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Governing Ourselves informs members of legal and regulatory matters affecting the profession. This section provides updates on licensing and qualification requirements, notification of Council resolutions and reports from various Council committees, including reports on accreditation and discipline matters.
Great teaching: It’s the high standard to which OCTs aspire, and it’s also the theme of the College’s 2014 Annual Report.
Messages from the Chair, the Registrar and the College’s committees, a full financial report and statistics about teachers in the province offer snapshots of the year in review. The report aims to demonstrate just how qualified Ontario’s teachers are, and to inform the public about who we are, what we do and how we regulate teaching in Ontario.
Because we know that students benefit from great teaching and the excellent preparation of teachers, the College took the lead role in helping to guide and implement Ontario's initial teacher education program.
The program comes into effect in September 2015, and is the result of the College’s collaboration with Ontario’s faculties of education and the Ontario Ministry of Education. Teachers will now benefit from at least 80 days of practical experience, over four semesters. Instruction will include a greater focus on diversity, the mental health and well-being of students, using technology in the classroom and Special Education.
The College also developed an Accreditation Resource Guide to help faculties, accreditation panels and the College provide guidance for the development of accreditation applications and decisions.
To help advance our mandate, and to complement the renewed mission and vision statements, the Council and senior staff members developed a set of four strategic priorities. The College aims to:
Each of these strategic priorities is achievable and measurable, and each one is a key component in helping the College protect the public interest.
Collaboration is an essential part of what we do, and it was a defining characteristic of the College’s work in 2014. Last year, in partnership with the Ontario College of Early Childhood Educators, we hosted a summer institute focused on Exploring Interdisciplinary Collaboration and Ethical Leadership.
In the fall, the College hosted two events. The first was an International Forum of Teacher Regulatory Authorities conference, which gathered representatives from international regulatory bodies to explore current issues in self-regulation of the profession and to discuss challenges in the mutual recognition of teacher qualifications. The second was a conference featuring workshops on professional regulation, acting in the public interest, and effective practices and research in teacher education.
The report’s section is especially popular with members, the education community, politicians and the media. It includes membership demographics, details about the volume and sources of teacher education, statistics about complaints, investigations and discipline, and more.
This year’s Transition to Teaching survey (bit.ly/1TduoT3), which looks at the early careers of new Ontario teachers, offers a reasonably positive forecast. After years of worsening job reports from early-career teachers, unemployment rates for new education grads dropped in 2014.
There are still many underemployed teachers and long queues for full-time work, but a decrease in the number of new teachers in the province last year meant more supply days for first-year teachers. After 2015, when the number of new grads is expected to drop steeply, the report predicts new teachers will have a faster track to long-term occasional and permanent teaching jobs.
The financial section of the report includes an independent auditor’s report, the balance sheet for the year, the statement of operations and members’ equity, a statement of cash flows and accompanying notes.
The College is financed primarily by member fees. At the end of 2014, it had 239,356 members in good standing, an increase of 1,155 over 2013.
For 2014, the College operating budget was set at $39,428,000. The College recorded an excess of revenue of $3,985,000 for 2014, due in part to the successful conclusion of a long-standing dispute with the CRA and a favourable property tax reassessment.
To read the full report, including more financial details, statistics and highlights, visit bit.ly/1KsKbd8.