The participation of academic staff in the governance of universities and colleges has long been seen as a key component of academic freedom. Today, however, collegial governance, and by extension academic freedom, is facing a critical challenge from new managerial practices and an increasing concentration of power in the administration.

Students graduating from UK universities and entering a hostile global economic climate with tens of thousands of pounds of debt are right to fear for their futures. What they probably don’t realise is that most of the highly qualified experts who teach them face the same insecurity year in, year out.

In the award-winning 1962 play, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, violence and marital discord unfold against a deeply dystopian vision of academic life: one where a university president enjoys unilateral license to prevent publication of a novel he deems inappropriate, or to block the promotion of a faculty member he dislikes.

The Carleton University Academic Staff. Association knows it takes vigilance to defend academic freedom and collegial governance. The growing secrecy around board meetings prompted academic staff, students, and other campus groups to come together to voice concern.

It turns out that the highest earners in Ontario’s academic sector are the managers of the University of Toronto Asset Management Corporation (UTAM). President and CEO William Moriarty ranked third among the province’s top earners in 2015, pocketing a salary of $1.47 million.

On the final scheduled day of medi­ation prior to a looming strike deadline, the University of Ontario Institute of Technology Faculty Association and their employer reached a tentative agreement.

The 2016 federal budget provided a long overdue boost to Canada’s knowledge infrastructure.

Austerity is increasingly the watch-word at post-secondary institutions across the country. But the facts question many of the cries of poverty. Last year, almost 75 per cent of Canadian universities and colleges posted a budget surplus.

An inquiry into Laurentian University has concluded that senior officials have routinely violated aca­demic freedom and principles of collegial governance.