Dean's Message
NOVEMBER 2007
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OISE faculty and students have been very engaged in a number of issues that will affect the future of public education this fall. During the provincial election, the merits of faith-based schools were discussed in the press by several faculty members, in a workshop organized by the Department of Curriculum Teaching and Learning and in our halls and classrooms by almost everyone.
The start up of Ontario’s Higher Education Quality Council has engaged our higher education group, and especially our new Centre for the Study of Students in Postsecondary Education, directed by Tony Chambers. The Council is debating the meaning of student satisfaction data, the relationship between policy and research and the utility of randomized trials for studying instruction.
Last weekend, the Centre for Urban Schooling held a workshop on student engagement, bringing visiting speakers from around the world to talk with students, teachers and administrators from local school boards about how to keep students engaged in school. The Toronto District School Board’s school safety panel will be discussing the same issues with faculty and students later in the month.
The Jackson Lecture given by Professor Rosemary Tannock addressed the history and current state of discussions around special education, pointing out the gaps between the concepts and language in the health field and the educational field, and looking for ways we can work together more productively.
These are all examples of engaged scholarship and fruitful partnerships. They are the public face of exchanges that go on in classrooms and research groups on a smaller scale every day at OISE. As we conclude our centennial year on November 16 and move forward into a new hundred years of studying and teaching education at the University of Toronto, I invite you all to join in our conversations.
Jane Gaskell
Inspiring Education: 2006-2007 Annual Report
Orbit Magazine for Schools: New issue Promising Practices in Special Education
Sincerely,