCIT. (What’s more, hardly any of the 182 members of the over $200K club came from the former university college system; almost all worked at one of the province’s four traditional universities, in particular UBC).
Who’s in the $500,000 club?
Who is Canada’s most highly paid academic? Surprise: he isn’t a university president
What does it take to make half a million dollars in a year? According to new figures, released by the government of Ontario today under the province’s decade-old “sunshine law,” two university administrators did just that.
Also, for the second year in a row, the province’s most well-compensated university officer isn’t a president. And one of the province’s most highly compensated university presidents is a former president who stepped down nearly two years ago. These are just some of the revelations in Ontario’s salary disclosures from 2008, which were released mid-day Tuesday on a provincial government website.
John Lyon, University of Toronto’s managing director of investment strategy topped the list with a salary of $494,598, with taxable benefits of $62,876, which brought his total compensation to $557,474.
For full OnCampus coverage of university salaries 2009, click here.
Coming in a close second place was McMaster University president Peter George, who made $524,435, with taxable benefits of $9,478, for total earnings of $533,913 last year. That’s up nearly 6 per cent from his pay the year before, which hit $505,000 in salary and benefits.
Other top earners include University of Waterloo President David Johnston, who made $488,242 total compensation and York University President Mamdouh Shoukri, who, despite his university’s lengthy strike, took home $484,357. In fifth place was University of Guelph president Alastair Summerlee, who made a total of $464,013.
One of the surprises was to find York’s former president, Lorna Marsden, still on the list. Marsden stepped down from the chief executive role in the spring of 2007, and was replaced by Shoukri. However, York in 2008 still has Marsden on the payroll as “president emerita” – and paid her $412,000. That’s more than is paid to most regular, still-on-the-job university presidents.
One other surprise: the most highly paid academic in Canada isn’t at an Ontario university. Ontario university presidents are apparently earning less than some of their peers at Western Canada’s largest universities. Continuing a trend first noticed last year, there are six senior administrators in Western Canada who reported salary and benefits worth more than the package given to Ontario’s most highly paid university president, Peter George. On the list are the president of the University of Calgary, the president of the University of British Columbia, and four executives at the University of Alberta, including President Indira Samarasekera, who received total compensation worth $627,000, or nearly $100,000 more than George. But one of the U of A’s vice-presidents, VP of facilities and operations Don Hickey, earned more than his boss. In 2007-08 he received total remuneration and benefits worth $688,000 — making him Canada’s most highly paid academic.
Go West, ambitious university president
Pay packages appear to be bigger out West — but that may be because BC and Alberta disclosure is more honest
Aspiring university presidents and senior academics looking to maximize their market value may want to look to Western Canada, where the leading universities appear to be offering their top executives compensation superior to that offered in the rest of Canada.
According to the most recent salary disclosures, at least six Western Canadian university administrators are making more than Ontario’s most highly paid university president, McMaster University’s Peter George. In 2008, George reported salary and benefits worth $534,000. During the 2007-08 fiscal year, four senior executives at the University of Alberta, including the president, were paid more. Indira Samarasekera, the U of A’s president, received salary and benefits worth $627,000. Her number two, provost Carl Amrhein, earned $618,000. Two other executives at the U of A earned more: Phyllis Clark, VP of finance and administration, received total compensation worth $654,000 and Don Hickey, VP of facilities and operations, received $668,000.
The president of the University of Calgary, Harvey Weingarten, earned $557,000 in total compensation in 2008. Stephen Toope, president of the University of British Columbia, received total compensation worth $579,000.
In Ontario, the next highest paid president after McMaster’s George is Waterloo’s David Johnston; in 2008, he received $488,000 in total compensation. The third most highly paid Ontario president was York University’s Mamdouh Shoukri at $464,000.
