December 2023

Happy Holidays from CAUBO!

The entire CAUBO team extends its best wishes to you, our members, for a peaceful and joyous holiday season and a very happy new year!
We look forward to connecting with you again in 2024.

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CAUBO 2023–2028 Strategic Plan

In September, we launched CAUBO’s 2023–2028 Strategic Plan. Our ultimate goal for the next five years is to continue to strengthen the capacity of leaders in the sector by connecting them with peers and information, enabling them to pursue opportunities and create solutions for shared issues. The intent is to innovate and build on our prior achievements while improving our responsiveness in helping members navigate increasingly complex challenges and opportunities.

We remain committed to an issue-based, member-driven approach to all that we do, which means that you, our members, will continue to be an essential part of CAUBO’s work. By sharing data, feedback, successes, and lessons learned with us and your peers, you contribute to the production of highly tailored reports and events and help us stay agile, so we may direct our resources where they are most needed.

We look forward to continuing to connect with all of you as we move CAUBO forward into the future once more, with the strength of this plan as our foundation.

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New Analytical Reports and Resources for Members

We are pleased to share several new resources with our members, some of which are the result of months of work by our team and volunteers.

Measuring Emissions from University Investment Holdings

In 2022, CAUBO issued the Common Measurement Approach and Tool for Scope 3 GHG Emissions report. The Scope 3 report outlined a recommended approach that could be adopted by post-secondary institutions to support consistent and transparent measurement of Scope 3 emissions across the sector. Emissions related to investment holdings are included in the 15 Scope 3 categories and can account for a material proportion of an institution’s Scope 3 emissions. However, the measurement and reporting of these emissions was not addressed in the Scope 3 guidance report, as it required specialized expertise.

We are pleased to announce that a report that provides an overview of how post-secondary institutions can measure the GHG emissions of their investment portfolios is now available for institutional members. The report outlines current best practices for carbon measurement of investment holdings, as well as the limitations that exist.

Data Insights Series Updates

CAUBO’s Data Insights series highlights key financial trends in the university sector. The insights provide concise, fact-based analysis of some of the sector’s most pressing risks and challenges. The first two entries in the series address changing patterns in spendable income and general operating expenditures. The third entry in the Data Insights series, highlights key considerations in order to properly assess university finances and provides context for the impact of the pandemic on university financial data.

All three entries have now been updated to reflect the most recent available data (2021–2022). The updated entries in the series are available for institutional members here.

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Upcoming Professional Development Opportunities

CAUBO offers topical webinars on trends and issues affecting higher education administrators. Many of these webinars, as well as some annual conference presentations, are available to institutional members on-demand. Catch up on what you missed by visiting the CAUBO website under Learning and Events.

New On-Demand Webinars 

Recent additions to our webinar library include: 

• Canadian University Leadership on Sustainability and the Race to Net Zero with Mark Carney 

• Data Governance webinar series:
  • Introduction to Data Governance and its Primary Drivers
  • Data Governance Capabilities
  • Operating Model, Roles, and Responsibilities in Data Governance

• Improving Our Resilience in Times of Crisis (Part 1)—Governance and Planning Insights: Crisis Management Governance Structures

Upcoming Online Courses 

University Culture and Governance (UCG) Online Course
Watch for registration and agenda details sent to your email and posted on the CAUBO website!

Fundamentals of the Research Enterprise (FORE) Online Course
Click here to add your name to the online course waiting list now. Please be sure to include your full name, title, institution, and contact information. You will receive an email offering you priority registration for the next offering of your preferred course(s).

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CAUBO 2024 – SAVE THE DATES!

CAUBO is hard at work creating the programming for our Annual Conference, taking place in stylish and cosmopolitan Montreal from June 3–5, 2024! Mark these dates in your calendar now and look forward to connecting face to face with friends and colleagues from across Canada at CAUBO 2024! Get ready for three days of enriching sessions and plenty of networking opportunities with higher education administration experts and industry partners.

The CAUBO 2024 website is now live with information about the conference location, accommodations, and transportation options. You can book your room now at the host hotel, Hotel Bonaventure Montreal.

The full conference program and registration will go live on the website in February 2024, so check back for more information about sessions, speakers, social events, and to register.

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Search the CAUBO Hotel Program preferred rates

As a CAUBO institutional member, you have access to preferential pricing for travel and accommodations. For more information, please visit the Member Discounts section on the CAUBO website. The CAUBO Hotel Program has been updated and the 2024–2025 rates are now available for members here.

June 2023

CAUBO National Office staff and Board members wish all of our members a healthy, happy, and restorative summer!

New Analytical Reports and Resources for Members

We are pleased to share several new resources with our members, some of which are the result of months of work by our team and volunteers.

Leading Practices for Higher Education Recruitment: Report on Consultations

Attracting and recruiting talent is a priority that poses many challenges for the higher education sector. CAUBO member universities across Canada are experiencing recruiting challenges, particularly at the management and executive levels. To support members as they navigate the challenges associated with recruitment, consultation discussions were held in 2023 with four search firms that frequently recruit in the higher education sector to gain insight into the challenges, barriers, best practices, and key opportunities for improvement in the sector. A report summarizing the learnings from these consultations is available for institutional members here.

Provincial Landscapes for Ontario and Nova Scotia

CAUBO has developed a series of financial landscapes focusing on critical areas within Canadian universities. Financial trends in higher education have been explored at the national, provincial, and institutional level. The provincial landscapes provide insight into the significant differences in university funding models between provinces, as identified and explored through CAUBO’s data-rich analytical tools and resources, and support a data-driven approach to assessing institutional finances. A new landscape providing an overview of the unique financial situation of universities in Nova Scotia has been added to the series, and the Ontario landscape has been updated and expanded upon with new insights into key financial trends. Both are now available for members.

Data Insights Series (updates)

CAUBO’s Data Insights series highlights key financial trends in the university sector. The insights provide concise, fact-based analysis of some of the sector’s most pressing risks and challenges. The first two entries in the series, initially released in 2021, address the changing patterns in spendable income and general operating expenditures. They have now been updated to reflect the most recent available data (2020–2021). The updated entries in the series are available for institutional members here.

The third entry in the Data Insights series, Implications of the pandemic on universities’ financial situation, was released in fall 2022 and provides context for the 2020–2021 university financial data, while positioning year-over-year shifts within the trends observed in the last decade and acknowledging the uncertainty that university decision-makers faced at the onset of the pandemic.

Data Governance Framework for Canadian Universities

CAUBO has developed a Data Governance Framework to support members as they build their institutional data governance practices. The framework is based on existing models or standards from other sectors—adapted to higher education—and considers the different institutional structures and invested parties, such as IT, institutional planning, and chief data officers.

The framework connects members with best practices in data stewardship and governance specific to higher education institutions and, more importantly, enables them to build a tailored data governance framework for their unique institutional needs. The Data Governance Framework is available here for institutional members.

Hybrid Survey Results

In early 2023, CAUBO released a survey to provide an update on members’ plans and practices regarding hybrid work arrangements, as a follow-up to a toolkit of resources developed in 2022 to support members as they developed plans and policies for their post-pandemic workplace.

As restrictions imposed due to the pandemic have ended, member institutions continue to explore new approaches to work models, including whether flexible work arrangements can be adopted, to what extent, and how they can be achieved in a strategic manner. A report summarizing the results of the latest survey, available here for institutional members, will help members situate their institutions with those of peers across the country.

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New On-Demand Webinars

Institutional members can explore CAUBO’s extensive archive of on-demand webinars on our website. Recent additions to our webinar library include:

Trends in Group Employee Benefits
University Governance in Canada: Navigating Complexity
Sustainability: Ideas-Action-Success Through Procurement
Tri-agency Financial Monitoring Framework: Pilot Update
Transformative Flexible Workplace Journeys: Where Are We Today?

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CAUBO 2023: Annual Conference Wrap-Up

The 2023 CAUBO Annual Conference took place in Toronto from May 8–10. More than 620 attendees were thrilled to finally meet and reconnect in person after two years of virtual events. Futurist Ken Steele kicked off the event with a look at how we can thrive in turbulent times; innovation strategist Shawn Kanungo offered a deep dive into Web3 and the Metaverse; and author and entrepreneur Ron Tite closed the conference with a positive and motivational look at how to prioritize personal and organizational growth to support not only recovery, but reinvention.

Members who attended the conference and those who purchased an on-demand conference pass can view all recorded conference sessions until August 31, 2023, by opening the CAUBO|ACPAU app on your mobile device and using the same credentials that were used to log into the conference app on-site. If an on-demand session does not appear on the PheedLoop app, this means that the recording is not available.

We’re thankful to everyone who joined us in Toronto and made our return to in-person conferencing such a success! We look forward to seeing many of you at CAUBO 2024 in Montreal from June 3–5, 2024.

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2023 Q&P and Recognition Award Winners Announced

At the 2023 annual conference in Toronto, we honoured some of our amazing volunteers with the Recognition Awards and celebrated the innovative ideas and best practices demonstrated by the 2023 Quality and Productivity Award winners. You can learn more about this year’s winners by watching the videos created to celebrate the Q&P and Recognition Award winners.

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CAUBO 2024 Call for Proposals—Opening Soon!

Share your expertise and experience with your peers and colleagues at CAUBO 2024, taking place from June 3-5, 2024 in Montreal, by submitting a content proposal to be considered for the conference program. The Call for Proposals opens on August 16 and closes on October 18, so keep an eye out for the launch message and visit www.caubo.ca for details and to access the submission form.

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2022/2023 CAUBO Highlights Infographic

Once again this year, CAUBO presents its annual Highlights in the form of an interactive infographic, making it easy to see and explore all the resources, information, and networking opportunities that we made available to members in 2022-2023. Check out the highlights of our past year here: https://www.caubo.ca/latest-news/caubo-2022-2023-highlights/

December 2022

New Analytical Reports and Resources for Members

We are pleased to share several new resources with our members, some of which are the result of months of work by our team and volunteers.

Post-Pandemic (Hybrid) Work Arrangements

The pandemic dramatically changed how Canadians work, and the post-secondary sector is no exception, as it quickly adapted to remote work arrangements to keep its workforce healthy, safe, and productive. Now, beyond the immediate crisis of the early pandemic, member institutions are exploring new approaches to work models, including whether flexible work arrangements can be adopted, to what extent, and how they can be achieved in a strategic manner. CAUBO has developed a toolkit of resources to support members as they develop plans and policies for their post-pandemic workplace. The toolkit includes:

• Hybrid Work Arrangements: Payroll and Employment Taxation Guidance, prepared by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).
• A report highlighting the results of the December 2021 Hybrid Work Arrangements Survey, which collected information on members’ plans and considerations regarding remote or hybrid work arrangements for staff.
• A report providing additional insight on member plans and practices, collected through follow-up interviews with survey respondents.
• A sample of institutional tools and resources developed by members (such as applicable principles, policies/frameworks, guidelines, assessment tools, request forms, remote work agreements and conversation or implementation guides).

Stay tuned: CAUBO will issue a member survey in early 2023 to provide an update on members’ plans and practices regarding hybrid work arrangements.

Responsible Investing

Many universities have climate action plans and net-zero targets that include responsible investing and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) considerations. For those that do not, or are seeking to adjust their plans or targets, comparisons with other institutions and the sector as a whole may be helpful.

In 2022, CAUBO issued its third responsible investing survey. The 2022 survey was slightly revised from the 2020 version to reflect the constantly evolving nature of the topic and capture the progressive nature of universities in addressing responsible investing. The survey results provide information on current member practices, approaches, and perspectives related to responsible investing, ESG, divestment, and shareholder engagement.

A summary report of the 2022 CAUBO Responsible Investing survey results is available for institutional members.

Implications of the Pandemic on Universities’ Financial Situation

Canadian universities have navigated an era of unprecedented change in the past few decades. The COVID-19 pandemic added a layer of uncertainty to an already tumultuous situation and posed unique challenges to the financial sustainability of universities. The financial data reported by Canadian universities, as part of the Financial Information of Universities and Colleges survey, provides valuable insight into the impact the pandemic had on university finances in 2020-21.

Following the official release of the 2020-21 FIUC data in August 2022, media headlines stated that universities had generated record-high surpluses during the pandemic, but this headline did not accurately paint the true financial context. Assessing universities’ financial situation is not a simple exercise. Caution must particularly be exercised when assessing the level of surpluses and deficits incurred by institutions.

CAUBO has developed the Data Insights series to highlight key financial trends in the university sector. The series aims to provide a concise, fact-based analysis of some of the sector’s most pressing risks and challenges. The most recent addition to the Data Insights series explores the implications of the pandemic on universities’ financial situation and summarizes the notable differences in the growth rates and trends for spendable and restricted funds. The analysis also acknowledges the uncertainty that university decision-makers faced at the onset of the pandemic. The analysis is available on the CAUBO website for members.

As well, CAUBO’s Financial Dashboard, available here, has been updated with the latest FIUC data release (2020–2021) and allows members to quickly see trends in university income and expenses at the national, provincial, and institution level.

The 2022 Financial Landscape of Canadian Universities

CAUBO has developed a series of financial landscapes that focus on critical areas within Canadian universities. Financial trends in higher education have been explored at the national, provincial, and institutional level. An update for the national landscape was recently released for members.

The 2022 Financial Landscape provides an overview of the implications of the pandemic on university finances in Canada. The landscape includes trends observed over the last decade while highlighting any significant year-over-year financial shifts that occurred due to the impact of the pandemic, which has been considerable and will no doubt continue to influence revenue and expense trends in the coming years.

