Search

The increased migration of skilled workers globally has led to a focus in the immigration literature on the economic costs of unsuccessful labour market integration. Less attention has been given to the consequences of employment difficulties, such as those related to over-education, on aspects of immigrants' subjective well-being. Although a large proportion of immigrants experience over-education, studies examining the relationship between over-education and life satisfaction tend to concentrate on the general population. These studies find a negative relationship between over-education and life satisfaction. Since immigrant and Canadian-born (non-immigrant) workers may experience over-education differently, it is important to examine this relationship in both groups. This study examines how over-education is associated with life satisfaction among university-educated immigrant and non-immigrant workers in Canada, and accounts for differences in the degree of over-education in each group. Results indicate that overeducation was negatively associated with life satisfaction among immigrants and non-immigrants, although the effect was weaker in the immigrant population. Income was the main factor mediating the negative relationship between over-education and life satisfaction among immigrants. Furthermore, this relationship weakened with immigrants' increased residence in Canada. This may suggest that over-education is less influential in immigrants' assessment of life satisfaction over time, or the effect of over-education is weaker among earlier arrival cohorts. Results also indicated that the negative relationship between over-education and life satisfaction was weaker for immigrants from developing countries compared with those from developed countries.

This study examines the relationship between occupational skill requirements and educational attainment (the highest level completed and the field of study). Using the 2011 National Household Survey matched to data from the Occupational Information Network (which contains information on occupational skill requirements), the study uncovers many new findings on the skill requirements of jobs held by Canadians aged 25 to 34 with different educational qualifications. First, skill-level requirements in all areas generally increase with higher educational levels. There are three notable exceptions to this trend, however: requirements for technical operation and maintenance skills do not generally increase with more schooling; doctoral graduates require considerably less resource management skills than other university graduates; and professional-degree holders have jobs that require lower mathematics skills than other university graduates, although this is entirely because of law graduates. Moreover, skill requirements are almost always higher among bachelor's degree holders and college graduates of specific disciplines, compared with high school graduates. Second, skill requirements vary considerably by field of study. For example, bachelor's degree holders in architecture, engineering, and related technologies generally work in multidimensional jobs requiring diverse, high-level skills. In fact, these graduates rank at the top or very close to the top in eight of the nine skills examined. In contrast, bachelor's degree holders in three fields (education; visual and performing arts, and communications technologies; and humanities) generally rank lower than other bachelor's degree holders in most skills examined. However, the skill requirements of college graduates and bachelor's degree holders are very different across fields of study. While skill requirements are almost always higher among bachelor's degree holders than among college graduates from the same discipline, the relative ranking of disciplines tends to differ for each level. Finally, there are considerably more gender differences among college graduates than among bachelor's degree holders with regard to skill requirements by field of study.

Faced with job loss, displaced workers may choose to return to school to help them reintegrate into the labour force. Job losses in a given local labour market may also induce workers who have not yet been laid off to pre-emptively enrol in postsecondary (PS) institutions, as a precautionary measure. Combining microdata and grouped data, this study examines these two dimensions of the relationship between layoffs and PS enrolment over the 2001-to-2011 period. Using individual-level longitudinal microdata and controlling for the unobserved heterogeneity of workers in a flexible way, the study finds that laid-off male and female workers are 2 to 4 percentage points more likely than other men and women to transition to PS education in the year of the layoff or the following year (from a baseline rate of about 3%). For both sexes, fulltime PS enrolment accounts for most of the increase in enrolment. Statistically significant correlations between layoffs and full-time PS attendance are detected between two years before job loss and two years after job loss. The study also takes advantage of the fact that the 2008-2009 recession increased layoff rates in a differentiated way across Canada and, thus, generated exogenous variation in layoff rates at the regional level. Using grouped data models that allow economic regions to display distinct trends in their rates of transition to PS institutions, the study finds that for every additional 100 adult men laid off in an economic region in a given year, there is an additional 2 to 6 men who enrol in PS education institutions on a full-time basis in the following year. The study also detects a positive relationship between regional layoff rates and regional PS transitions for unmarried women. In line with the notion that some non-laid-off workers may pre-emptively enrol in PS institutions, the study finds evidence that movements in regional layoff rates are positively correlated with short-term transitions to PS institutions for adult male workers aged 35 to 44 who have not been laid off yet.