The pay seems higher out West — and that is in part due to the stated objective of some Western universities to offer executive pay that meets or exceeds what’s offered by top institutions in the rest of Canada and the United States. For example, UBC explicitly benchmarks its president’s salary against those peers. “UBC is one of the highest ranked universities in Canada, and one of the top 40 universities in the world,” says the university’s statement on senior administrator compensation. “As such, UBC seeks to retain and attract the best senior administrators it can by remaining competitive in its compensation practices with other large research-intensive universities represented by the G13 (i.e., leading research-intensive universities in Canada), and in particular the University of Toronto and the University of Alberta, and with the global market for senior administrator talent generally.”
David Naylor, president of the University of Toronto, reported $430,000 in total compensation in the most recent year: $380,000 in salary and $50,000 in benefits.
The pay packages appear to be larger out West, but that may be partly an accounting wrinkle: compensation disclosure by Alberta and BC universities is more honest and complete. In Ontario, as in BC and Alberta, executives must report base salary and other compensation. However, Alberta and BC appear to be fully (or at least more fully) expensing the cost of their senior administrators’ supplemental pension payments, whereas Ontario’s salary disclosure does not appear to include this. Pension costs are not cash payments made in 2008, but rather the estimated present cost of the pension benefits earned in 2008. Many Canadian administrators are going to get large pensions on retirement, the cost of which in the present is substantial, and should be recorded and disclosed. Out West, it is.
For example, U of A president Samarasekera’s total compensation of $627,000 exceed that of every Ontario university president. However, her base salary of $436,000 is less than the base pay given to the top three Ontario presidents. What puts her total compensation over the top is $191,000 in “other non-cash benefits.” The largest part of that is pension benefits. UBC’s compensation disclosure for president Toope breaks it down even further: $378,000 in salary, a bonus of $50,000, “other compensation” of $65,000 and pension expense of $85,000. Ontario’s Sunshine Law salary disclosure covers the first three of those items but does not appear to completely cover pension expenses.
For example, it was revealed last year that, on retirement, McMaster’s George is set to receive a golden handshake of $1.4 million, paid out at the rate of $99,999/year for 14 years. This does not appear to have ever been accounted for in McMaster’s disclosures under Ontario’s Sunshine List. (It is not clear how such a payment — which McMaster does not consider a pension — would be treated by Alberta or BC compensation disclosure requirements). Nor does it appear that Peter George’s supplemental pension benefits have been disclosed as completely as those of his Alberta and BC peers. McMaster’s Sunshine Law disclosure says that George received salary of $524,000 and “taxable benefits” of less than $10,000. It seems a safe bet that the cost of his various pension and other benefits is considerably larger than this, but Ontario’s transparency law does not require quite as much transparency as BC and Alberta.
Comparing “total compensation” at Alberta/BC universities with those in Ontario is thus not always an entirely equivalent comparison, as it may somewhat understate the compensation of Ontario administrators. (That wording is deliberately chosen: it’s not that Alberta and BC are overstating executive compensation, but rather that Ontario is understating it). The bottom line, however, is that senior administrators in Alberta and BC are well paid, and at top universities, senior executives’ salaries compete with what is offered by leading universities in Ontario. No matter how you slice it, Western presidents aren’t getting short changed. For example, in 2008, U of A president Samarasekera’s total compensation rose 6.1 per cent.
(Ontario presidents aren’t exactly suffering, either).
And what about those senior execs at the U of A who earned more than the president? The university’s annual report explains that “in the current year, certain individuals became eligible for an additional six month professional leave. Included in non-cash benefits is the equivalent of an additional six months salary for Vice-President Finance and Administration ($176,000) and Vice-President Facilities Operations ($179,000).”
The two VPs, Clark and Hickey, were not paid those benefits in 2009 — but, in another act of Western accounting honesty, the university calculated and reported the cost of their six month leaves (which they will take later, perhaps after retirement) on its 2008 statement of executive compensation.
University and college compensation, coast to coast
*Click here for the most up-to-date coverage of university salaries 2009* Who’s in the $500,000 club? Who is Canada’s most highly paid academic? Surprise: he isn’t a university president College presidents: gaining on their higher-paid university peers The pay of college executives still trails that of universities, but they’re catching up How many university employees [...]
