Back to Basics
Excerpt from “Higher Education and Innovation: The Canada-U.S. Story”, a speech by Professor Heather Munroe-Blum, Principal and Vice-Chancellor, McGill University, delivered in Boston, Mass., Sept. 15, 2010.
Vol. 10, No. 7 Early Spring 2011
Publisher Pegasus Publications Inc.
www.pegasuspublications.net
Design Cottonwood Publishing Services
Editor Joan Cohen
joan@pegasuspublications.net
Managing Editor Dorothy Dobbie
ddobbie@pegasuspublications.net
Editorial Intern Jenny Ford
jenny.ford@
pegasuspublications.net
. . . In the new global community, prosperity and well-being will come from three things – education, education and education – on all levels. Primary, secondary and tertiary. As Finland, Singapore and other countries have proven, dramatic gains in educational outcomes can be made, and quickly. Canada and the U.S. must not stagnate or decline while the rest of the world gets smarter. We need a drive to re- emphasize education as a top priority at every level of society. And we need the right type of education, one that effectively prepares our young
people for this new world. What is the right kind of university education? University graduates will flourish in an innovation context only if they are equipped with the capacity to create their own knowledge, to be both innovative and entrepreneurial, to have the communication and social skills needed to build teams and networks of diverse people and the leadership and business skills to manage them. For today’s students to become tomorrow’s innovators and global network build-
ers, they must have what John Kao, the author of Innovation Nation, calls “cultural intelligence”. Students will require multilingualism, world experiences, experience of and comfort with varied cultures and socioeconomic backgrounds. I’d add to these characteristics the key qualities of empathy and authenticity, which begin very early in life. Te combined presence of these will be highly sought-aſter qualities for global leadership. . . Te “back-to-basics” mantra applies to research and scholarship, too. Businesses
have become obsessed with the short term. With the emphasis on quarterly results, it can be hard to justify the risks or longer lead-times of complex research, develop- ment and innovation. Similarly, our research funding agencies, in an effort to show government sponsors
concrete results, are increasingly reluctant to support seemingly risky or “blue-sky” proposals. Critically important is our scholarship exploring technology and knowl- edge domains in the human fields: the social sciences and the humanities. Tese receive insufficient funding in North America. But it’s oſten the very understanding of human considerations and characteristics that lead to the big breakthroughs and solutions for big problems. . . . Te character of the innovation story has changed dramatically [in recent
times]. Gone is the master narrative of the conveyor belt that carries a new idea in linear fashion from basic research to applied research to development to product. Today’s innovation is a global web, in which ideas and people are in perpetual move- ment and flux. It’s fundamentally collaborative, multidisciplinary and nimble. . .
4 SMART careers | Early Spring 2011
Layout Designer Gayl Punzalan
gayl@pegasuspublications.net
Photography for Smart Phones Gayl Punzalan
Advertising & Subscriptions 1-888-680-2008
Subscriptions: $20 per year plus tax
American Express, MasterCard, Visa & cheque accepted
Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to: 130A Cree Crescent Winnipeg, MB R3J 3W1 Phone: (204) 940-2700 or 1-888-680-2008
Canadian Publications mail product Sales Agreement #40027604 ISSN 1492-7624
SMART Careers is published four times annually by Pegasus Publications Inc. It is distributed to universities, colleges, guidance counsellors and employment centres.
Publisher reserves the right to withdraw any introductory-free circulation at any time without notice.
Reproduction in whole or in part is prohibited without permission in writing to the publisher. Unsolicited manuscripts and photographs should be addressed to The Editor, with an enclosed stamped self-addressed envelope for return.
Publisher buys all editorial rights and reserves the right to republish any material published.
Copyright Pegasus Publications Inc.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32