Financial Health Indicators

Since 2018, CAUBO has been compiling a series of four sector-wide indicators of financial condition, based on publicly available information contained in universities’ financial statements. The Financial Indicators Dashboard has been updated and now includes a nine-year period (2011–12 through 2019–20). A comprehensive Management Discussion and Analysis (MD&A) is also available to explain the indicators, their value, and limitations. Both the Indicators Dashboard and the MD&A report are now accessible to university members working in senior finance roles as well as Vice-Presidents.

Stay tuned: Work is underway to compile the 2021 and 2022 indicators.

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Member Car Rental Discount Program Expanded

CAUBO negotiates a limited number of national contracts for products and services to secure volume pricing as a benefit to members. As an institutional CAUBO member, you have access to exclusive savings programs and value-added services. To respond to CAUBO members’ varied travel needs and habits, the Car Rental program has been expanded to include multiple providers. Eligible members now have the option to secure discounted rates at several car rental companies, allowing them to determine which company can best meet their car rental needs and budget. The discounted rates extended to CAUBO members will vary depending on a number of factors, including the city, pick-up location (airport/downtown), date, duration, vehicle type, etc. The car rental agreements are in effect until 2024.

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Upcoming Professional Development Opportunities

Webinar: Transformative Flexible Workplace Journeys: Where Are We Today?

Tuesday, January 31, 2023
1:00-2:30 PM (ET)

Presenters:

• Carey Barker, Executive Director, Talent Acquisition and Strategy and Governance, Human Resources, Toronto Metropolitan University
• Michelle Benoit, Vice President, Finance and Administration, Saint Mary’s University
• Janelle McNulty Director, Quality Initiatives and Transformation, Saint Mary’s University
• Laurie Stewart, Executive Program Director, Future of Work, Toronto Metropolitan University

Workshop: Post-Pandemic Workshop: Lessons Learned from a Risk Perspective

Thursday, March 23, 2023
8:30 AM–5:00 PM
Toronto, ON

Watch for registration and agenda details coming in February to the CAUBO website!

Upcoming Webinar Topics

Watch the CAUBO website for dates and details coming soon!

• Tri-Agency guideline update
• Social procurement
• University governance

Upcoming Online Courses

University Culture and Governance, March–June 2023 (schedule TBC)
Fundamentals of the Research Enterprise, September–December 2023 (schedule TBC)

Click here to add your name to the online course waiting list now. Please be sure to include your full name, title, institution, and contact information. You will receive an email offering you priority registration for the next offering of your preferred course(s).

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CAUBO 2023 – Save the dates for these high-calibre speakers and sessions!

CAUBO is hard at work creating the programming for our Annual Conference in Toronto from May 8-10, 2023. That’s about five weeks earlier than usual, so be sure to mark the dates in your calendar!

We’ve already confirmed two incredible plenary speakers for the conference: innovation and disruption strategist Shawn Kanungo and purpose-driven leadership and marketing expert Ron Tite. As well, 30 wide-ranging concurrent sessions will focus on timely and relevant topics like recruitment and retention, evolving work models, digital transformation, and equity, diversity, inclusion, and decolonization.

Registration for the 2023 conference will open in early February, but you can find the conference schedule, hotel and travel information right now on the conference website. Book your rooms now so you’re ready to join us for our first in-person conference in four years!

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Happy Holidays from CAUBO!

The entire CAUBO team extends its best wishes to you, our members, for a peaceful and joyous holiday season and a very happy new year! We look forward to connecting with you again in 2023.

June 2022

CAUBO National Office staff and Board members wish all of our members a healthy, happy, and restorative summer!

New Analytical Reports and Resources for Members

We are pleased to share several new resources with our members, some of which are the result of months of work by our team and volunteers.

Emerging Post-Pandemic Work Arrangements in Canadian Universities

This report was prepared for CAUBO by Christina Sass-Kortsak, higher education consultant and former Assistant Vice-President, Human Resources at Toronto Metropolitan University (formerly known as Ryerson University). It summarizes the themes and learnings drawn from a December 2021 survey of member universities and follow-up interviews conducted in the winter of 2022 with 12 universities that are well underway in adopting and implementing post-pandemic hybrid and remote work arrangements.

Several key drivers for this strategic change were revealed by the research, including:

Employee attraction and retention: Some universities conducted surveys that confirmed a majority of staff were interested in some degree of remote work post-pandemic. Many universities cited the growing importance of remote work options as a competitive advantage in attracting skilled employees – especially those located in more remote areas or locations with a high cost of living.

Space optimization: Universities see opportunities to reduce leased space, repurpose existing space for student-centered purposes, decommission poor/unsuitable space, reduce overcrowding, reduce the need for future growth in space, and optimize how space is configured and used.

Student experience: Some universities expect that a broader strategy of work flexibility will have a positive impact on the student experience, noting that during the pandemic some students appreciated the increased flexibility in services, for example the ability to receive counselling services remotely. At the same time, universities are aware of the importance of on-campus activities and continue to assess appropriate models of service delivery.

Service delivery and operational effectiveness: Some universities noted that certain roles may function more productively away from office distractions, or anticipated efficiencies in saved travel time between meetings, even for those working on campus.

Diversity and inclusion: Flexible work arrangements may attract a greater diversity of candidates and increase diverse participation in the workforce by making work more accessible. At the same time, factors such as personal living space or family circumstances may result in inequitable application of hybrid work programs.

Sustainability: Several universities cited opportunities to reduce carbon emissions through lower levels of commuting and potential reduction in use of campus facilities.

The full report is available to all institutional members in the CAUBO Knowledge Centre.

Roadmap to Net Zero

Based on a survey of CAUBO’s membership, the majority of institutions had or were in the progress of developing a climate action plan. To support members, CAUBO initiated the Climate Change project, comprised of four components. The Roadmap to Net Zero represents the third of those deliverables. The Education Materials and State of Affairs were released previously (and are also available in the Knowledge Centre), and the Common Measurement Tool and Approach will follow.

The Roadmap outlines the considerations institutions need to make as they carve out their individual path to net zero and provides guidance on when in their journey to make these considerations. The guidance follows three key phases:

• Conservation and efficiency: focuses on gathering detailed information on campus emissions and implementing the simplest, no-to-low-cost measures.
• Decarbonization: focuses on implementing the large, capital-intensive measures that will account for the majority of emissions reductions.
• Continuous improvement, renewable energy, and offsets: focuses on implementing the final phases of decarbonization, ensuring net-zero new construction, installing final phases of renewable energy systems and the procurement of green power products and carbon offsets.

Each phase outlines measures applicable to that phase of the Roadmap, along with the level of impact and implementation strategy. This will allow individual institutions to carve out their unique Roadmap to Net Zero, customized and informed by institution-specific characteristics.

New Provincial Financial Landscapes

Canadian universities continue to navigate an era of unprecedented change. They are experiencing significant shifts in their funding models, due to declining government grants and increasing reliance on tuition and alternative revenue sources. Concurrently, expenditure patterns have been altered due to changing societal expectations of the role of universities and the services that they should provide.

As a result, benchmarking has become an increasingly important tool to identify areas of strength and opportunities for improved efficiencies. CAUBO has developed a series of financial landscapes, focusing on critical areas within Canadian universities. Provincial landscapes for British Columbia, Ontario, and Quebec have recently been developed and are now available in the Knowledge Centre. Other provinces will be added in the future.

FTE-Based Dashboards

CAUBO, through a continued partnership with the Université du Quebec, has developed a new series of financial dashboards that place a wealth of information at members’ fingertips. The dashboards include financial information from the FIUC and allow members to more accurately benchmark with their peers across the country, as the dashboard incorporates student and faculty full-time equivalent (FTE) data, as reported through Statistics Canada’s University and Colleges Academic Staff System (UCASS) and Post-Secondary Student Information System (PSIS) surveys. The dashboards also allow users to customize their analysis through a number of filters in order to view institutions of the same size, with a similar mission or research intensity, or within their province.

New On-Demand Webinars

Institutional members can explore CAUBO’s extensive archive of on-demand webinars on our website. Recent additions to our webinar library include:

Cybersecurity—Fighting the Good Fight (four-part series)

• Webinar 1: Fighting the Good Fight Using a Risk Based Approach
• Webinar 2: Fighting the Good Fight Using Data Informed Strategies
• Webinar 3: Navigating the Unique Challenges of Higher Education
• Webinar 4: Cyber-Insurance: Do We Need It?/Can We Get It?

Moving to the Cloud (five-part webinar series)

• Webinar 1: Why Move to the Cloud?
• Webinar 2: Assessing the Risks?
• Webinar 3: Contract Negotiations and Management
• Webinar 4: Understanding the Financials
• Webinar 5: Change Management

CAUBO 2022: Annual Conference Wrap-Up

The CAUBO 2022 annual conference was held virtually from June 13–15, with more than 450 participants joining in the fun over the three conference days, taking part in engaging sessions and connecting with one another and with conference speakers via video and text chat.

We celebrated the year’s most innovative best practices with the 2022 Quality and Productivity Awards, honoured some of our wonderful volunteers at this year’s Member Recognition Awards, and heard from many top-notch and inspiring speakers, including business and tech visionary Leonard Brody on bouncing back from the upheaval of the pandemic, ground-breaking higher education leaders Indira Samarasekera and Martha C. Piper’s lessons in leadership, and workplace expert and author Jennifer Moss, who spoke about how to prevent burnout and increase happiness at work.

Some of the most popular concurrent sessions included Transformative Flexible Workplace Journeys: From Design to Implementation, Digital Disruption: Adapting to Challenges and Innovations in the Finance Function and Risk in the University Landscape: A Survey of Canadian Universities.

Conference attendees can watch all the sessions on-demand on the PheedLoop virtual event platform until August 15. The sessions will be posted to the CAUBO Knowledge Centre in October for all institutional members to access there, so if you missed the conference, you can catch up then.

Huge thanks to everyone who participated in CAUBO 2022 and to our many volunteer speakers and CCT members who helped make it such a great success! We look forward to seeing all of you in person at CAUBO 2023 in Toronto. Please note that next year’s conference will be held a few weeks earlier than usual, from May 8 to 10, so mark your calendars now!

CAUBO 2023 Call for Proposals—Opening Soon!

Share your expertise and experience with your peers and colleagues at CAUBO 2023, taking place from May 8-10, 2023 in Toronto, by submitting a content proposal to be considered for the conference program. The Call for Proposals opens on August 16 and closes on October 6, so keep an eye out for the launch message and visit www.caubo.ca for details and to access the submission form.

CAUBO Launching New Strategic Planning Exercise

CAUBO’s most recent strategic plan was intended to last from 2015 to 2020, but in 2019 we made the decision to extend that plan to 2022, to allow our Association some time to stabilize after the substantial changes that plan had brought about. But now it’s time for CAUBO to undertake a new strategic planning process. We want to ensure that the work we do on members’ behalf remains purposeful, makes a difference, meets your needs, and supports you in your efforts to attain your professional and institutional goals.

The new strategic planning exercise will take place over the coming year, and will include extensive consultation with members, so we can ensure that we truly understand what you need and want from CAUBO, today and in the future. Over the next several months, we hope each of you will give us a piece of your mind, so to speak! Watch out for invitations to member consultations and surveys that will allow us to collect and analyze your feedback about what you need and want from us.

2021/2022 CAUBO Highlights Infographic

Once again this year, CAUBO presents its annual Highlights in the form of an interactive infographic, making it easy to see and explore all the resources, information, and networking opportunities that we made available to members in 2021-2022. Check out the highlights of our past year here: https://www.caubo.ca/latest-news/caubo-2021-2022-highlights/

December 2021

Happy Holidays from CAUBO!

From our team to yours, we would like to extend our warmest thoughts and best wishes for a wonderful holiday and a Happy New Year. We hope you have a happy, safe, and relaxing holiday season!

New Analytical Reports and Resources for Members

As the year comes to a close, we are pleased to share many new resources with our members, some of which are the result of months of work by our team.

FTE-Based Dashboards and Supplement Primer

CAUBO, through a continued partnership with the Université du Quebec, has developed a new series of financial dashboards that place a wealth of information at members’ fingertips. Many facets of university finances that were not previously accessible in a consistent and comparable manner can now be explored.

These dashboards provide users with access to information such as faculty composition by field of study and by rank, student population by field of study, cycle, and status, as reported through Statistics Canada’s University and Colleges Academic Staff System (UCASS) and Post-Secondary Student Information System (PSIS) surveys.

A primer document  has also been developed  to provide guidance on how to determine appropriate comparators when using the dashboards, and to outline limitations inherent to the data, which need to be understood by users.

The FTE-based dashboards and primer are now available on the CAUBO website. A recorded webinar showcasing the information that can be garnered via the dashboards is available in the Knowledge Centre.

The dashboards will be fine-tuned over time, and updated data will be added as it becomes available. We welcome member feedback regarding additional data to include in future iterations or other suggested improvements.

Financial Landscapes—Request your institution-specific financial landscape

CAUBO has developed a series of financial landscape analyses focusing on critical areas within Canadian universities. Building on the national and provincial landscape analyses that are currently available to members, CAUBO has launched a new service for members that  supports a data-driven approach to assessing institutional finances. For a nominal fee, members can receive an institution-specific financial landscape that provides analysis on their institution’s unique financial trends and situation.

Canadian universities continue to navigate an era of unprecedented change. They are experiencing significant shifts in their funding models due to declining government grants and increasing reliance on tuition and alternative revenue sources. Concurrently, expenditure patterns have been altered due to changing societal expectations of the role of universities and the services that they should provide.

As a result, benchmarking has become an increasingly important tool to identify such trends, as well as areas of strength and opportunities for improved efficiencies.

Is your institution interested in answering any of the following?