*Click here for the most up-to-date coverage of university salaries 2009*
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Who’s in the $500,000 club?Who is Canada’s most highly paid academic? Surprise: he isn’t a university president |
How much does your president make, 2009 edition
We’ll have complete coverage online later today
UPDATED: For complete coverage of University Salaries 2009, click here.
Ontario this morning released its annual Sunshine List of public sector employees paid more than $100,000. As always, the list includes all university and college employees in the province.
We’re preparing a number of articles right now; look for us for full coverage throughout the day from me, Karen Pinchin and Joey Coleman.
I’m just now taking a look at how university presidents’ salaries in Ontario compare to what we know about pay in Western Canada. The conclusion seems to be: go West, ambitious academic administrator. More in just a moment.
Eased admissions for affluent applicants
From The New York Times: In the bid for a fat envelope this year, it may help, more than usual, to have a fat wallet. Facing fallen endowments and needier students, many colleges are looking more favorably on wealthier applicants as they make their admissions decisions this year. Institutions that have pledged to admit students [...]
From The New York Times:
In the bid for a fat envelope this year, it may help, more than usual, to have a fat wallet. Facing fallen endowments and needier students, many colleges are looking more favorably on wealthier applicants as they make their admissions decisions this year.
Institutions that have pledged to admit students regardless of need are finding ways to increase the number of those who pay the full cost in ways that allow the colleges to maintain the claim of being need-blind — taking more students from the transfer or waiting lists, for instance, or admitting more foreign students who pay full tuition.
Time to cut journal jargon
From CTV News: The time has come for scientific journals to dump the academic jargon and replace it with clear language the general population can understand, contends an editorial in the Canadian Medical Association Journal. Dr. Noni MacDonald and Globe and Mail health reporter André Picard argue that with the Internet, the general public, politicians [...]
From CTV News:
The time has come for scientific journals to dump the academic jargon and replace it with clear language the general population can understand, contends an editorial in the Canadian Medical Association Journal.
Dr. Noni MacDonald and Globe and Mail health reporter André Picard argue that with the Internet, the general public, politicians and news media are now reading the journals and studies that used to be reserved for academics. Websites such as CTV.ca regularly provide links to studies on medical journal websites so readers can assess the data themselves.
But because the language in those studies is often so confusing, many are misinterpreting what they read.
UToronto researchers uncover vast online spy ring
Mostly Chinese-based operation tapped into classified documents in 103 countries
A cyber spy network based mainly in China has tapped into classified documents from government and private organizations in 103 countries, according to a report by Canadian researchers that was released Sunday.
The work of the Information Warfare Monitor initially focused on allegations of Chinese cyber espionage against the Tibetan community in exile, including the Dalai Lama, who is frequently denounced by Chinese officials.
The research eventually led to a much wider discovery of compromised machines, the Internet-based research group said.
Information Warfare Monitor is a joint effort of the SecDev Group in Ottawa and the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto.
The group said in a news release that investigators conducted field research in India, Europe and North America, including in the private office of the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan government-in-exile and several Tibetan NGOs.
“We uncovered real-time evidence of malware that had penetrated Tibetan computer systems, extracting sensitive documents from the private office of the Dalai Lama,” Investigator Greg Walton said.
During the second phase of the investigation, the data led to the discovery of insecure, web-based interfaces to four control servers. The interfaces allow attackers to send instructions to and receive data from compromised computers.
“What we found is not so much unprecedented in scope and sophistication,” said Nart Villeneuve, a senior IWM analyst.
“But the relatively small size of the network and concentration of high-value targets is significant. It does not fit the profile for a typical cyber crime network.”
Principal investigators Ron Deibert and Rafal Rohozinski said: “This report serves as a wake-up call.”
“At the very least, the large percentage of high-value targets compromised by this network demonstrates the relative ease with which a technically unsophisticated approach can quickly be harnessed to create a very effective spynet.”
Earnings of private career college graduates
Nearly 60 per cent of grads say post-college job pays better than their previous one
The Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation has released a report of a recently completed survey of graduates of private career colleges in Canada.
