Advocacy

As the voice of Canada’s research-intensive colleges and institutes of technology, Polytechnics Canada advocates for building a stronger economy through enhanced innovation and productivity. In our classrooms and by helping small and medium-sized enterprises meet a variety of business challenges, our colleges train students to become innovative and highly skilled for the Canadian economy. As graduates, they achieve rewarding careers that benefit industry and the Canadian economy.

Currently, these are our major Polytechnics Canada priorities:

Applied research/Industry innovation

For Polytechnics Canada, applied research focuses on activities with immediate industrial and commercial relevance for industry-identified problems. Our member colleges are leaders in applied research to solve a firm’s specific research, development and commercialization problems. Applied research can be original investigation to acquire new knowledge or, more often, it can be experimental development that draws on existing research knowledge or practical experience to produce innovative products or processes. In addition to prototype development, our colleges and institutes also help with the scale-up of manufacturing processing, along with commercial testing, certification, marketing and business plan development.  The majority of the industry clients we serve with our applied research services are small and medium-sized entrepreneurs, representing firms from all sectors: manufacturing, high technology, services and digital media.  With hands-on participation in solving relevant industry problems, our students become “innovation literate” graduates who are job-ready and able to contribute to innovation gains for Canada. 

Our Number One priority remains redressing the imbalance in government support for research and development at Canada’s post-secondary education institutions.  The current overwhelming emphasis on discovery and university basic research needs to be modified to include the commercially proven applied research conducted mostly at the college level in Canada. Also, by increasing funding and support for industry innovation the government can enable smaller firms to improve their own productivity and competitiveness, while preparing the next generation of job-ready graduates.

In 2010/11 alone, our members engaged over 4,978 students in 560 research projects and developed 307 prototypes.  These research projects are part of the program course requirements and not co-op or internship opportunities outside of the formal learning experience.

Enabling College Applied Research

Pilot a network of Commercialization Chairs in colleges and polytechnics

A Commercialization Chair would be an industry-experienced point-person (not faculty or administrator) located in a college applied research office, acting as an intermediary between the college and local industry. The Chair’s key functions would be to: advise SMEs on how best to meet their commercialization needs; channel SMEs to appropriate solutions in their community and within the college; work with emerging technologies; and apply existing technologies to a new commercial purpose.  Connecting our college expertise with those firms not able to conduct in-house R&D would be the key benefit of this proposal.

Modernize federal funding programs

Polytechnics Canada believes existing federal granting council programs can become more effective and deliver better results by including applied research and college graduates. There are at least a dozen taxpayer-supported NSERC Industrial Partnership programs that now exclude college participants. Opening up these programs to broader participation is a win-win. Industry gains by having a larger talent pool and college students and graduates gain from the practical experience. In the end, the Canadian economy benefits the most.

University/College collaboration

Polytechnics Canada believes that increased commercial success for Canadian firms can be achieved through promoting collaboration among small and medium-sized enterprises, industry partners, universities and colleges. If the commercial potential of university basic research were enhanced through collaboration with college applied research, Canada’s innovation and commercialization outcomes would receive a huge boost. Such a complementary approach would allow Canada’s entire research spectrum, from basic to applied, to be utilized to its fullest. As a result, we promote the need to establish a formal mechanism to facilitate collaboration between universities and colleges for federally funded R&D projects.

Apprenticeships

Polytechnics Canada is working to garner more support for mature apprenticeship students throughout the duration of their work placements and studies. Currently, apprenticeship students are supported by government grants when they initiate and complete their apprentice studies. Apprentices are working toward a career in a skilled trade, not just a job. By supporting these students throughout their entire studies, Canada would be able to boast an excellent future generation of journeymen and journeywomen. If the opportunity costs for mature apprentices could be reduced, the overall completion rate for mature apprentices would increase.

Ongoing Issues

International

Polytechnics Canada’s members teach and train over 16,000 international students and carry the Edu-Canada brand. We believe in the enhanced promotion of college and polytechnic educational opportunities to international students. International students need to be informed about their options when pursuing post-secondary-education in Canada. More needs to be done to make these students aware that Canadian research-intensive colleges provide first-class education and pathways to employment as well as advanced education.

Credit transfer

The philosophy of Polytechnics Canada is "Your student is my student." We believe that credit transfer enhances student mobility, and every one of our members has signed a mobility protocol recognizing that credits earned at one institution are valid at all other member institutions. A pan-Canadian approach to credit transfer is needed to facilitate labour mobility and increase employment.

Newcomers

Providing support to internationally trained professionals is a key function of Polytechnics Canada’s members. In addition to providing skills upgrading, certification, workplace skills, newcomer integration and language training, Polytechnics Canada believes that internationally educated researchers should be brought into the college and polytechnic system to conduct applied research in their sectors of expertise. This will help them integrate into Canada’s innovation sector while providing valuable mentorship to our students.

Entrepreneurship Training

Polytechnic graduates equipped with innovation and entrepreneurship skills, as well as their highly specialized technical training, are in high demand. In addition to providing in-class training to entrepreneurial students, Polytechnics Canada believes that retiring serial entrepreneurs can be brought into the polytechnic system to mentor our students and local start-ups, thereby transferring valuable know-how to the next generation of entrepreneurs.

Digital Skills

Polytechnics Canada members teach digital skills in both STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) and non-STEM disciplines. Our graduates have a high degree of digital literacy, leading them to integrate successfully into the many existing and emerging sectors that have a high demand for digitally literate workers. Polytechnics Canada believes that the federal government should recognize and include graduates of Canadian colleges and polytechnics when promoting the need for a more digital-literate workforce.

Skills matching

Polytechnics Canada members provide students a job-ready education.  This means that our educational programming must match the skills demanded by industry.  This skills-matching is critical not only to the success of our students but also to our graduates’ ability to be immediately productive in the workplace.  Polytechnics Canada strives to develop areas of convergence between industry’s demand for talent and our members’ supply of job-ready graduates.