• How does the funding landscape at your institution compare to national or provincial trends or to those seen at peer institutions?
• Is the performance and asset allocation of your institution’s investment pool comparable to peer institutions?
• Does your institution’s rate of operating spending vary from provincial trends or that of peer institutions? Are there underlying trends within certain expense types, such as academic salaries and benefit?
• Is your institution’s deferred maintenance liability in line with the average level of deferred maintenance in your region or among peer institutions, or does it have a relatively higher proportion of DM that needs to be addressed in the pending years?
• Overall, is your institution showing any signs of weakness compared to peers regarding its financial health, based on key metrics like the Primary Reserve Ratio and Interest Burden Ratio?

If so, request an institutional landscape tailored to your institution by completing the form available here.

CAUBO Employee Benefits Initiative

CAUBO, through the National Benefits Steering Committee, has been looking at ways to help member institutions manage rising benefit costs and risks by forming a consortium of members working with common providers.

This past spring, CAUBO sought preliminary expressions of interest in joining the consortium from members. More than half of CAUBO members responded positively, demonstrating strong interest in the consortium.

In October, institutions that expressed interest received a customized institutional analysis from GSC and/or Manulife regarding the benefits and services available to their institution and, most importantly, outlining the potential savings the institution could achieve by joining the consortium.

CAUBO recently issued a survey to gain insight into the status of members’ review and assessment of the proposals. More details regarding the terms of the consortium agreements and the consortium governance are close to being finalized and will be shared shortly.

Institutions will be asked to formally commit to joining the consortium by March 2022, with a start date between June 1 and August 1, 2022. Institutions will have the opportunity to express their interest and join one of the consortium programs in the spring of each year, pending receipt by the provider of institutional data in January.

If the expressions of interest result in a large enough number of insured lives to realize the targeted cost savings and risk mitigation, then the consortium will be formally launched, bringing to fruition an exciting and innovative initiative in the area of HE employee benefits. For questions or feedback regarding this initiative, please contact Elizabeth Taylor (etaylor@caubo.ca).

New Tax Resources

Two new technical Tax Notes covering Cross-Border Remote Work and GST-HST-QST Regarding Online Courses have been added to the tax note series and are now available for members here.

More Projects Underway

Climate Change

CAUBO has initiated a Climate Change Mitigation Strategies project to support members’ efforts to mitigate and adapt to the impacts of climate change.

The project includes the four following components:

1. Educational material that raises awareness of the risks and impacts of climate change, the implications of the Paris Agreement at the national and relevant provincial levels, and emission reduction strategies and impacts on operations pertaining to Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions.
2. A “State of Affairs” report that sets out the current landscape regarding member policies, practices, areas of focus, and planned priority areas related to climate change adaptation and mitigation.
3. A “Net-zero Roadmap” that provides advice and information to guide institutions as they take actions to become net zero and resilient.
4. A recommendation of a common carbon-measurement tool and approach that can be adopted by post-secondary institutions to support consistent measurement across the sector to enable benchmarking and priority-setting, especially regarding measurement of Scope 3 emissions.

Stay tuned for the release of these resources in early 2022.

Post-Pandemic Work Policies

While a growing number of institutions have begun or are planning to welcome employees and students back onto campuses and university sites, questions remain regarding whether the pandemic has had permanent impacts on the workplace and work practices of higher education administrators.

CAUBO has undertaken a project to support members as they develop plans and policies for their post-pandemic workplace.

This project will be undertaken in phases, starting with an overview of the extent to which universities are adopting or considering implementing remote work arrangements for staff, what key considerations are guiding their actions, and which tools, templates, and guidance could help them do so effectively.

It is expected that the scope of the project will expand over time to include flexible work arrangements with adaptation strategies that must be applied to ensure the successful implementation of such programs.

CAUBO has also released a survey, to collect information on members’ plans regarding remote or hybrid work arrangements for staff.

Upcoming Professional Development Opportunities

Thursday, January 20, 2022, 1:00–2:30 PM (ET)
Live Webinar: CAUBO/CUCCIO Cybersecurity Series (#2) – Fighting the Good Fight Using Data Informed Strategies
Stay tuned for more information on the CAUBO website. 

Thursday, February 24, 2022, 1:00–2:00 PM (ET)
Live Webinar: Are You Ready for the CARM Customs Changes?
Stay tuned for more information on the CAUBO website. 

On-Demand Webinars
Institutional members can also explore CAUBO’s extensive archive of on-demand webinars on our website!

CAUBO 2022 Update

The CAUBO Board met on November 19 and discussed the state of the pandemic, its impact on in-person events in general and the CAUBO 2022 conference format in particular, and members’ ability to travel in 2022.

After assessing the key considerations, we will be moving forward with a hybrid event with the in-person component held in Edmonton from June 12–14, 2022. The conference will follow our typical schedule, with functional (pre-conference) seminars on Sunday followed by full days of plenary and concurrent sessions on Monday and Tuesday.

Furthermore, in order to accommodate members who cannot travel to Edmonton or who may not be comfortable with in-person conferences, we will offer a virtual ticket so that they can take in the rich conference content from the comfort of their office or home.

For those attending in person, the health and safety of our members, sponsors, and vendors is paramount to CAUBO. For this reason, and based on member feedback, we will be implementing some changes to the CAUBO 2022 format and considering several new protocols to be implemented on-site.

FORMAT CHANGES

• Based on member feedback that indicated varying degrees of comfort levels in attending social events at CAUBO 2022, we will be holding one social event: a Welcome Reception, to be held outdoors (weather permitting).
• Members will have the option of selecting a conference registration package that includes or excludes a ticket to the Welcome Reception.
• We will not be holding a Farewell Event.
• We will not be holding an Optional Event (usually held on the Saturday preceding the conference).
• We will not be offering a companion’s ticket given limited capacity in the meeting rooms once social distancing measures are implemented.

NEW PROTOCOLS

• Mandatory vaccinations for all attendees, exhibitors, and suppliers (vaccine passports to be presented at registration)
• Wearing masks when walking around the event but not required once seated at a session or meal
• Limiting the number of delegates per meeting room (1-meter distance between seats)
• Hand sanitizer stations
• Touchless event registration check-in
• Mandating venue staff to wear masks
• More space between trade show booths
• No handouts or swag to be handed out by vendors
• Buffet meals with servers handling the food
• Pre-packaged snacks where available 

We will continue to monitor how the situation is evolving in the months leading up to the conference, and if it is unsafe to hold an in-person conference, or if legislation changes making it impossible, we will pivot to a fully virtual format.

Member Feedback Survey – Launching January 2022

In order to guide our planning, we would like to hear from you (again).  We conducted a survey in August 2021; however, we hope to gain more insight in early 2022 as to your desire and ability to participate in CAUBO 2022 and in what format. Stay tuned for the next CAUBO 2022 Member Survey coming in early January 2022. 

We look forward to delivering this new hybrid model in collaboration with our CAUBO 2022 hosts:

• University of Alberta
• Athabasca University
• MacEwan University

Call for Nominations for CAUBO Awards

The Q&P Awards – Found a Better Way to Do Something? Tell Us About It!

The concept is simple: Reward and share effective and innovative practices that enable excellence in the management of risk, human, financial, IT and physical resources on Canadian campuses.

Have you recently implemented a new and innovative initiative that has improved operational efficiencies, or the overall sustainability of your institution? Or perhaps an initiative that stems from your strong institutional entrepreneurial spirit? That’s the kind of project we want to hear about.

If there’s a way to do it better….tell us.

Complete the application form online and tell us why you should be a Q&P award winner! The submission deadline for the 2022 Awards is January 14, 2022.

Our Members Are Amazing – Help Us Honour Them!

Do you know a CAUBO member whose dedication and commitment to leadership in their field is too great to be ignored? Nominate him or her for a 2022 CAUBO Recognition Award!

Submit your nominees for the following prizes:

• The Emerging Leader Award honours future leaders in the higher education field.
• The Ken Clements Distinguished Administrator Award recognizes an administrator who has made an extraordinary contribution to the advancement of higher education administration and has demonstrated outstanding leadership.
• The Distinguished Service Award is awarded to members who have made a significant contribution to CAUBO and higher education management over a long period of time. It’s given at the conclusion of the member’s career in university administration.
• Honorary Membership is a meaningful recognition bestowed sparingly and only to those individuals among those satisfying the criteria for a Distinguished Service Award who are deemed to have made an extraordinary contribution to CAUBO and higher education management.

This year’s awards will be presented at the CAUBO 2022 Annual Conference in Edmonton. Nominate a colleague online before nominations close January 14, 2022.

June 2021

2020/2021 CAUBO Highlights infographic

Once again this year, CAUBO presents its annual Highlights in the form of an interactive infographic, making it easy to see and explore all the resources, information, and networking opportunities that we made available to members in 2020-2021. Check out the highlights of our past year here: https://www.caubo.ca/latest-news/caubo-2020-2021-highlights/

On-demand webinars

Institutional members can explore CAUBO’s extensive archive of on-demand webinars on our website. Recent additions to our webinar library include:

“Moving to the Cloud: Key Considerations” five-webinar series:

• Why Move to the Cloud?
• Assessing the Risks
• Contract Negotiations and Management
• Understanding the Financials
• Change Management

Two EDI webinars hosted by Faculty Bargaining Services:

• Inclusivity and Equity for Indigenous Faculty at Canadian Universities
• Anti-Black Racism and Inclusivity for Black Faculty

The Financial Landscape of Canadian Universities

CAUBO has developed an overview of the financial landscape of Canadian universities, focusing on critical topics that have become particularly relevant in this current era of unprecedented change. The financial landscape is available for institutional members by clicking here. Stay tuned for the release of the provincial-level financial landscapes in the fall.

Risk Management Benchmarking Reports and Dashboards

Two high-level summary reports providing the results of the Environmental Health and Safety (EH&S) Benchmark Survey and Campus Safety and Security Benchmark Survey are now available for members. A dashboard for each is available here for CAUBO members that participated in the surveys.

New Tax Resources

Two new technical Tax Notes, covering GST/HST and QST Employer and Pension Plan Responsibilities and Other International Tax Issues (expanding on U.S. income tax reporting obligations and more), have been added to the tax note series and are now available for members here.

Join the CAUBO Online Community!

Did you know that CAUBO has an active and engaged online community where members can join email-based groups (also known as listservs) to discuss issues and ask questions related to their functional areas? It’s a great resource for networking, sharing lessons learned, policies, plans, and best practices, and finding new ways to collaborate on common issues.

If you’re already a member of one of the listservs, you know the value they provide. If you’re not, you can find out more, check out the list of existing groups, and request to join the relevant ones to you by clicking here. We hope you’ll take advantage of this free member resource to find answers to your questions and help build your higher ed admin network.

CAUBO 2021: Virtual Conference Wrap-up

The 2021 CAUBO conference was held virtually from June 15–17, and if you joined us you’ll know what a great time it was! Over 500 participants spent three days participating in engaging sessions and connecting with one another and with conference speakers via video and text chat. We celebrated new and innovative best practices with the 2021 Quality and Productivity Awards, honoured some of our amazing volunteers at this year’s Member Recognition Awards, and heard from many incredible speakers, like happiness expert Neil Pasricha, diversity and inclusion leader Toni de Mello, and a panel of university Presidents who spoke about their visions of leadership.

Some of the most popular concurrent sessions included Using Data to Inform Decisions and Enable Cultural Change, Higher Education Strategic Planning – Creating Alignment and Impact Across Your Institution and Navigating Conflict: Embracing Challenging and Courageous Conversations with Conflict Theatre.

Conference attendees can watch all the sessions on-demand on the PheedLoop virtual event platform until July 17. The sessions will be posted to the CAUBO Knowledge Centre in October for all institutional members to access there.

Thank you to everyone who joined us for CAUBO 2021 and to our many volunteer speakers and CCT members who helped make it a success!

January 2021

New FBS Director appointed

CAUBO is pleased to announce that Elvio Buono has been appointed as the new Director of Faculty Bargaining Services, effective January 18, 2021.

Elvio takes over the role from Jim Butler, who will retire on January 30. The CAUBO Board, FBS Management Committee, and National Office staff wish Jim all the best and thank him for his many contributions to both CAUBO and FBS over the years.

CAUBO 2021 Virtual Conference website now live!

Visit the 2021 CAUBO Annual Conference website now to get an overview of our first-ever virtual conference taking place June 15–17, 2021. It will include all the dynamic, relevant, and thought-provoking content you have come to expect from this event, including plenty of time for active engagement and networking with your peers and colleagues from across Canada.

The website also includes conference pricing, reasons to attend the conference, and a helpful FAQ section. More detailed information about the program and the features of the virtual conference platform will be available soon, and registration opens in February. Consider bookmarking the website so you can check for new updates easily.

We hope you’ll join us June 15-17, 2021 for the first virtual CAUBO Annual Conference!

McConnell Foundation releases “The Community Engaged University Administrator: A Primer on Community Engagement for Post-Secondary Administration Professionals”

Higher education institutions are increasingly harnessing their assets, platforms, and relationships to contribute to thriving communities. This is driving administrator interest in roles they and their departments can play to enhance their institutions’ social impact. This is a new role for many administrators, and they seek mandates, skills, practical examples, and community connections to better prepare and equip them for this opportunity. To address this interest and help build administrator capacity in this area, the McConnell Foundation partnered with CAUBO to produce this community engagement primer for administrators. It lays out a pathway administrators can pursue to tackle societal challenges, strengthen communities, and help their institution achieve its aims. Check it out for information on this new field of administrative practice.