Among employed graduates, 59% noted that their current job paid better than the previous job they held. A further 20% said their job paid as well as their previous one and 17% reported that their income was lower than it was in their previous job.
The report notes that the average income of graduates of career college was $26,727. This finding would appear to lend further credence to the existing evidence that private career college graduates earn roughly the same as high school graduates.
The available data from the 2006 Census indicates that individuals holding a certificate or diploma below the bachelors level earned an average of $30,512 in 2005, so the average earnings of private career college graduates would appear to be quite a bit below that of individuals with sub-baccalaureate credentials.
While comparable data are not available from the 2006 Census, according to data from the 2001 Census individuals with a high school diploma and/or some post-secondary education earned $25,477 in 2000.
An important question with this group is whether or not graduates of private career colleges would be as likely to be employed had they not completed a private career college credential.
New Brunswick defeats Western Ontario 4-2 in hockey final
CIS most valuable player MacIntosh scores three goals to win University Cup
Lachlan MacIntosh scored three goals, including the winner midway through the third period, to lead the New Brunswick Varsity Reds past the Western Ontario Mustangs 4-2 in the Canadian university men’s hockey final.
MacIntosh broke a 2-2 tie at 10:24 when he collected a loose puck in the slot and fired a low shot past goaltender Brad Topping.
“I was just fortunate to get some chances, and capitalized. It was just one of those days where the bounces went my way,” said MacIntosh.
The CIS University Cup most valuable player iced things with an empty-netter with 46 seconds left, and also opened the scoring at 18:58 of the first as the V-Reds claimed their second national title in three years.
They lost 3-2 to Alberta in the 2008 final and edged Moncton 3-2 in overtime two years ago.
John Scott Dickson also scored for New Brunswick, while Travis Fullerton made 28 saves, including a handful of big ones as Western pressed hard for an equalizer in the dying minutes.
“We had a lot of soldiers out there,” said New Brunswick coach Gardiner MacDougall. “To win a national championship we need complete efforts from everyone but your best players have to be your best players.”
Patrick Ouellet and Kevin Baker replied for the Mustangs, unlikely finalists after scoring five straight goals in the third period of a 7-2 thrashing of Saint Mary’s on Saturday. They needed to beat the Huskies by at least three goals to advance.
The Ontario champions ran out of magic after tying the game when Baker scored 1:13 into the third, failing to win the title in their first trip to the national final since beating UQTR in triple overtime seven years ago.
Coverage of provincial budgets
Paris Meilleur, former president of OUSA and former executive director of ANNSA, offers a great summary of what recent (and upcoming) provincial budgets mean for post-secondary education. Read it over here: http://cynicismfallsasleep.wordpress.com/2009/03/27/provincial-budgets-pse/
Paris Meilleur, former president of OUSA and former executive director of ANNSA, offers a great summary of what recent (and upcoming) provincial budgets mean for post-secondary education.
Read it over here: http://cynicismfallsasleep.wordpress.com/2009/03/27/provincial-budgets-pse/
Fire at UManitoba causes partial campus evacuation
Extent of damage unknown as labs burn in spectacular fire
Students and staff at the University of Manitoba were ordered to leave the campus Saturday after a fire broke out in one of the buildings.
Thick smoke could be seen pouring from the upper floors of the Duff Roblin building, which houses the university’s Psychology Department and zoology labs.
Const. Jason Michalyshen, a police spokesman, said emergency officials had ordered people to leave the area because the fire appeared to be “significant”.
“We’re evacuating a fairly large area within the university. We have emergency personnel on scene. Right now, it looks like a fairly involved fire,” he said.
There were also media reports that firefighters were concerned about the possibility of asbestos burning in the building and had requested an inventory of any chemicals stored in the labs.
Emergency crews were called to the building just after noon local time.
Stephen Sumka, a fire platoon chief, said by mid-afternoon, firefighters had got the blaze under control.
“We’ve basically got 20 pieces of apparatus at the fire right now, which is approximately 75-80 firefighters,” he said.
