The Council of Ontario Universities (COU) recently released results from the first ever report on Canadian professors at work.
“Faculty At Work,” released Aug. 26, aims to clarify what Ontario faculty members do on the job.
COU president Bonnie Patterson said the study was an effort to help people understand the contributions professors are making to prepare students for success, help their communities, and conduct research.
“Ontario universities have been aware that there isn’t adequate data on faculty work and wanted to change that,” Patterson said.
Using data collected from 17 of Ontario’s 21 publicly assisted universities, the study captured 77 per cent of Ontario university faculty—10,867 professors—to produce a better idea of the contributions of professors at the province’s post-secondary institutions.
According to the report, contrary to popular belief, full-time professors don’t focus almost entirely on their own research.
The majority of university faculty taught undergraduate students (87 per cent), produced research outputs (87 per cent), and participated in service work of some kind (81 per cent) in the year measured.
The study found that, on average, Ontario professors devote 40 per cent of their time to research, 40 per cent to teaching and 20 per cent to service.
“We found that university faculty play a tremendous role in research, teaching and service, even in the face of surging demand and constrained resources,” Patterson said.