Data Insights – Changing Patterns in University Revenues and General Operating Expenditures (released January 2021)

CAUBO has developed a new Data Insights series to highlight key financial trends in the university sector. These factsheets aim to provide a concise, fact-based analysis of some of the sector’s most pressing risks and challenges. The first two factsheets in the series address the rapidly changing patterns in spendable income and general operating expenditures in recent years.

Factsheet #1 focuses on the ongoing shift in the composition of operating income at Canadian universities and underscores that tuition revenues have become increasingly consequential as government revenues continue to decline as a proportion of funding. The factsheet highlights the sector’s increasing reliance on more volatile sources of income such as those stemming from international students.

Factsheet # 2 examines the concurrent shift that has occurred in expenditures at Canadian universities.  It highlights the factors that have driven changes in the distribution of spend between various expenditures types (including faculty compensation) and across functions.

Both factsheets can be viewed in full in the Winter 2021 issue of University Manager magazine.

Please let us know if there is a topic that you would like to see covered in future additions to the series. We welcome all suggestions!

University Funding in Canada, A Comparison of Provincial Policies on University Funding, Student Aid, and Research Support (released December 2020)

This new CAUBO report, prepared by Higher Education Strategy Associates (HESA), compares approaches to institutional funding across the country. It provides comparative information, summarizing provincial differences regarding determining institutional grants; approval and funding of new programs; transfers to support specific missions (e.g. minority-language or rural/northern populations); and performance measures that are used in funding distribution.

The report includes a series of provincial summaries outlining the individual provinces’ policies in detail, as well as comparative information for student assistance, such as provincial financial aid expenditures per student, upfront grants and remission programs, and targeted aid for specific student populations. CAUBO institutional members can read the full report here.

Stay tuned for additional resources in 2021! A supplement resource to support the comparative analysis included in this report is currently in development. It will provide useful information for how to interpret the key provincial differences highlighted in HESA’s report and identify key considerations that impact financial benchmarking across jurisdictions.

New data have been added to the CAUBO financial dashboards! (November 2020)

CAUBO continues to enhance the information available in our online financial dashboards. The dashboards have been updated with the most recent FIUC data (2018–2019). Institutional members can now view this data, which include institutional income sources, expenses, and operating expenses by function.

2018–19 FIUC release highlights
The dashboards allow users to quickly see trends in university finances at the national, provincial, and institution level. Some highlights of the 2018–19 data presented in the dashboards include:

• Overall income for Canadian universities increased by 3.2% in 2018–19, reversing the decline seen in the previous year.
  • The proportion of income from tuition and other fees continued to increase, rising from 28.2% to 29.3% of total income at the national level; this proportional increase reflects a year-over-year increase of 7.3%.
  • At the same time, the proportion of revenues from government sources continued to decline, falling from 47.2% to 45.9% of the total; this proportional decrease reflects a year-over-year increase of 0.4%, further detailed as follows: government funding for operating remained stable in 2018-2019 while the annual increase in government funding for research purposes was 4.7%.
  • Among provinces with more than one institution, Nova Scotia had the highest increase in income (5.4% over the previous year), attributed to a combination of increases from tuition and other fees (up 7.5% from 2017–18) and a 4.1% increase in revenues from government grants. Meanwhile, income in Manitoba decreased by 3.0%, primarily attributable to a decline in both provincial grants and research funds received from the federal government.
• Overall university expenditures decreased by 0.2% in 2018–19; a decrease in expenditures has not been observed since 2014–15.

About the dashboards:
With an ever-increasing need for evidence-based decision-making, university administrators rely on indicators to inform their financial, academic, and strategic planning processes. CAUBO now conveys sector-wide financial data through web-based dashboards, providing members with the ability to observe various trends in university finances and find out how institutions compare. In order to more accurately compare the dollar values from one year to the next, users can view the income and expense values in both current and constant dollars.

Leveraging Robotic Process Automation to Optimize Administrative Processes (September 2020)

To help members answer the question “How can we do more with less?” CAUBO commissioned a report (prepared by Deloitte) that outlines how Robotic Process Automation (RPA) can be applied to optimize administrative processes. The report, available to CAUBO’s institutional members, suggests a framework specific to higher education that can be used to identify and prioritize opportunities for automation and offers practical, real-life examples of RPA application.

Highlights of the report also include:

• Insights into PSE RPA processes from Deloitte’s global network to highlight how automation is improving processes in the PSE space.
• Common practices on how to identify and prioritize opportunities including factors to consider, automation objectives and how to leverage an automation framework.
• Six relevant automation case studies and high applicability automation use cases and lessons learned from past projects.
• Practical insights drawn from internal and external sources related to automation.

The report was developed as a conversation starter to bring forth ideas and discussion, highlighting the differing considerations institutions face when embarking on an automation journey. CAUBO offered a webinar on this topic in September 2020; the recording is available on demand for institutional members from the CAUBO website.

National benefits project update

CAUBO, through the National Benefits Steering Committee, has been looking at ways to help member institutions manage rising benefits costs and risks.

As part of a pre-qualification process, last fall CAUBO released an RFP inviting interested providers to submit a comprehensive proposal for benefits and services to be offered through a collaborative program for Canadian universities and affiliated colleges. The Steering Committee received two proposals that present high potential to provide cost efficiencies to members of all sizes. They held two virtual information sessions this month for college and university members to find out more about the initiative, what we seek to achieve and how, as well as the next steps.

Members will also have the opportunity to participate in virtual information sessions with the two providers in February. During these sessions, the providers will present their proposal in order to gain interest, in principle, from members. Stay tuned for more details regarding these upcoming sessions.

Additional information, including a summary of the progress of the initiative as well as a frequently asked questions (FAQ) document, is available on the CAUBO website (in English only).

Advancing social purpose in administration: updates and tools from CAUBO’s partnership with the McConnell Foundation

According to a Universities Canada survey, most universities are engaged in social impact projects to improve societal conditions in their communities and beyond. You can read about this trend in this Milestone Report: a snapshot taken in 2020 of social impact collaborations underway in the post-secondary sector. The report also highlights results of the CAUBO-McConnell partnership since 2017. Hundreds of CAUBO members have participated, via social impact workshops, conference sessions, webinars and the inventory of social impact administration and finance practices.

Social Impact Administration Jobs: CAUBO members raised the importance of embedding social impact into hiring decisions and performance management, recognizing that social impact becomes more routine when administrators with social impact experience are hired and when social impact is reinforced in performance objectives and professional development. To help with this effort, the McConnell Foundation is developing an HR tool to help embed social impact into the employee experience. Do you have administrator jobs with social impact in the job description? Please contact khodgins@mcconnellfoundation.ca if you do, so we can design a tool that builds upon current best practices.

Strategic Planning: Many institutions will likely update strategic plans to reflect the changes brought about by COVID-19. If that includes yours, check out these Strategic Planning Guidelines for ideas on how to embed social purpose into strategic plans. A related tool is this Social Impact COVID-19 Decision Lens, produced to help institutions embed social considerations into COVID decisions. Use it as a prompt to stretch mindsets and decisions to foster increased social outcomes and community well-being. The crisis has reaffirmed the role universities – including administrators – play in contributing to sustainable and equitable communities.

Upcoming professional development opportunities

Wednesday, February 3, 1:00-2:30 PM ET
Live Webinar: CAUBO/CUCCIO Cloud Series #1: Why Move to the Cloud?
For more information or to register, click here.

Tuesday, February 9, 1:00-2:15 PM (ET)
Virtual Roundtable: Risk Management #1 — CAUBO’s Environmental Health & Safety Benchmark Survey
For more information or to register, click here. 

Thursday, February 11, 1:00-2:15 PM (ET)
Virtual Roundtable: Risk Management #2 – CAUBO’s Campus Safety and Security Benchmark Survey
For more information or to register, click here. 

Wednesday, February 24, 1:00-2:15 PM ET
Live Webinar: Procurement Legal Hot Topics – Coffee with Council
Registration opening soon.

February–April (dates confirmed soon–check CAUBO website for updates)
Online Course: Fundamentals of the Research Enterprise (FORE)

Wednesday, March 3, 1:00-2:30 PM ET
Live Webinar: CAUBO/CUCCIO Cloud Series #2: Assessing the Risks
For more information or to register, click here. 

Wednesday, March 31, 1:00-2:30 PM ET
Live Webinar: CAUBO/CUCCIO Cloud Series #3: Contract Negotiations and Management
For more information or to register, click here.  

Wednesday, April 28, 1:00-2:30 PM ET
Live Webinar: CAUBO/CUCCIO Cloud Series #4: Understanding the Financials
For more information or to register, click here.

On-demand webinars
Institutional members can also explore CAUBO’s extensive archive of on-demand webinars on our website!

June 2020

CAUBO recognizes that our members continue to deal with the effects of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and related challenges. CAUBO national office staff are continuing to disseminate new and updated resources to support your work. We are here to answer members’ questions and help the higher education administration sector remain connected. We hope you are staying safe and healthy.

2019/2020 CAUBO Highlights infographic

This year, for the first time, CAUBO presents its annual Highlights in the form of an interactive infographic, so it’s easy to see and explore all the resources, information, and networking opportunities that we made available to members in 2019-2020. Check out the highlights of our past year here: https://www.caubo.ca/latest-news/caubo-2019-2020-highlights/

CAUBO resources to support the transition to the new Tri-Agency guidelines on financial administration

CAUBO has developed a series of resources to support members during the transition to the new principles-based guidelines. As the guide is no longer prescriptive, institutions will need to rely on their own institutional policies to assess whether expenses charged to a research grant are compliant.

New tax note: Honorariums and payments to Indigenous individuals
A CAUBO survey conducted last year revealed that most institutions do not have a policy related to payments for Indigenous individuals. To address this need, we retained KPMG to develop a note clarifying the tax treatment of payments made to such individuals. Institutional members can access this new technical tax note from CAUBO’s website by clicking here.

A webinar on this topic will take place on June 18 (see below for details and registration link).

Statistical approach framework for transactional compliance testing
CAUBO retained KPMG to create a framework that can be used by member institutions to develop a statistical approach to internal compliance monitoring, based on their own circumstances and in ways that would complement the Tri-Agencies’ new monitoring structure.

The framework provides factors for members to consider when developing or adopting a sampling methodology suitable for their institution, including size of institution, review of historical data, internal control framework, advice on how to determine and assess risks associated with key expense categories, and how to set materiality levels and list potential statistical-based software and tools.

We expect to release this framework by the end of June 2020. A series of webinars on this topic are also in the works, so check the CAUBO website for updates.

Leveraging robotic process automation to optimize administrative processes

In an effort to modernize, and due to increasing resource constraints, some universities are investigating emerging automation tools and technologies. Based on feedback from members, CAUBO is exploring how automation can be applied to optimize administrative processes and increase efficiency. We have retained Deloitte to provide a comprehensive report on the state of automation in the higher education sector and insights into how members can leverage Robotic Process Automation (RPA).

The report includes case studies that provide practical examples of how this has been done and suggests a framework administrators can use to identify and prioritize opportunities for automation. We expect to release the report and announce a date for an accompanying webinar by the end of June 2020. Check the CAUBO website for updates.

Comparison of provincial policies on university funding, student financial aid, and research support

CAUBO has retained Higher Education Strategy Associates (HESA) to produce a report comparing provincial policies on university funding, student financial aid, and research support. The information has been gathered and summarized in a simplified manner to facilitate useful interprovincial comparisons. The report will be available in the next few weeks for institutional members to review on the CAUBO website.

Financial health indicators dashboard updated

CAUBO’s financial health indicators dashboard has been updated to include data for 2016–17 and 2017¬–18. When viewed together, the financial ratios provide an overall picture of the sector’s financial condition, identifying specific strengths and weaknesses. At the institutional level, the ratios can also provide a baseline to help institutions set priorities. By viewing the indicators in a dashboard format, users can compare nationally, provincially, and/or by institutional size or with selected institutions. A summary of the latest data has also been developed to provide an update on the analysis that was included in the Management Discussion and Analysis (MD&A) published in 2018. The updated dashboard is available for institutional members to view on the CAUBO website by clicking here.

CBSA Assessment and Revenue Management (CARM) notice sent to members

A reminder that Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) is changing several processes that will directly affect all importers of commercial goods in Canada, including universities. CAUBO sent a notice to all institutional members in May 2020 regarding this change. The text of the notice can be viewed here.

Upcoming professional development opportunities

Wednesday, June 17, 12:00-1:00 PM ET
Virtual Roundtable: Let’s Stay Connected – Academic Administrators (session 2)
Join your peers in this open forum discussion.
Visit the website for topic details and to register – space is limited.

Thursday, June 18 / 12:00-1:15 PM (ET)
Webinar: Payments to Indigenous Peoples for Services
Presenters:
Barry Travers, Partner – KPMG
Rita Blais, Associate Vice-President, Financial Services – Lakehead University
Denise Baxter, Vice-Provost, Aboriginal Initiatives – Lakehead University
For more details and to register, click here.

Tuesday, June 23 / 12:00-1:00 PM (ET)
Webinar: Decarbonizing the University Endowment – The McGill University Approach
Presenter:
Sophie Leblanc, Chief Investment Officer and Treasurer – McGill University
For more details and to register, click here.

Friday, June 26 / 1:30-2:30 PM (ET)
Webinar: Returning to Campus Safely Amidst COVID-19 –  A Planning Framework, Physical Distancing and HR Perspectives
Presenters:
Laura Vajanto, Senior Director, Enterprise Risk & Resilience, Simon Fraser University
Kane Kilbey, Associate Vice President, Human Resources, University of Victoria
Mark McLaughlin, Chief Commercial Services Officer – Simon Fraser University
For more details and to register, click here.