Sumka said it appeared that the blaze was confined to the Duff Roblin building, but there were reports that people in a student residence nearby were among the first told to leave the area.
Off-duty firefighters were called in to help cover other areas of the city, while dozens of their colleagues battled the fire on the university campus.
Damage to the building appeared to be extensive, Sumka said.
No injuries were immediately reported due to the blaze.
Fire officials urged motorists and pedestrians to stay away from the area.
But police were flooded with calls from worried parents wanting to pick up their children.
Police set up an area on campus where they could do that.
About 120 students from area schools who were on campus for a career program were to be transported back to those schools so parents could pick them up.
According to the University of Manitoba website, the building was named after the province’s former premier and also houses a zoology museum.
- The Canadian Press
Links:
- University of Manitoba emergency updates page: http://umanitoba.ca/
- Winnipeg Free Press coverage: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/breakingnews/Building-on-fire-at-University-of-Manitoba-42054577.html
- Flickr photograph by UManitoba student of building on fire: http://www.flickr.com/photos/emples/3393444094/
- The Manitoban, UManitoba student paper, Twitter feed: http://twitter.com/themanitoban
Fees and university access
Jeffery Simpson picks up the subject of access to university in his Globe and Mail column today. He makes the following observation about university tuition fees and access: Some governments have tried to ease the financial path to university by keeping fees low, ostensibly to improve access. (Quebec’s are the lowest in North America, but [...]
Jeffery Simpson picks up the subject of access to university in his Globe and Mail column today. He makes the following observation about university tuition fees and access:
Some governments have tried to ease the financial path to university by keeping fees low, ostensibly to improve access. (Quebec’s are the lowest in North America, but there’s no evidence of higher participation rates.) Study after study has rebuffed that theory, in that higher fees are actually not much, if any, deterrent – not when compared with a host of other factors. But, politically, keeping fees down has often been attractive, although they’ve been rising above inflation in recent years to make up for the reduction in government funding.
Doctor shortage? Fence them in
The tricks provinces play to keep medical school graduates from moving
Last week, certain parts of Quebec’s French-language media got themselves all hot and bothered by the following discovery: many graduates of McGill University medical school move to… Ontario. Or Western Canada. Or the rest of the world.
The table below shows where 2006 graduates of Canada’s medical school were practicing, two years after exiting their post-MD training. McGill’s “problem”? It has the highest percentage of graduates who have moved to another province or country.
Training physicians is expensive, and provincial governments assume much of the cost of that training, hence the complaint. And the desire, on the part of some, to find ways to further fence in med school graduates: you know, if you want to go to medical school, you have to promise to never leave the country, or to spend umpteen years in a rural area. Some provinces, in particular Quebec, appear to feel themselves squeezed in the same way as some Third World countries are: their best and brightest and most educated leave.
But restrictions on mobility, as the experience of any Third World country can tell us, don’t tend to work. And Canada already imposes extensive restrictions on the labour mobility of doctors. And yet we still have doctor shortages in many places.
Canada’s restrictions on physicians start right up front–when prospective doctors apply to medical school. In all other areas, Canadian higher education is open to the most talented, regardless of whether they come from other provinces or overseas. The University of British Columbia does not turn away qualified applicants because they happen to live in Manitoba or Ontario — unless, that is, those applicants want to go to medical school. By order of every provincial government except one, medical school seats are overwhelmingly restricted to those who already live in the province. Just look at page 2 of this table, from the Association of Faculties of Medicine of Canada.
The one province that does not impose a locals-only policy on its medical schools? Ontario.
UBC, the only medical school in BC, reserves 95% of its seats for BC residents. U Saskatchewan and U Manitoba, the only medical schools in their respective provinces, each set aside 90% of seats for locals. Dalhousie and Memorial, the only medical schools in Atlantic Canada, take the same approach, with a careful apportioning of seats among residents of the various Atlantic provinces. Quebec puts its medical schools in the same straight jacket, such that McGill — one of North America’s oldest and most prestigious medical schools — must reserve 91% of its seats for provincial residents.