This paper examines the personal and societal choices that will shape the kind of country Canada will become. It is argued that Canadian policymakers' current approach to work, family, and urban life is based on patterns and associations that were developed in an earlier time and no longer reflect Canadians' experiences in the 2000s. Recent trends in Canadian home and family life, workplaces, and cities are analyzed, and policy challenges resulting from significant social changes in each of these areas are identified. It is argued that policymakers must address the following sets of choices when formulating the policies that will shape education in Canada in years to come: (1) striving for work-life balance or crafting policies based on the belief that life is only at work; (2) sharing responsibilities for intergenerational well-being needs with families or adopting policies based on the belief that families are solely responsible for meeting those needs; (3) accepting the notion that life "without work" matters or basing policies on the principle that everybody must work; and (4) acting as if "space matters" (spending on physical and cultural infrastructures, investing in public services, deciding land use and housing policies, redesigning local, province and federal governance, enabling democracy). The consequences of selected policy decisions based on each of these choices are explored. The bibliography lists 46 references. Five reference tables are appended.(MN)

The worldwide school closures in early 2020 led to losses in learning that will not easily be made up for even if schools quickly return to their prior performance levels. These losses will have lasting economic impacts both on the affected students and on each nation unless they are effectively remediated. While the precise learning losses are not yet known, existing research suggests that the students in grades 1-12 affected by the closures might expect some 3 percent lower income over their entire lifetimes. For nations, the lower long-term growth related to such losses might yield an average of 1.5 percent lower annual GDP for the remainder of the century. These economic losses would grow if schools are unable to re-start quickly. The economic losses will be more deeply felt by disadvantaged students. All indications are that students whose families are less able to support out-of-school learning will face larger learning losses than their more advantaged peers, which in turn will translate into deeper losses of lifetime earnings. The present value of the economic losses to nations reach huge proportions. Just returning schools to where they were in 2019 will not avoid such losses. Only making them better can. While a variety of approaches might be attempted, existing research indicates that close attention to the modified re-opening of schools offers strategies that could ameliorate the losses. Specifically, with the expected increase in video-based instruction, matching the skills of the teaching force to the new range of tasks and activities could quickly move schools to heightened performance. Additionally, because the prior disruptions are likely to increase the variations in learning levels within individual classrooms, pivoting to more individualised instruction could leave all students better off as schools resume. As schools move to re-establish their programmes even as the pandemic continues, it is natural to focus considerable attention on the mechanics and logistics of safe re-opening. But the long-term economic impacts also require serious attention, because the losses already suffered demand more than the best of currently considered re-opening approaches.

A study identified students' perspectives on quality and nature of learning achieved in a vocational program using a cooperative learning approach. The theoretical framework for analysis of the implementation of a vocational program included Lave and Wenger's (1991) concept of situated learning and the Guile and Griffiths' (2001) model of work experience. A 1997-2001 action research study focused on dynamics as collaborations between schools and businesses were implemented, including how collaboration evolves; the nature and type of collaboration in relationship to the size of organizations; and implementation of partnerships in a vocational training program. The context was a new, high-school-level vocational program to train specialized workers for the pulp and paper sector. Questionnaire and interview data indicated first experiences of cooperative education in the sector were filled with challenges that vocational centers and mills overcame; large majorities of students were satisfied with training and confident of finding a job; and the practicum was not a good example of successful integration in the pulp and paper community of practice. Mills appeared to play the role of a demonstration environment. Many students reported limited access to job operations; mills engaged in training with a focus on productivity; work supervisors saw their role mainly as adapting to the vocational centers' demands rather than being more active; and degree of work autonomy conferred on students was very variable. (YLB)

In Canada and elsewhere, the shift from more horizontal models of governance and toward a more organized, diverse, and empowered civil society has sparked renewed interest in citizen involvement. The various dimensions of citizen involvement in policy processes are as follows: (1) mobilizing interest; (2) claims making; (3) knowledge acquisition; (4) spanning and bridging; (5) convening and deliberating; (6) community capacity building; (7) analysis and synthesis; and (8) transparency and feedback. These dimensions play various roles in the following stages of the policy process: (1) problem identification; (1) priority setting; (3) policy formation and design; (4) passage of policy instruments; (5) implementation; and (6) evaluation. An analysis of the adequacy of Canada's existing political institutions in providing for the dimensions of citizen involvement in each of these stages reveals that those institutions are not assuming as effective a part in citizen involvement as they might. Possible types of reforms to address this problem are as follows: (1) improving existing institutions and processes and developing institutionalized mechanisms for funding citizen involvement; (2) creating a new institution for citizen engagement, such as a civic forum; (3) changing culture within government; and (4) investing in civil society, including by promoting strong associational networks and supporting capacity building in voluntary organizations. (Contains 100 references.) (MN)

