Canada’s education system is lagging behind other developed countries in important areas of learning and education, according to a recent report by the soon-to-be defunct Canadian Council on Learning (CCL).
“While Canada does possess strengths in education, we are not setting the conditions for future success,” said CCL’s president and CEO, Paul Cappon, in a press release. “The principal cause of this unacceptable and deeply troubling state of affairs is that our governments have failed to work together to develop policies to improve the learning futures of Canadians of all ages.”
The CCL’s last report, “What is the Future of Learning in Canada,” called for a national oversight body to ensure the quality of the Canadian education system. Without it, Canada’s education system will continue to erode and undermine the country’s economic competitiveness in the future, the report stated.
According to the report, Canada is unique in the developed world because it lacks a national strategy for post-secondary education. Canada has “no acknowledged and accepted goals, no benchmarks, and no public reporting of results based on widely accepted measures,” the report stated.
Glen Jones, the Ontario research chair on post-secondary education policy and measurement at the University of Toronto, said he agrees that Canada needs to develop a system to collect data on what’s happening inside post-secondary institutions.
“Canada lacks the data infrastructure for policy development,” Jones said. “There is no national co-ordination and ability to monitor post-secondary education.”
Jones said education is primarily a provincial matter, so the provinces should work together to ensure there’s data co-ordination to come up with clear measurable outcomes as a nation.
But the report is critical of provincial monopoly on education. Provinces prevent federal involvement in developing national standards for university and college education, according to the report.
The National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE) has proposed a solution, which calls for a Canada Education Act (CEA) to clarify the commitments between the federal and provincial government to education.
Mike Luff, co-ordinator of research and communications at NUPGE, said creating an education act will help Canada do a better job when it comes to the quality, accessibility and affordability of post-secondary education.
“When the federal government becomes a stronger funding partner, it can set criteria and conditions for the money it transfers to the provinces including lower student-to-faculty ratios, lower tuition fees and improved accessibility,” Luff said.
Canadian universities are losing ground in innovation and research and development, the report stated.
The Liberal party established the CCL in 2004. Its goal was to report on Canada’s progress in learning results, and publish key findings on what works and doesn’t in the system. But in 2010, the Conservative government pulled the council’s federal funding, meaning it will no longer function as of spring 2012.