And yet a substantial percentage of grads from almost every medical school leave the province. McGill’s numbers are the highest, but all Canadian medical schools are “bleeding” graduates to other provinces or countries. Look at Memorial: almost all of its students come from Atlantic Canada, yet a third of those who exited its post-MD training in 2006 are practicing elsewhere. (Go to page 132 of this document and you see that they have moved to Ontario, Manitoba, Alberta and BC). Even UBC, which accepts almost no non-BC medical students, sends a substantial number of its graduates outside the province. (Most went to Ontario and Alberta. A few went to Quebec).
I’ve got to start my essay. In a minute.
After procrastinating all weekend, I vowed to myself that I would get to work on my religious studies essay. Right away. I would do nothing all day but research and take notes. I wouldn’t stop until I had a rough draft. Instead, I somehow ended up watching the History Channel. I learned why the Great [...]
After procrastinating all weekend, I vowed to myself that I would get to work on my religious studies essay.
Right away.
I would do nothing all day but research and take notes. I wouldn’t stop until I had a rough draft.
Instead, I somehow ended up watching the History Channel.
I learned why the Great Pyramid of Giza is one of the Seven Wonders of the world. I learned the origin of the phrase, “Worth your weight in salt.” And then promptly forgot it.
And I still haven’t started my essay.
Jump in U.S. student loan defaults
From The Wall Street Journal: The U.S. Department of Education, demonstrating the toll the sour economy is taking on recent college graduates, reported a jump in the student-loan default rate to 6.9%, from 5.2% a year earlier. Raising the stakes for consumers and taxpayers, the amount that students are borrowing for their education has been [...]
From The Wall Street Journal:
The U.S. Department of Education, demonstrating the toll the sour economy is taking on recent college graduates, reported a jump in the student-loan default rate to 6.9%, from 5.2% a year earlier.
Raising the stakes for consumers and taxpayers, the amount that students are borrowing for their education has been increasing dramatically in recent years, with half a trillion dollars in federal student loan debt now outstanding.
Robert Shireman, a senior adviser to Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, says he expects the default rate, which reflects the early part of the recession, to continue to rise. “When people are facing a job loss, figuring out how to pay their student loan is not No. 1 on their list,” he said.
University and college compensation, coast to coast
All the presidents’ contracts How much does each university president make? The definitive guide for 2008. New! Click here for university salaries 2009 Presidents’ salaries up nearly 100% since 1997 University heads’ pay rising four times faster than inflation. Who is Canada’s most highly paid academic? Surprise: Ontario’s salary leader isn’t a university president. College [...]
All the presidents’ contractsHow much does each university president make? The definitive guide for 2008.
Presidents’ salaries up nearly 100% since 1997University heads’ pay rising four times faster than inflation. |
For more stories from university salaries 2008, click here
For the most up to date coverage of academic compensation, click here
The “best student aid package in the country”
Newfoundland and Labrador eliminates interest on the provincial portion of student loans
The government of Newfoundland and Labrador has released its 2009 Budget. The budget, which has a $750 million deficit, makes a number of changes to student financial assistance that, according to the minister of education, provide for the “best student aid package in the country”. Spending initiatives that will impact the student pocketbook include:
- a continuation of the tuition fee freeze at Memorial University of Newfoundland and the College of the North Atlantic;
- an increase in up-front, non-repayable, needs-based grants from $70 to $80 per week of study; and
- the elimination of interest on the provincial portion of student loans.
Future of Manitoba tuition freeze in limbo
Freeze was set to end in 2009-10, with increases being “gradually phased in”
From The Winnipeg Sun:
Manitoba’s university students will have to wait a while longer to find out if their tuition is going up.
Many expected yesterday’s budget to include an announcement the decade-old tuition freeze at universities and colleges would be lifted. Last April, Advanced Education Minister Diane McGifford said the freeze would end in 2009-10 and tuition increases would then be “gradually phased in.”
However, during yesterday’s budget speech, Finance Minister Greg Selinger said he expects it will be another 10 days or so before he receives a report from the one-man commission studying the freeze and the implications of lifting it.
