Academic Innovation Working Group

The Office of the Provost has created an Academic Innovation Working Group (AIWG) to explore how we can deliver our academic programs more efficiently, leverage technology to enhance teaching and learning, and create new revenue streams through program development. The Academic Innovation Working Group will lead subgroups that will build on work already underway in the Faculties, helping to facilitate awareness, sharing, ideation, and implementation of good ideas across units. 
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AIWG Leadership Group Members

  • Chair, David DeVidi, Associate Vice-President, Academic 

  • Mary Wells, Dean, Engineering 

  • Alexie Tcheuyap, Dean, Arts 

  • Chris Houser, Dean, Science 

  • Martin Cooke, Assistant VPA, ALP and Strategic Initiatives 

  • Ian VanderBurgh, Special Advisor to the Vice-President, Academic and Provost, Strategic Enrolment Management

Efficient and Effective Delivery of Academic Programs

Each Faculty is working on questions of efficient and effective delivery of academic programming. This subgroup will work to develop common approaches to ensuring the effective and efficient delivery of academic programming, where appropriate. The primary goal is to strike the best balance between quality of education and efficiency in light of the financial realities facing the University.  
With this intention, they will consider various mechanisms for achieving efficiencies, including logistics, more effective use of technology, opportunities created by new AI tools, and changing approaches to teaching delivery and assessment of learning, to develop guiding principles that can inform academic program decision-making. 

Membership for this subgroup is being finalized.

Modernizing Our Academic Program Offerings

À¶Ý®ÊÓƵ is world-renowned for delivering high-quality education, preparing students to become the leaders of tomorrow through academic programs that help them succeed in their chosen fields and empower them to confidently face an unpredictable future. We do this by embracing innovative approaches to teaching and learning, and by cultivating within students entrepreneurial and problem-solving skills that they can apply in real-world scenarios through work-integrated learning. 
To maintain this standard of excellence, this subgroup will take as its starting point that À¶Ý®ÊÓƵ’s academic programs, individually and collectively, should be academically credible, socially useful, and financially viable. Meeting all three of these conditions should be a necessary condition for any new programs, and an expectation for existing programs. As a result, this group will have three primary tasks: 

  1. Develop mechanism and supports for efficient and effective development of promising ideas into program proposals that can be more quickly approved and implemented. 

  1. Develop processes for providing meaningful and easily interpreted information for decision-makers tasked with assessing existing programming in relation to our financial situation, and designing supports for programs that can become viable through redesign. 

  1. Recommend process and support changes that can help foster efficient cooperation and cross-unit co-creation. 

Membership for this subgroup is being finalized. 

Logistics for Alternative Credentials

The AIWG will take under its umbrella an existing working group aimed at providing answers around non-credit credentials. There are many ideas around campus for credentials aimed at non-degree-seeking learners (e.g., mid-career professionals) or that are aimed at degree-seeking students but that are not part of the degree program (e.g., co-curricular learning). What is holding many of these ideas back is the lack of answers to these questions. This group is looking at both existing and proposed alternative credentials, identifying logistical challenges for each type, and developing solutions for these challenges.ÌýÌý

Subgroup members 

  • David DeVidi, Associate Vice-President, Academic (co-lead) 

  • Clarence Woudsma, Interim Co-Associate Vice-President, Graduate Studies and Postdoctoral Affairs (co-lead) 

  • Martin Cooke, Assistant Vice-President, Academic – Leadership and Strategic Initiatives 

  • Catherine Newell Kelly, Registrar 

  • Sanjeev Gill, Associate Vice-President, Innovation and Executive Director, WatSPEED 

  • Angela Christelis, Director, Quality Assurance and Continuous Improvement 

  • Carrie MacKinnon Molson, Institutional Analyst, Policy and Enrolment Planning 

  • Alisa Sivak, AVPA Office (administrative, logistical, and data analysis support)Â