It has been well documented that the children of immigrants in Canada outperform their peers with Canadian-born parents in educational attainment, and that the two groups have similar labour market outcomes. However, large variations by ethnicity or source country exist among the children of immigrants. This study examines the extent to which admission class (e.g., skilled workers, business immigrants, live-in caregivers, the family class and refugees) also matters in the socioeconomic outcomes of childhood immigrants who arrived in Canada before the age of 18. Using the 2011 National Household Survey, linked with the Immigrant Landing File, this study finds large differences by admission class in university completion rates and earnings for childhood immigrants aged 25 to 44. Children of skilled workers and business immigrants had the highest university completion rates and earnings. Children of live-in caregivers and in the family class had the lowest university completion rates, and children of live-in caregivers and refugees landed in Canada had the lowest earnings. The analysis shows that the admission class of immigrant parents matters to their children's outcomes partly through group differences in the education and official language ability of parents and partly through the unique pre- and post-migration circumstances experienced by each admission class.

Are teachers and principals aligned in their perceptions of the core components of the theory of Leadership for Learning across countries, or are there subgroups of schools in which there is misalignment? The purpose of this study is to examine the extent to which a congruency-typology model of leadership for learning is distributed across countries/economies using the TALIS 2018 dataset through examining the interaction of significantly different subgroups of teacher and principal responders through using multilevel latent class analysis (LCA) with a cross-level interaction. I analyse data from lower secondary schools of n=152 635 teachers in 9 079 schools and their principals across 47 countries/economies. Currently in the research literature on school leadership, leadership for learning has emerged as a framework to bring together managerial, transformational, distributed, and instructional leadership. Yet little is known about leadership for learning across national contexts. This study 1) maps the TALIS 2018 survey items to the current literature and surveys for leadership for learning, 2) then details the methods and analysis framework to examine if there are multiple significantly different types of teachers, principals, and schools from a leadership for learning theory framework. The final model 3) identifies a three-group teacher typology and a three-group principal typology, linking these types to school context, covariates, as well as teacher and principal training and experience. Results relate directly to the intersection of research, policy, and practice for training and capacity of school leaders across 47 countries/economies globally.

Research suggests which study strategies are effective but little descriptive research focuses on how undergraduate students study in real-world settings. Thus, the mechanisms of students' actual learning remain a black box for the field of higher education, with far more attention paid to inputs and outputs of the learning process. Using a situative theory of cognition and learning, we analyzed data from 22 focus groups (N = 60 students). Results indicate studying is a multi-faceted process that is initiated by instructor or self-generated cues, followed by marshaling resources and managing distractions (or not), and then study behaviors that include selecting time, setting, and specific strategies. Underlying these behaviors are contextual factors including course material and students' personal lives. The results highlight the importance of self-regulation skills, particularly managing digital distractions, and we suggest that the development of these skills should be more frequently incorporated into instructional design and student support services.

This systematic review investigates the relevance of general pedagogical knowledge for successful teaching. It synthesises the empirical evidence of 10 769 teaching professionals and 853 452 students from primary to tertiary education in 21 countries. The meta-analysis of 20 quantitative studies revealed significant effects for teaching quality and student outcomes (Cohen's d = 0.64 and 0.26), indicating that more knowledgeable teachers achieve a three-month additional progress for students. The three themes emerging from 31 qualitative studies underline that general pedagogical knowledge is a crucial resource for teaching. Results also show that teaching requires knowledge about a range of topics, specific skills and other competences to transform knowledge into practice. Teachers need training and practical experience to acquire knowledge, which they apply according to the pedagogical situation at hand. The results allow for important conclusions for policy, practice and research.

Through a historical and comparative analysis of international education policy development in Canada and the U.S., this paper will map the similarities and differences in the two countries. It will highlight the contributions and challenges of the government's involvement in international education (IE) in the two federal states and in particular, explore the implications of the changing contexts, rationales and approaches for international education to the federal role in higher education. It will conclude with observations on the differential impact of the federal government's role in international/higher education on the higher education systems of the two countries and thus contribute to our understanding of how national specificities and characteristics outweigh the commonly stated policy rationales, approaches and outcomes for international education. [A bibliography is included.]