One-stop shopping for postsecondary students

A group of Canadian colleges are working to set themselves apart from their peers with an expanded mandate under the banner of polytechnics.

The schools - five in Ontario, one in Alberta and one in British Columbia - are carving out a niche in postsecondary education, providing one-stop shopping for students for a range of qualifications from diplomas and certificates to apprenticeship programs to four-year applied degrees.

"When I describe to people what we do here, they are blown away," says John Davies, president of Ontario's Humber College, one of seven members of Polytechnics Canada, a group established three years ago to promote the polytechnic concept.

With about 18,000 full-time students at its main campus in Toronto and two satellite sites, Humber offers seven degree programs and plans to increase that to 10 by September, 2008.

It also offers a joint nursing degree with the University of New Brunswick and has a joint venture with the University of Guelph to deliver undergraduate degrees on its main campus using both Guelph and Humber faculty.

The school's current name - Humber College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning - is an attempt to reflect this evolving status. Humber and other Ontario schools are now lobbying the provincial government for permission to officially call themselves polytechnics.

In the meantime, several colleges - including Humber and Sheridan colleges - are already using the term to describe themselves in promotional material.

"We need to have a way to define to the broader community what we are actually doing," Mr. Davies explains. "We know we have an issue that goes beyond a name."

Indeed, the term polytechnic has a variety of meanings in Canada.

The polytechnic model is most familiar in Quebec and the West; the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology, for example, has officially changed its name to SAIT Polytechnic. By comparison, most people in Ontario associate the term with Ryerson - a former polytechnic that became a university.

(Mr. Davies says he is not seeking the name change for Humber as a stepping stone to university status: "That is certainly not my vision.")

What sets polytechnics apart from community colleges is that they offer applied degrees and some also do applied research.

Humber College, for example, has just announced plans to begin research on green building technologies such as the use of grey water and green roofs.

Irene Lewis, president of SAIT Polytechnic in Calgary, says the research done at her campus helps to tackle the immediate needs of businesses, such as the development of a portable desalination unit for the oil industry.

That project, done in partnership with a local company and with university researchers, was led by SAIT faculty and produced equipment that solved a particular problem encountered in the field.

"All our research has the same focus - to meet the needs of the business community," Ms. Lewis says.

She sees polytechnics as the "third pillar" of postsecondary education, complementing the work done at universities and traditional colleges.

Mr. Davies agrees. Even though polytechnics offer applied degrees and do research, they are not like universities because the focus of instruction is on career-oriented skills and teaching, he says.

"We occupy a different place than a university," Mr. Davies says. "We don't want to creep there. We are a comprehensive institution and we are not looking to abandon our other work."

Sharon Maloney, executive director of Polytechnics Canada, says people increasingly are looking for ways to move between different levels of qualifications, whether they are university or college students, and to incorporate education with work life.

"The current approach we are taking just isn't serving the interests of our students," she says.

"We have to have a different attitude."

Those looking to fashion a network of polytechnic institutions across Canada, however, have some selling to do in parts of the country.

Rick Miner, president of Toronto's Seneca College, has seen first-hand how controversial the polytechnic model can be to some communities.

Dr. Miner is the co-author of a recent report on the postsecondary system in New Brunswick, which recommended the creation of three polytechnics by combining satellite campuses of the province's two main universities with local community colleges.

But the idea met with stiff resistance in Saint John, the location of one of the proposed new institutions. Students, faculty and residents of the city demanded that the Saint John campus of the University of New Brunswick remain as is.

Some of the concerns centred on the very things that supporters of the polytechnic model identify as its strengths - such as the involvement of business in the direction of the instruction offered, and the practical, career-focused nature of courses. The New Brunswick government has since decided that Saint John will keep its university.

Dr. Miner says the experience in New Brunswick helped to raise the profile of the polytechnic concept even though it drew some vocal opposition.

"I think it helped the cause because it started people saying, 'What is this about?' "

He predicts that the demand for the kind of choices a polytechnic can provide will increase as Canada is confronted with a shortage of skilled workers.

Dr. Miner's school, Seneca College, now offers nine applied degrees in areas such as aviation and financial services, in response to the demands of employers and students for such qualifications.

The aviation program gives commercial pilots a wider perspective on the industry, allowing them to move into management or operations if they do not wish to remain in the cockpit.

Dr. Miner says polytechnics will be key to increasing the percentage of Canadians who go on to postsecondary education because the model is so flexible, allowing students to obtain a certificate, diploma or degree program.

He believes the polytechnic model will eventually gain acceptance - whether under that name or another.

"Canada will value in the long run a third type of education, which is a polytechnic. I think it is inevitable because it makes so much sense."

A new niche: Polytechnics at a glance

What makes a polytechnic is an evolving concept.

Polytechnics Canada, an umbrella group that is promoting the model, defines polytechnics as offering "career-focused applied education that spans trades through to advanced degrees, delivered in an environment where students receive hands-on training that enables them to more readily apply their skills."

Rick Miner, president of Seneca College in Toronto and co-author of a recent report that recommended three new polytechnics for New Brunswick, describes a polytechnic this way:

It is more concerned with application than theory; there will be theory, but the raison d'être will be application.

It offers a variety of credentials: apprenticeships, certificate programs, diploma programs of one and two years, undergraduate degrees and possibly graduate degrees - a whole menu of choice.

Those choices are interrelated, with a laddering of programs. For example, a student could begin with a two-year diploma program, get a job, and then return to study for a degree.

It is student-centred in the way it designs courses and promotes faculty.

There is applied research. There may be a role for pure research, but value is attached to applied research.

There is community focus and involvement; the mission of the school encompasses community needs and desires.

The governance system is designed to be responsive to the needs of the community.

Polytechnics Canada has seven members: British Columbia Institute of Technology; SAIT Polytechnic, Calgary; Conestoga Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning, Kitchener, Ont.; and George Brown College, Humber Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning, Seneca College and Sheridan Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning in Toronto. (The Northern Alberta Institute of Technology recently broke ranks with Polytechnics Canada; a spokeswoman for NAIT said it felt the group did not have a national focus.)

Polytechnics Canada has three main priorities: increased funding for applied research; collaborative initiatives between government, industry and institutions of applied learning to solve skills shortages in the labour force; and creation of a national credentials framework for transferability of credits and academic mobility.

Elizabeth Church