Monday, June 29, 12:00-1:30 PM ET
Virtual Roundtable: Let’s Stay Connected – Finance & Administration (session 2)
Join your peers in this open forum discussion.
Visit the website for topic details and to register – space is limited.

December 2019

Happy Holidays from CAUBO!

The CAUBO national office staff extend our best wishes to members for a safe, joyful, and relaxing holiday season. The office will be closed from December 24 to January 1 inclusive, as we recharge our batteries and spend some quality time with loved ones. See you in 2020!

New Analytical Reports and Resources for Members 

As 2019 comes to a close, we are pleased to share many new resources with our members, some of which are the result of an entire year (or in some cases, more) of work by staff and volunteers.

Tri-Agency Transition Toolkit

CAUBO has developed a toolkit to support members during the transition to the Tri-Agency’s new principles-based guidelines. The toolkit is based on the experiences of the pilot institutions and includes three parts:

• An Approach to the Tri-Agency Policy Gap Analysis document provides guidance for institutions completing a policy gap analysis. It includes best practices and items to consider when undertaking the gap analysis.
• A Policy gap analysis template
• Sample scenarios

More resources to support your institution throughout this transition will be available from CAUBO in the coming months

2019 Deferred Maintenance Report

The 2019 report (currently available in English only) prepared by VFA, an Accruent company, is now available  for members. It provides an updated perspective on deferred maintenance at Canadian Universities.

The report contains practical information for members, including strategies for managing deferred maintenance and making the case for investment. It includes case studies and success stories to provide insight into how institutions have found innovative methods to secure additional funding and/or manage the funding they receive.

A data dashboard (currently available in English only) has also been developed to provide institutions that participated in the survey with access to benchmark data.

Partnership with HR Metrics Service

CAUBO has signed a partnership agreement with HR Metrics Service (HRMS) to provide CAUBO members with quality HR benchmarking services to support the development of national HR metrics and the collection of reliable data to guide decision-making.

HRMS is a privately owned national company with 65 client organizations including several Canadian universities. Participating universities report being very satisfied with the service, content, and quality of reporting they have received from HRMS and recommend it to colleagues in the sector.

CAUBO members that participate in the HRMS benchmarking service will receive:

• Sector-wide data analysis and trend reporting provided by a third-party consultant with support from CAUBO
• Educational support to help use the resulting evidence-based data and information effectively
• Differentiated HRMS participation fees for CAUBO members, based on institutional size

For information about this service, please contact HRMS directly at support@hrmetricsservice.org.

Ancillary Benchmark Survey Series

Ancillary operations are now a prominent area of focus at Canadian universities, which need reliable data to help administrators identify opportunities for improved efficiencies. CAUBO has been working to collect and report on key performance indicators for each major ancillary area.

A high-level summary report of the 2018 ancillary benchmark parking services survey results is available to all members. A dashboard is also accessible to CAUBO members that participated in the survey. Users can assess their institutional performance against that of peer institutions across Canada based on key indicators.

CAUBO also recently launched two new ancillary benchmark surveys on housing and food services. Invitations to participate have been sent to the Vice-President Finance and Administration (or equivalent) at each CAUBO member university and college. If your institution is interested in participating, please contact etaylor@caubo.ca.

Risk Management Benchmark Surveys

CAUBO members told us they need comparative benchmark data within the risk management portfolio. Two surveys were recently launched to collect benchmark data on environmental health and safety (EH&S) and campus safety and security. The surveys have received strong responses so far. Invitations to participate were sent to the Vice-President Finance and Administration (or equivalent) at each CAUBO member university and college. If your institution is interested in participating, please contact etaylor@caubo.ca.

In Case You Missed Them

Below are some of the member resources released earlier this year that you may not have heard about yet.

National Perspective on Budget Carry-Forward Policies

CAUBO conducted a survey last spring to gain a better understanding of members’ policies and practices governing the carry-forward of unspent operating funds. A roundtable discussion was held during CAUBO 2019 in Halifax to discuss the topic. The survey results and a summary of the roundtable discussion are available online for members.

As part of the survey, members were asked to share their institutional carry-forward policies. These policies have now been posted here for reference. Please let us know if you are willing to share your institution’s policy to advance sector knowledge on this topic. A number of institutions in Ontario, in collaboration with the Council of Ontario Finance Officers (COFO), have developed a summary of best practices for reporting carry-forwards. This document is also available for viewing online.

Financial Dashboards Updated

Financial dashboards based on FIUC data were developed to provide members with the ability to examine sector-wide trends in university finance and compare their institution with others. These dashboards were recently updated to include 2017–2018 FIUC data.

June 2019

Visit the CAUBO Knowledge Centre Later This Summer for Selected Content from the 2019 Conference!

If you couldn’t attend the 2019 Annual Conference or you did, but want to check out a session you missed, you may be in luck. A selection of the more popular conference sessions, including the plenary speakers, were captured on video and will be available at the end of July for viewing in the CAUBO Knowledge Centre. We will notify members by email once they are live.

Photos from CAUBO 2019

An archive of photos taken at the CAUBO 2019 Annual Conference in Halifax is now available here for your viewing enjoyment.

2018-2019 Highlights and Strategic Plan Extension

At the AGM, we advised members that the CAUBO Board has decided to extend the current strategic plan by two years, until 2021-2022, at which time we will undertake a new planning process for the subsequent five years. We plan to use this time to consult with members in an effort to determine how well we, as an Association, are doing in terms of supporting and enabling your success, and engage in conversations with you to help us maintain the relevance of our services during the period. These consultations have already begun and will continue throughout this summer and into the fall.

For an overview of CAUBO’s achievements and work undertaken during the past year, read the 2018-2019 Highlights Brochure.

New CAUBO Member Resources

Here are some of the newest member resources that are accessible now or coming soon to the CAUBO Knowledge Centre:

The CAUBO financial dashboards have been updated to include the most recent FIUC data (2016–2017). In the coming months, new dashboards will be created that include data normalized on a per-student and per-faculty basis, and the current dashboards will get a new filter to allow members to select institutions according to their size (based on student FTE).

The results from the 2018 parking survey (part of CAUBO’s series of ancillary services benchmarking surveys) will be released shortly in a high-level summary report and a key indicators dashboard. The housing and food services surveys will launch next fall.

Recorded versions of two recent CAUBO cybersecurity webinars (Responding to a Cybersecurity or Data Breach and Not Just an IT Issue: Roles of the Board and Executives in Managing Cyber Threats) are now available in CAUBO’s Knowledge Centre.

CAUBO recently released a series of educational briefs to help educate and inform members about the benefits landscape in Canada and support an engaging conversation around the future of group benefits. Benefit costs were also the topic of a feature in the summer issue of University Manager magazine.

An updated report on deferred maintenance to be released this summer will provide current information on the amount and potential impact of deferred maintenance at Canadian universities and provide practical advice and information on how to effectively manage it, including case studies and success stories to demonstrate best practices and provide examples of initiatives that were successful in securing funding for deferred maintenance projects.

In April, CAUBO conducted a survey to gain a better understanding of members’ policies and practices regarding the carry-forward of unspent operating funds. Survey results are available in the Knowledge Centre, as is a summary of a related round table discussion held at the conference.

Share your expertise and experience with your peers and colleagues!

The CAUBO 2020 Annual Conference and Pre-Conference Seminars will be hosted by the University of Toronto from June 14-16, 2020 in Toronto. Take advantage of this unique opportunity to advance the conversation, network with administrative colleagues, and highlight best practices.

CAUBO provides peer-to-peer sharing to build on the capacity of leaders in the higher education sector by connecting them with colleagues and information, enabling them to pursue opportunities and create solutions for shared issues.

Our general themes are new or best practices in higher education administration related to managerial and operational efficiency, and using data to inform decision-making.

We’d love to see your proposal on a program or activity that:

• Demonstrates innovation
• Provides opportunity for transferability to other institutions
• Improves quality of service delivery
• Improves efficiency and process
• Improves productivity within team or institution
• Involves cross-functional collaboration
• Informs a national perspective

Proposals will be accepted starting later this summer with a deadline of Friday, September 13, 2019. Keep an eye on the CAUBO website for details on how and when to submit your proposal!

2019 CAUBO Award Recipients

Every June, CAUBO celebrates the accomplishments of its members through the Quality & Productivity (Q&P) Awards and the Member Recognition Awards. Presented during CAUBO’s annual conference, these awards recognize member achievements.

The Q&P Awards are the Oscars of best practices in higher education administration. On June 10 in Halifax, five national prizes were presented, recognizing excellence in innovation, environmental sustainability, facilities management, risk management, and administrative efficiency. Learn more about this year’s winners by watching the 2019 Q&P video. You can also search the Q&P submissions database in CAUBO’s Knowledge Centre by keyword, year, or institution to find innovative practices that can be applied to your institution.

CAUBO’s Member Recognition Awards celebrate and honour those who help build a vibrant CAUBO community and a stronger higher education sector through collaboration and leadership. On June 11, four awards were given out to acknowledge some of these contributions. We would like to extend our sincerest congratulations to the recipients of this year’s awards! Check out this year’s video to find out which of your colleagues were celebrated at the CAUBO Recognition Awards ceremony for their leadership and volunteerism.

Upcoming Professional Development Opportunities

Biannual Summit/Workshop on Cybersecurity

Save the date – CUCCIO and CAUBO will host a biannual workshop on cybersecurity on November 27 and 28, 2019 in Montréal. Details will be available soon!

CAUBO Online Courses

Fall 2019: University Culture and Governance

January 2020: Fundamentals of the Research Enterprise

Watch the CAUBO website for start dates!

December 2018

Happy holidays!

From our office to yours, we would like to extend our very best wishes to each of you. We hope you have a happy, safe, and relaxing holiday season!

– the CAUBO National Office in Ottawa

The Q&P Awards are back – with a twist!

Never heard of the Q&P awards? Well, they’re the Oscars of best practices in higher education administration. This year we are changing things up a bit in order to inspire more creativity and innovation in the submissions and to allow for more nimbleness in the recognition process.

The concept is simple: reward and share effective and innovative practices that enable excellence in the management of risk, human, financial, IT and physical resources on Canadian campuses.

Have you recently implemented a new and innovative initiative that has improved operational efficiencies, or the overall sustainability of your institution? Or perhaps an initiative that stems from your strong institutional entrepreneurial spirit? That’s the kind of project we want to hear about.

If there’s a way to do it better….tell us.

Complete the application form online and tell us why you should be a Q&P award winner! The submission deadline for the 2019 Awards is January 23, 2019.

Our members are amazing – help us honour them!

Do you know a CAUBO member whose dedication and commitment to leadership in their field is too great to be ignored? Nominate him or her for a 2019 CAUBO Recognition Award!

Submit your nominees for the following prizes:

• The Emerging Leader Award honours future leaders in the higher education field.
• The Ken Clements Distinguished Administrator Award recognizes an administrator who has made an extraordinary contribution to the advancement of higher education administration and has demonstrated outstanding leadership.
• The Leadership in Learning Award recognizes outstanding individual contributions to CAUBO professional development activities, including the annual conference, pre-conference seminars, online course, workshops and webinars.

Awards will be presented during a special ceremony on Tuesday morning at the CAUBO 2019 Annual Conference in Halifax. Nominate a colleague online before nominations close January 31, 2019.

CAUBO 2019 heads to Halifax!

Join your peers in the heart of the Maritimes: Halifax! This year, the conference is co-hosted by: Saint Mary’s University, NSCAD University, Mount Saint Vincent University, and ISI Corporation.

Be inspired by Monday’s keynote Andrew Au, and Tuesday’s keynote Pete Luckett, and of course, your colleagues! Take in conference sessions focused on innovation, problem-solving, and positive change within our institutions. Find fresh solutions and look at things from new angles.

In addition, enjoy vibrant networking and social events including a spectacular evening at Pier 21 and an unforgettable kitchen party on the Saint Mary’s campus!

Hotel information is available on the CAUBO 2019 website. Don’t wait – reserve your room soon! CAUBO 2019 takes place during one of the city’s busiest seasons.

Watch for the conference section in the Spring 2019 issue of University Manager and log onto the conference website mid-February 2019 for full program details and to register!

Apply for the Pat Hibbitts Professional Development Bursary!

In honour of Pat Hibbitts, a long-standing CAUBO member and contributor, and in support of her commitment to continuing education, CAUBO has established a professional development bursary.

Each year, the bursary provides a complimentary conference registration (including a pre-conference seminar) to one institutional member.

The deadline to submit applications online for the bursary is January 31, 2019. Apply now.

Cannabis on campus

As of October 17th, 2018, institutions across the country were faced with a new challenge on campus due to the legalization of cannabis. Regulations and legislation around the legislative change have been implemented and handled differently from coast to coast.

CAUBO conducted a survey to identify how universities and colleges are handling the change in legislation. The survey results and summary are now available on the website (members only)

Following the survey and webinar, CAUBO created a Cannabis on Campus listserv in an effort to support members as they respond to the impacts on campus from the legalization of marijuana.

Infrastructure needs survey

An Infrastructure Needs Survey was conducted to collect information about shovel-ready infrastructure needs on university campuses across Canada.

Shovel-ready projects were defined as those that are ready to go and have had all the relevant studies, consultations and planning completed. We would sincerely like to thank the participants from 45 institutions who completed the survey.

A summary of the results will be made available online to members in the early New Year.

Update on the CAUBO-McConnell joint initiative

New! Social Purpose Administration and Finance Inventory of Post-Secondary Practices

CAUBO and the McConnell Foundation have launched an online searchable database of Social Purpose Administration Post-Secondary. The inventory highlights CAUBO member submissions over the past year – See who is doing what.

Want to include your initiative? Share practices from your administration department here.

Article Says it All!
The University Manager article provides a great roll-up of social purpose administration and finance across Canada. It profiles administrators and finance staff who are generating positive community impacts by integrating sustainability and social responsibility into their every day practices. A must read for innovators. Read more Higher Education, Higher Purpose.

Just Released: The Social Administrator Workshop-in-a-Box
Administrators wishing to engage colleagues on social purpose/social impact administration and finance now have access to a free, tested, off-the-shelf, self-directed 1–1.5 hour in-person workshop. Or, use it to orient your teams on this idea and strategize on how to advance practices at your institution. Use it as a discussion-starter and accelerator of social innovation within admin departments.

SFU tested the workshop and according to the VP Finance and Administration, Martin Pochurko:

“I found the conversation to be valuable on many fronts – thought-provoking, idea generating, and even reassuring in that we were already starting down a path of social innovation without realizing that was what we were doing. Traditionally the role of VP Finance and Administration was ‘Finance’ and now more currently our institutions expect us also to be service oriented in the support the academic mission.

I believe the next phase of expectations are rapidly approaching senior administrators – helping enable the University to live and fulfill its social mandate. It’s becoming an ever-growing expectation of our staff, students, faculty and communities and the challenge is being put to us. In this regard I think you will find the workshop to be a timely and thought-provoking investment of your time.”

Download the Workshop-in-a-Box, learn about SFU’s success, and try it at your institution.

June 2018

Missed a session at CAUBO 2018? Visit the Knowledge Centre to view available presentations!

CAUBO’s has added all available presentations to its Knowledge Centre, including recordings of the top two attended sessions per concurrent block.

Here are just a few of the sessions that are available on the CAUBO website from CAUBO 2018:
• Bringing Continuous Improvement to the Masses
• Towards a Strategic and Sustainable Budget
• Marijuana: “Hashing Out” Your Obligations
• Threat Assessment Teams in Higher Education
• Governance Matters
• Leading from the Middle

Available presentations from the nine pre-conference seminars are available by clicking here.

CAUBO: A Year in Review

This past year, CAUBO has been privileged to facilitate conversations between peers, stakeholders, and government agencies on topics as diverse as its participants. Many of these dialogues have crossed functional and geographical boundaries on topics from responsible investing to cyber-security and operational benchmarks, to consultations with the Tri-Agencies on the evolution of their financial administration guide. A couple of common themes were fundamental to these exchanges: to identify opportunities for increased efficiencies for higher education administration and providing members with a broader toolkit of information, data and resources to support informed decision-making.

View the CAUBO 2017/2018 Highlights & Achievements brochure to learn what is available to you from our collective efforts.

2018 CAUBO Award Recipients

June is the time of year where CAUBO gets to celebrate the accomplishments of its members through two award programs: The Quality & Productivity (Q&P) Awards and the Member Recognition Awards. Both celebrated during the annual conference, these awards recognize member achievements.

Earlier this month at the CAUBO 2018 Conference, a total of eight Q&P Awards were given out. The Q&P Awards are the Oscars of best practices in higher education administration. View the 2018 winning submissions, or search by keyword, year, or institution to find innovative practices that can be applied to your institution in our Knowledge Centre.

CAUBO Member Recognition Awards celebrate and honour those who help build a vibrant CAUBO community and a stronger higher education sector through collaboration and leadership. This year, four awards were given out to acknowledge some of these contributions. We would like to extend our sincerest congratulations to the recipients of this year’s awards! Find out which of your colleagues were celebrated at the CAUBO Recognition Awards ceremony for their leadership and volunteerism.

FIUC Dashboards

CAUBO has developed a new tool to explore and analyze the Financial Information of Universities and Colleges (FIUC) data.

This tool provides a new channel to view the FIUC data; these dashboards provide institutional income sources, expenses and operating expenses by function. Members can more easily access FIUC data in order to see sector trends in university finances and how various institutions, including your own, compare in this regard.

The dashboards are available online for University members only.

Financial Health Indicators

A series of five indicators of financial condition are now available through the new Financial Indicators Dashboard. A comprehensive Financial Indicators Management Discussion & Analysis (MD&A) report has also been released to support the information found in the dashboard.

When viewed together the ratios provide an overall picture of the sector’s financial condition, identifying specific strengths and weaknesses. At an institutional level, these ratios can also provide a baseline for priority setting. By viewing the indicators in a dashboard format, users can compare nationally, provincially, and/or by institutional size or with selected institutions.

Both the dashboard and MD&A report can be accessed online. Access to both the dashboard and the MD&A report is restricted to VP members only (to share internally with staff as they deem appropriate).

Fraud Survey Results

The 2017 Fraud Survey results were presented at CAUBO 2018. The Fraud Survey is an annual survey of internal and external fraud cases within Canadian universities. It tracks the volume and value of fraud cases, fraud detection, the nature of control weaknesses exploited, the extent of anti-fraud policies and processes and the action taken against perpetrators.

The results are intended to help audit and other professionals better understand fraud and its characteristics in the higher education environment, and to help build awareness at the executive level of fraud risks and impacts. The presentation is now available in the Knowledge Centre.

Investment Survey Report

The 2017 CAUBO Investment Survey report is now available for participating members. This Survey is Canada’s most comprehensive survey of investments held by Canadian post-secondary institutions. The survey includes both investment pool (including endowment) and pension results. One of the purposes of this survey is to provide universities with the information necessary to assist them in better managing their investment portfolios.

The Investment Survey report is distributed to all CAUBO members that participated in the survey. Online access to the report is restricted to survey respondents at participating institutions, unless otherwise advised. Additional copies may be purchased by using the order form for participating members. Members that have not participated in the survey, affiliate members, corporate members and associate members can purchase the report by using the order form available here.

2016-2017 FIUC coming soon!

The 2016-2017 Financial Information of Universities and Colleges (FIUC) data is scheduled for release by Statistics Canada on July 24th. The FIUC Report will be available online at the end of the month in the Knowledge Centre.

The FIUC is an annual publication that is jointly prepared by CAUBO and Statistics Canada. It is a valuable source of information for financial data at Canadian universities and colleges. The financial data in the publication is based on an annual return completed and submitted by each member institution.

Take advantage of the opportunity to advance the conversation, network with administrative colleagues, and highlight best practices

Share your expertise and experience with your peers and colleagues! Submit your content proposals for the CAUBO 2019 Annual Conference and Pre-Conference Seminars, co-hosted by Saint Mary’s University, Mount Saint Vincent University, NSCAD University, and InterUniversity Services (ISI) from June 9-11, 2019 in Halifax, NS. CAUBO provides peer-to-peer sharing which builds on the existing capacity of higher education leaders by connecting them with colleagues and information, enabling them to pursue learning opportunities that offer insights into effective practices; create solutions for shared issues; and, provide participants with new and different perspectives. We’d love to see your proposal on a program or activity that: • Demonstrates innovation • Improves quality of service delivery • Improves productivity within a team or an institution • Involves cross-functional collaboration • Informs a national perspective Proposals accepted until Friday, September 14, 2018. Submit today!

Missed a session at CAUBO 2017– or the conference altogether? Visit the Conference Learning Centre and view recorded content now!

CAUBO’s Conference Learning Centre (CLC) has been updated to include content from the CAUBO 2017 conference and pre-conference seminars. Attendees can access this content for free. Members who did not attend can purchase individual sessions or packages at low member prices. Stream content on your computer, mobile device, or tablet anytime, anywhere.

Here are just a few of the sessions that are available on the CLC from CAUBO 2017:

• People Analytics Used to Drive Quality Decisions and Service Delivery
• Relationship of Budget Models and Strategic Planning
• Leadership, Mentoring, and Professional Development
• The State of Procurement Transformation in Higher Education

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CAUBO: A Year in Review

This past year has been one of significant renewal for CAUBO, and the momentum continues. In 2016-2017, the organization laid the groundwork for many new projects. The CAUBO team and community tackled commonly faced challenges at institutions by using an issue-based approach that resulted in the expansion and creation of a number of dedicated new resources being available to members on topics such as cyber-security and divestment. Several other initiatives are being launched on topics such as ancillary services and operational benchmarking.

View the CAUBO 2016/2017 Highlights & Achievements brochure to learn what is available to you from our collective efforts.

FIUC Dashboards

CAUBO, in partnership with the Université du Québec Network – Head Office, has developed a new tool to explore and analyze the Financial Information of Universities and Colleges (FIUC) data.

This tool provides a new channel to view the FIUC data; these dashboards provide institutional income sources, expenses and operating expenses by function. Members can more easily access FIUC data in order to see sector trends in university finances and how various institutions, including your own, compare in this regard.

The dashboards are available online for members only.

Fraud Survey Results

The 2016 Fraud Survey results were presented at CAUBO 2017. The Fraud Survey is an annual survey of internal and external fraud cases within Canadian universities. It tracks the volume and value of fraud cases, fraud detection, the nature of control weaknesses exploited, the extent of anti-fraud policies and processes and the action taken against perpetrators.

The results are intended to help audit and other professionals better understand fraud and its characteristics in the higher education environment, and to help build awareness at the executive level of fraud risks and impacts. The presentation is now available in the Conference Learning Centre.

Ancillary Services Survey – Participate Now!

The Ancillary Benchmark Survey is a new initiative based on work originally piloted in Ontario. This series of surveys will collect information on the major ancillary areas (housing, food, bookstore, printing, parking, conference, child care and campus card), with a focus on housing, food services, and parking in the first year. The survey results will be compiled in a dashboard format to provide a national perspective on each ancillary service and allow universities to assess their institutional performance with that of peer institutions across Canada.

Preliminary results of the survey were presented at CAUBO 2017. The final results will be presented as part of a webinar in 2017-2018.

The survey remains open for institutions to participate. Institutions have been invited to participate; however, we encourage you to contact Elizabeth Taylor, CAUBO Analyst (etaylor@caubo.ca) if your institution is interested in participating or for more information.

ISI Post-Secondary Education Procurement Transformation Study

Interuniversity Services Inc. (ISI) recently completed the Post-Secondary Education Procurement Transformation Study. The study was commissioned by ISI to assess the current state of the procurement within higher education in Canada.

Results of the study were presented at CAUBO 2017 and the study is available in the CAUBO Knowledge Centre.

Take advantage of the opportunity to advance the conversation, network with administrative colleagues, and highlight best practices

Share your expertise and experience with your peers and colleagues! Submit your content proposals for the CAUBO 2018 Annual Conference and Pre-Conference Seminars which will be hosted by Simon Fraser University, BC from June 10-12, 2018 in Vancouver.

CAUBO provides peer-to-peer sharing to build on the capacity of leaders in the higher education sector by connecting them with colleagues and information, enabling them to pursue opportunities and create solutions for shared issues.

Our general themes are new or best practices in higher education administration related to managerial and operational efficiency, and using data to inform decision-making.

 

We’d love to see your proposal on a program or activity that:

• Demonstrates innovation
• Provides opportunity for transferability to other institutions
• Improves quality of service delivery
• Improves efficiency and process
• Improves productivity within team or institution
• Involves cross-functional collaboration
• Informs a national perspective

Proposals accepted until Friday, September 8, 2017. Submit today!

2017 CAUBO Award Recipients

June is the time of year where CAUBO gets to celebrate the accomplishments of its members through two award programs: The Quality & Productivity (Q&P) Awards and the Member Recognition Awards. Both celebrated during the annual conference, these awards recognize member achievements.

At the CAUBO 2017 conference, three Q&P awards were given out in the themed category, three in the open category, and two honourable mentions were allocated. The Q&P Awards are the Oscars of best practices in higher education administration. View the 2017 winning submissions, or search by keyword, year, or institution to find innovative practices that can be applied to your institution in our Knowledge Centre.

CAUBO Member Recognition Awards celebrate and honour those who help build a vibrant CAUBO community and a stronger higher education sector through collaboration and leadership. Eight awards were given out to acknowledge some of these contributions. We would like to extend our sincerest congratulations to the recipients of this year’s awards! Find out which of your colleagues were celebrated at the CAUBO Recognition Awards ceremony for their leadership and volunteerism.

Upcoming Professional Development

Fundamentals of the Research Enterprise
October 16 – December 1, 2017

University Culture and Governance
January 15 – February 09, 2018

Happy Holidays!

From our office to yours, we would like to extend our very best wishes to each of you and hope you have a happy, safe and relaxing holiday season!

– the CAUBO National Office in Ottawa

2017 Q&P Awards: Show us your best!

The CAUBO Q&P Awards are the Oscars of best practices in higher education administration. There are cash prizes, a ceremony at the annual conference, a dedicated section in the summer issue of University Manager, and videos featuring the winning projects. The best way for us to show you what the selection committee look for in a winning project is by showing you those videos. You’ll see that the most successful ideas and projects are often dazzling in their simplicity.

Ready to see your university’s project on the big screens at the 2017 conference? Complete the application form online and tell us why you should be a Q&P award winner!

The submission deadline for the 2017 Awards is January 13, 2017. So go ahead – show off your achievements! We’re waiting to reward them.

Our members are amazing – help us honour them!

Do you know a CAUBO member whose dedication and commitment to volunteerism on behalf of their field is too great to be ignored? Nominate him or her for a 2017 CAUBO Recognition Award!

It’s the perfect way to acknowledge and thank someone for their valuable contributions to higher education administration in Canada. It’s well worth the effort to do so – past winners say that being recognized by their peers is incredibly fulfilling and meaningful to them. If you think you know someone who fits that description but aren’t sure about nominating them, check out the criteria for the member-nominated recognition awards as well as some past recipients:

• The Emerging Leader Award honours future leaders in the higher education field.
• The Ken Clements Distinguished Administrator Award recognizes an administrator who has made an extraordinary contribution to the advancement of higher education administration and has demonstrated outstanding leadership.
• The Leadership in Learning Award recognizes outstanding individual contributions to CAUBO professional development activities, including the annual conference, pre-conference seminars, online course, workshops and webinars.

The awards will be presented in a special ceremony on the Tuesday morning of the CAUBO 2017 Annual Conference in Ottawa. Nominate a colleague online before nominations close April 7, 2017.

Discover the Capital Advantage at CAUBO 2017 in Ottawa!

As Canada celebrates its 150th birthday and Carleton University turns 75, come to the nation’s capital to experience the excitement and to get inspired with your peers at CAUBO 2017. Capitalize on this unique opportunity to explore how we can tap into our “capital” – our people, our knowledge and our resources.

There is no better time to discover the Capital Advantage in Ottawa, June 11-13, 2017. Registration for the conference will open in February 2017, but you can book your conference accommodations now. Hotel information is available on the CAUBO 2017 website.

Watch for program details on the CAUBO 2017 website in mid-February, 2017 and for the conference section in the Spring 2017 issue of University Manager for full program details. We look forward to seeing many of you in Ottawa in June 2017!

Pat Hibbitts Professional Development Bursary – APPLY NOW!

In honour of Pat Hibbitts, a long standing CAUBO member and contributor, and in support of her commitment to continuing education, CAUBO has established a professional development bursary. Each year, CAUBO will extend a complimentary conference registration (including a pre-conference seminar) to one institutional member.

The deadline to submit applications for the bursary is January 31, 2017. The winner will be notified by in February 2017. Download an application form today!

October 2016

Bringing More Data to Your Fingertips

CAUBO is excited to announce upcoming tools which will create new ways to access critical data to help you in decision making and ultimately improve efficiency!

We heard from you, our members, that there is a very clear need for CAUBO to play a greater role in identifying, developing, collecting and reporting operational data and benchmarks. As one of our initiatives, we continue to work towards making the FIUC data more accessible and more advantageous for benchmarking purposes – a need which has been widely identified by our members.

Here are some of the great partnerships we are working on to develop these benchmarks:

• Université de Québec (UQ) network to make sector wide indicators available, based on the FIUC data
• National Financial health metrics, building on those already developed in Ontario
• Ancillary benchmarking expansion of the work that has already begun

Stay tuned for more updates as these resources become available.

 

Save the date: Discover the Capital Advantage at CAUBO 2017 in Ottawa!

As Canada celebrates its 150^th birthday and Carleton University turns 75, come to the nation’s capital to experience the excitement and to get inspired with your peers at CAUBO 2017. Capitalize on this unique opportunity to explore how we can tap into our “capital” – our people, our knowledge and our resources.

There is no better time to discover the Capital Advantage in Ottawa, June 11-13, 2017. Registration for the conference will open in February 2017, but you can book your conference accommodations now. Hotel information is available on the CAUBO 2017 website.

Watch for program details on the CAUBO 2017 website in mid-February, 2017 and for the conference section in the Spring 2017 issue of University Manager for full program details. We look forward to seeing many of you in Ottawa in June 2017!

 

Pat Hibbitts Professional Development Bursary – APPLY NOW!

In honour of Pat Hibbitts, a long standing CAUBO member and contributor, and in support of her commitment to continuing education, CAUBO has established a professional development bursary. Each year, CAUBO will extend a complimentary conference registration (including a pre-conference seminar) to one institutional member.

The deadline to submit applications for the bursary is January 31, 2017. The winner will be notified by February 15, 2017. Download an application form today!

To be eligible for this bursary you must:

• Be currently employed at a CAUBO member university in one of the following functional areas: Academic Administration, Facilities Management, Finance, Human Resources, Internal Audit, Procurement, Risk Management, Taxes, Treasury & Investment
• Have been working for three years or less in a university environment (at time of application)
• Not have attended a CAUBO annual conference before

Applications for the bursary may be self-submitted or submitted by a supervisor; however, all applications must have supervisor sign-off to ensure that the recipient has approval to attend the conference. One recipient will be selected annually by lottery from the pool of all eligible submissions.

 

Our members are amazing – help us honour them!

Do you know a CAUBO member whose dedication and commitment to volunteerism on behalf of their field is too great to be ignored? Nominate him or her for a 2017 CAUBO Recognition Award!

It’s the perfect way to acknowledge and thank someone for their valuable contributions to higher education administration in Canada. It’s well worth the effort to do so – past winners say that being recognized by their peers is incredibly fulfilling and meaningful to them. If you think you know someone who fits that description but aren’t sure about nominating them, check out the criteria for the member-nominated recognition awards as well as some past recipients:

• The Emerging Leader Award honours future leaders in the higher education field.

• The Ken Clements Distinguished Administrator Award recognizes an administrator who has made an extraordinary contribution to the advancement of higher education administration and has demonstrated outstanding leadership.

• The Distinguished Service Award is granted to persons who have made a significant contribution to CAUBO and the management of higher education over a long period of time, upon the conclusion of their career in university administration.
• The Leadership in Learning Award recognizes outstanding individual contributions to CAUBO professional development activities, including the annual conference, pre-conference seminars, online course, workshops and webinars.
• Honorary membership is a meaningful recognition bestowed sparingly and only to those individuals among those satisfying the criteria for a Distinguished Service Award who are deemed to have made an extraordinary contribution to CAUBO and the management of higher education.

The awards will be presented in a special ceremony on the Tuesday morning of the CAUBO 2017 Annual Conference in Ottawa.

Nominate a colleague online before nominations close April 7, 2017.

 

What kind of projects win Q&P Awards? We won’t tell you – we’d rather show you!

The CAUBO Q&P Awards are the Oscars of best practices in higher education administration. There are cash prizes, a ceremony at the annual conference, a dedicated section in the summer issue of University Manager, and videos featuring the winning projects. The best way for us to show you what the selection committee look for in a winning project is by showing you those videos. You’ll see that the most successful ideas and projects are often dazzling in their simplicity.

Ready to see your university’s project on the big screens at the 2017 conference? Download the application form and tell us why you should be a Q&P award winner!

The submission deadline for the 2017 Awards is January 13, 2017. So go ahead – show off your achievements! We’re waiting to reward them.

 

Get in on the Discussion – CAUBO listservs back by popular demand!

Fall is in the air and now that you’ve had a few weeks back into your routine, you may have some questions on your mind. Tackling new challenges can seem overwhelming when you feel like you are on your own, but did you know you can ask your peers what they’ve done in the past?

The listserv is available to members on a secure website with many features accessible directly through your inbox! By using the listserv tool, you have the ability to share best practices and engage with peers online. Find the group that fits your needs, and sign-up by emailing us your request!

You will be able to:

• Create a new question or topic thread directly from email (your post will be automatically be posted to the website) or via the website;
• Add a response to a pre-existing question or topic by replying to a notification email or via the website;
• Attach documents (Word, PDF, Excel, etc.) to a post;
• Sort the list of existing topics and questions on the website chronologically;
• Search the archive of previously posted topics, questions, and documents for specific keywords in your group’s discussion thread;
• Unsubscribe from a group;
• Select the frequency with which you’ll receive email notifications (daily or as posted) or halt or suspend email notifications.

June 2016

Introducing the new CAUBO website featuring resources at your fingertips!

We have developed a brand new, community-centric CAUBO website with enhanced features that align with member needs. At the hub of the new site is the Knowledge Centre: where members can find all available CAUBO resources by topic, be it a report, best practices from the Q&P Awards, a conference session or article from University Manager magazine, etc. Click here to visit the new Knowledge Centre now!

Back by popular demand: CAUBO listservs!

Informed by the results of a member survey conducted in 2015 that made it clear that members prefer an email-based system to communicate with their peers, CAUBO has launched a renewed listserv function, with archived discussions for later reference. Click here for more information.

Missed a session – or the conference? Visit the Conference Learning Centre and view recorded content now!

CAUBO’s Conference Learning Centre has been updated to include captured content from the CAUBO 2016 conference as well as the pre-conference seminars. Attendees receive access to this content free of charge, while members who did not attend the conference or pre-conferences may purchase individual sessions or packages at low member prices. Stream conference content on your computer or mobile device anytime, anywhere.

You can review sessions you attended at the conference and experience sessions you missed, in the form of screen captures of the sessions including all audio, video and slides used in the presentations. As a pilot project in 2016, some sessions were video-recorded. These sessions are also available on the CLC.

Here are just a few of the sessions that are available on the Conference Learning Centre from CAUBO 2016:

• The Transformational Journey for the Finance Function
• Delivering Campus-wide Change
• A Human Focus on Change Management
• Aligning Operational Activities with Strategic Initiatives

CAUBO: A year in review

In June 2015, CAUBO launched a five-year strategic plan. The CAUBO team and community have been very active in operationalizing the plan. The emphasis in year one has been to develop new processes and adequate structures that will enable CAUBO to deliver on its core commitments. In addition to maintaining a focus on building the structures to support the Strategic Plan, CAUBO and its volunteers have been very active on many other fronts. Click here to view the CAUBO 2015/2016 Highlights & Achievements brochure and learn what CAUBO and its members have been up to.

Take advantage of the opportunity to advance the conversation, network with administrative colleagues, and highlight best practices. CAUBO is seeking content for the CAUBO 2017 Annual Conference and Pre-Conference Seminars (June 11-13, 2017 in Ottawa, hosted by Carleton University). Proposals will be accepted until Friday, September 9, 2016. Click here for more information.

2016 CAUBO Award Recipients

CAUBO believes in the importance of recognizing and honouring its members’ achievements. Last week in Québec City during CAUBO 2016, CAUBO awards were handed out. Click here to view the winning Quality & Productivity Award projects: the Q&P Awards are the Oscars of best practices in higher ed administration. Click here to see which of your colleagues were celebrated at the CAUBO Recognition Awards ceremony for their leadership and volunteerism.

French Workshop

CAUBO is pleased to present a repeat performance of the French workshop titled Mieux comprendre les particularités du monde universitaire Join your francophone colleagues on November 17, 2016 in Montréal to learn firsthand from a former VP Academic about the unique aspects of administration within the university context. Look for more details and the registration form on the CAUBO website in late August at www.caubo.ca.

E-newsletter March 2016

March 2016

Registration is now open for CAUBO 2016 in Quebec City!

The Université du Québec invites you to join us to explore the power of collaboration June 12-14, 2016 in beautiful and historic Québec City.

Register early and save! Early Bird deadline is April 29, 2016. Click here to register now. Click here for the full conference program, pre-conference seminar information, and details on the social and optional events taking place during CAUBO 2016.

New Investment Survey coming soon

The annual Investment Survey has been redeveloped and the new survey will be launching soon. The survey was revamped based on user feedback to include more detail in key information areas while underutilized portions have been eliminated. Survey respondents will see a more streamlined process with improved ease of data entry, while users of the report will see similar data to that previously published.

The Investment survey is structured as two independent surveys on investment pool (including endowment) and pension results. The primary purpose of the survey is to provide institutions with information to assist them in better managing their investment portfolios and includes information on annualized rates of return, mandate performance and asset mix, spending policy and costs. The Investment Survey results are compiled into a published report that is available only to participating institutions, a summary of the results are also highlighted in an annual University Manager article.

An invitation to participate will be sent by e-mail to last year’s participants as well to as members who have expressed an interest in participating for 2015. If you would like to participate in the survey and receive the report please contact Elizabeth Taylor (etaylor@caubo.ca).

CAUBO’s annual Fraud Survey is now underway

This annual survey of internal and external fraud cases within Canadian universities tracks the volume and value of fraud cases, fraud detection, the nature of control weaknesses exploited, the extent of anti-fraud policies and processes and the action taken against perpetrators. The results of the survey will be presented during the Internal Audit pre-conference seminar at the CAUBO 2016 conference and may be published through other channels.

These results are intended to help audit and other professionals to better understand fraud and its characteristics in our environment, and to help build awareness at the executive level of fraud risks and impacts. The survey is completely anonymous and we do not ask you to include any information that would identify you or your institution.

The invitation to participate in the survey is sent to one individual only at CAUBO member institutions (either the Director of Internal Audit (or equivalent) or the Director of Finance (or equivalent). If you would like to participate in the survey but have not received an invitation please contact Elizabeth Taylor (etaylor@caubo.ca). The survey will remain open until March 20th .

New Tax Resource

As announced in 2015, CAUBO has retained KPMG to develop a series of interpretive notes covering key university-specific issues in the areas of income tax and sales tax (GST/HST/QST). The first four notes in the series are now available online for members and can be accessed by clicking here. The notes cover the following topics: Meal Plans, External Sales of Goods and Services, Imported Taxable Supplies and Determination of Tax Status – Employee Versus Contractor.

A fifth note on Taxable Benefits was released in February but a misstatement was detected and the note is currently being revised. We would like to express our sincerest apologies for this error and any inconvenience it may have caused and to provide members with assurance that the notes have undergone a thorough and extensive review by the Taxes Oversight Group. If you have questions or feedback about the tax resources, please contact Elizabeth Taylor at etaylor@caubo.ca.

As part of the agreement, in addition to the development of the tax notes, a tax hotline is also available for CAUBO members to communicate with KPMG Indirect Tax and Income Tax practitioners located across Canada regarding questions about university-specific tax issues. The hotline, which has been live since August, has been well received and the service has processed more than 50 queries from members. It can be accessed free of charge for CAUBO members, is available by email at caubotax@kpmg.ca or by phone at 1-800-663-1280 (by phone, please ask for Jennifer Boychuk, Raj Sharma).

Our members are amazing – help us honour them!

Do you know a CAUBO member whose dedication and commitment to volunteerism on behalf of their field is too great to be ignored? Nominate him or her for a 2016 CAUBO Recognition Award! It’s the perfect way to acknowledge and thank someone for their valuable contributions to higher education administration in Canada. It’s well worth the effort to do so – past winners say that being recognized by their peers is incredibly fulfilling and meaningful to them.

If you think you know someone who fits that description but aren’t sure about nominating them, check out the criteria for the member-nominated recognition awards as well as some past recipients:

The Emerging Leader Award honours future leaders in the higher education field.

The Ken Clements Distinguished Administrator Award recognizes an administrator who has made an extraordinary contribution to the advancement of higher education administration and has demonstrated outstanding leadership.

The Distinguished Service Award is granted to persons who have made a significant contribution to CAUBO and the management of higher education over a long period of time, upon the conclusion of their career in university administration.

The awards will be presented in a special ceremony on the Tuesday morning of the CAUBO 2016 Annual Conference in Quebec City.

Nominations close April 8, 2016. Please submit your nominations by email to nlaporte@caubo.ca or by fax to 613-563-7739. Complete a nomination form here.

Our members are amazing – help us honour them!

Do you know a CAUBO member whose dedication and commitment to volunteerism on behalf of their field is too great to be ignored? Nominate him or her for a 2016 CAUBO Recognition Award! It’s the perfect way to acknowledge and thank someone for their valuable contributions to higher education administration in Canada. It’s well worth the effort to do so – past winners say that being recognized by their peers is incredibly fulfilling and meaningful to them.

If you think you know someone who fits that description but aren’t sure about nominating them, check out the criteria for the member-nominated recognition awards as well as some past recipients:

• The Emerging Leader Award honours future leaders in the higher education field.
• The Ken Clements Distinguished Administrator Award recognizes an administrator who has made an extraordinary contribution to the advancement of higher education administration and has demonstrated outstanding leadership.
• The Distinguished Service Award is granted to persons who have made a significant contribution to CAUBO and the management of higher education over a long period of time, upon the conclusion of their career in university administration.

The awards will be presented in a special ceremony on the Tuesday morning of the CAUBO 2016 Annual Conference in Quebec City.

Nominations close April 8, 2016. Please submit your nominations by email to clymburner@caubo.ca or by fax to 613-563-7739. Find the nomination form here.

What kind of projects win Q&P Awards? We won’t tell you – we’d rather show you!

The CAUBO Q&P Awards are the Oscars of best practices in higher education administration. There are cash prizes, a ceremony at the annual conference, a dedicated section in the summer issue of University Manager, and videos featuring the winning projects. The best way for us to show you what the selection committee look for in a winning project is by showing you those videos. You’ll see that the most  successful ideas and projects are often dazzling in their simplicity.

Ready to see your university’s project on the big screens at the 2016 conference? Find the application form and tell us why you should be a Q&P award winner!

The submission deadline for the 2016 Awards is January 15, 2016. So go ahead – show off your achievements! We’re waiting to reward them.

Want to understand university research better? Get online with CAUBO this winter!

CAUBO’s popular online course “Fundamentals of the Research Enterprise” returns starting January 11, 2016! Over seven weeks, this course assists university administrators in understanding the overall context of university research, including its funding, regulation, and administration, explains why so many areas of the university are involved in research administration, and explores some of the challenges that arise from the sharing of responsibilities between the university and researcher, as well as the balancing of resource allocation between the university’s two principal missions of teaching and research.

The course is delivered in a hybrid format consisting of independent study and group study. The independent study materials are provided to participants in the form of PDFs; Live Learning Sessions are delivered via virtual meeting. All course participants will take part in a Technical Orientation session to help them get comfortable with the technology used to deliver this course.

Course dates: January 11 – February 25, 2016
Registration Fee: $550

The course has limited space and will be filled on a first come, first served basis so don’t wait – Get more information or register now!
* Please note this online course is being offered to CAUBO institutional members only.

Announcing the Pat Hibbitts Professional Development Bursary

Sadly and unexpectedly, in June 2015 the CAUBO Community lost one of its most active and distinguished members: Patricia Hibbitts, known to most as Pat. Her participation in the advancement of the higher education administration sector was unparalleled. A huge supporter of and believer in life-long learning and in the education sector as a whole, Pat was passionate about education from many perspectives, an avid learner and a substantial contributor when it came to presenting and sharing her experiences and insight.

In Pat’s honour, and in support of her commitment to continuing education, CAUBO has established a professional development bursary. Annually, CAUBO will extend a complimentary conference registration (including a pre-conference seminar) to one institutional member.

To be eligible for this bursary you must:

• Be currently employed at a CAUBO member university in one of the following functional areas: Academic Administration, Facilities Management, Finance, Human Resources, Internal Audit, Procurement, Risk Management, Taxes, Treasury & Investment
• Have been working for three years or less in a university environment (at time of application)
• Not have attended a CAUBO annual conference before

Applications for the bursary may be self-submitted or submitted by a supervisor; however, all applications must have supervisor sign-off to ensure that the recipient has approval to attend the conference. One recipient will be selected annually by lottery from the pool of all eligible submissions.

The deadline to submit applications for the bursary is January 31, 2016. The winner will be notified by February 15, 2016. Download an application form today!

Save the date: Harness the Power of Collaboration at CAUBO 2016 in Quebec City!

With the globalization of knowledge, how can universities constantly adapt to an ever more competitive backdrop and increasing pressure on their operating budgets? Collaboration may very well be the answer.  Indeed, collaboration allows universities to better operate and deliver Canadians quality higher education and high-end research results that contribute to global prosperity.

CAUBO would like to extend our thanks to all members of the Conference Coordination Teams who have been working very hard planning the conference content, and also to acknowledge the very high calibre of the presentation proposals we received for this year’s conference. These contributions will all help to create an exceptional 2016 conference experience for our delegates. Thank you!

Registration for the conference will open in February 2016, but you can book your conference accommodations now. Hotel information is available on the CAUBO 2016 website.

Watch for the conference section in the Spring 2016 issue of University Manager for full program details. We hope to see you in Quebec City in June!

Advanced Resource Management Workshop in Toronto: register now

CAUBO is pleased to present a one-and-a-half-day workshop on advanced resource management in Toronto on November 16 and 17, 2015, facilitated by Andrew L. Laws, Managing Director, Huron Consulting Group.

In an effort to manage resources effectively, administrators often look to budget models for answers. This workshop will consider if and to what extent such resource allocation models can effectively contribute to sustainability in a financially-constrained environment. We will explore the wide spectrum of resource allocation models, the importance of linking incentives and other elements to the strategic plan and, most importantly, seek answers to key questions that must be contemplated to ensure that a change in model helps drive positive change.

Some of the questions that will be explored are:

• What are the key elements of a successful resource allocation model?
• How can we successfully implement a new budget model that will help minimize challenges and maximize expected results?
• How do incentives impact decision-making and behaviours?
• How does understanding marginal revenue and costs associated with programs contribute to program optimization?

Those who may find this workshop useful include VPs Administration and Finance, Provosts and VPs Academic, controllers, planning officers and budget directors. All CAUBO members are welcome to participate.

The workshop will be held at the Hyatt Regency Toronto, 370 King Street West, Toronto.  Click here for full details or to register now for the workshop.

GST Public Service Body Rebates Update

Representatives from CAUBO and the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) met with Finance Canada in June to voice concerns regarding recent changes to the claim periods for GST Public Service Body Rebates.

CAUBO and FCM representatives clearly illustrated the administrative impact of this change for universities and municipalities, as well as potential implementation and auditing challenges for the CRA.  CAUBO also produced data over a three year period that indicated typical delays in payment of invoices outside of the month an invoice is issued from one large Canadian University.

Both groups strongly urged Finance Canada to reverse the CRA decision or, as a last resort, to find a reasonable compromise on time frames for claim periods. As an alternative, Finance Canada officials suggested a 6-month claim period might accommodate the processing times for most rebate claims (e.g. revised GST returns would only be required to cover invoices taking longer than 6 months to process.) CAUBO and FCM expressed strongly that 6 months would not be acceptable.

Finance Canada provided clarification on the reason for the change—the changes to claim periods were primarily a response by CRA under their legal interpretation of the Excise Tax Act. Finance Canada officials also indicated that even if they wanted to make a legislative change (although none was offered), it would not be possible until after the federal election in October.

Finance Canada officials committed to discuss the issue further with the CRA and will reach out to FCM and CAUBO with potential solutions. We have been informed that Finance Canada has had a number of discussions with the CRA on the issues raised during the meeting. Finance Canada also committed to outlining the meeting outcomes in writing. However, this outline has not yet been received; CAUBO plans to follow up with them shortly on this matter.

We would like to thank everyone who provided CAUBO with a letter of support. In total, close to 50 letters of support were sent to Finance Canada, demonstrating that CAUBO had strong support from its members on this issue.

Communications in a University Context: Guide and Strategies documents now available online!

CAUBO’s newest resources for university administrators focus on the unique communications challenges posed by working in a university environment and offer support and solutions in two distinct documents:

The Guide to Communications in a University Context provides university administrators with an understanding of the university context, its stakeholders, and their particular traditions, culture, roles, and relationships with the intent of helping administrators develop and deliver communications that achieve a positive impact. Members who are new to a management role or new to higher education will find this guide to be of particular value.

As a companion to the Guide, CAUBO developed Strategies for Communicating in a University Context to provide a series of concrete approaches that help ensure that communications are on message, focused, and clear. Together, these documents prepare administrators to produce successful communications that facilitate positive outcomes.

Let us know what you think of these new resources! Contact David Elliott, Professional Development Coordinator, at delliott@caubo.ca.

Tax Hotline for CAUBO members now live

As announced in June, CAUBO has retained KPMG to develop university-specific tax resources for members. These resources are currently in development and will consist of a series of interpretive notes covering key university-specific issues in the areas of income tax and sales tax (GST/HST/QST).

We also indicated to you that as part of this agreement, in addition to the development of the tax notes, a tax hotline would be made available to CAUBO members to allow you to communicate with KPMG Indirect Tax and Income Tax practitioners located across Canada regarding questions about university-specific tax issues.

That hotline is now live and can be accessed by email at caubotax@kpmg.ca or by phone at 1-800-663-1280. By phone, please ask for Jennifer Boychuk, Raj Sharma or Brad Perkins.

If you have questions or feedback about this service, please contact Elizabeth Taylor at etaylor@caubo.ca.

CAUBO Online Courses: register now for fall and winter offerings

CAUBO’s popular online courses “University Culture and Governance” (UCG) and “Fundamentals of the Research Enterprise” (FORE) are both being offered in the next few months. UCG runs from October 26-November 27, 2015 and the FORE course runs from January 11-February 25, 2016. The registration fee for each course is $550; courses are open to all CAUBO members. Registration for UCG is open now; FORE registration will open shortly.

Fundamental Concepts for Working Effectively in Universities: one-day French-language workshop in Montreal

CAUBO is pleased to present a one-day workshop in Montreal on Thursday, November 26, 2015, tailored to meet the needs of our francophone members, composed of key content drawn from CAUBO’s two online courses “University Culture and Governance” (UCG) and “Fundamentals of the Research Enterprise” (FORE).

The UCG course helps both new and established administrators to better understand the unique characteristics of universities including governance, tenure, and academic freedom. This knowledge can help administrators function more effectively within the university environment and increase their capacity to drive results.

Research is one of the three main pillars of a university’s existence, affecting everyone on campus, including students, faculty and administrative staff. The FORE course provides an overview of the research enterprise, including its funding, regulation, administration, and impact on the entire institution. Learn more about how your work in administration supports the research enterprise, directly or indirectly.

The English versions of these courses have received many positive evaluations, and CAUBO is eager to share this content with our francophone members. New managers or staff new to higher education administration will find this content particularly useful; however, we have had many participants with a decade or more of experience in higher education who have found great value in these two courses.

The workshop will take place on November 26 at the Delta Montreal. For more details or to register now for this great professional development opportunity, click here.

University Culture and Governance Online Course Registration Now Open!

The next offering of CAUBO’s online course “University Culture and Governance” will take place from October 27 – November 27, 2015. Space is limited so sign up early to guarantee your spot!

This course provides a comprehensive overview of university culture and governance. Its objective is to help administrators, both new and established, to better understand the university context and work more effectively and efficiently within the unique university environment.

The course fee is $550. Click here to learn more and register now!

Financial Sustainability report now online

A recent report commissioned by CAUBO on the topic of financial sustainability is now available from the CAUBO website. Entitled “Canada’s Universities: Cost Pressures, Business Models and Financial Sustainability,” this discussion paper, written by consultant Ken Snowdon, focuses on identifying and examining the cost pressures and financial challenges that are an integral part of the Canadian higher education business model. The paper is intended to provide sufficient information and analysis to stimulate discussion and focus attention on fundamentals – key ingredients to ‘improving the odds’ for a financially sustainable future. Click here to read the report.

Representing your interests!

GST Public Service Body Rebates

CAUBO has heard from a number of members who have recently received a letter from CRA regarding claim periods for GST Public Service Body Rebates. We wanted to let members know that we understand the importance of this issue and its impact on our members, and are liaising with other interested parties and exploring the option of forming a united front to further press the government on this issue. We encourage universities to provide us with letters of support that can be included in the submission that we will be making to CRA and the Department of Finance and have created a draft template that universities can use for this purpose. It is available for download here. (The French version will be available shortly.) Once completed, letters of support can be sent to the attention of Elizabeth Taylor at the CAUBO National Office: etaylor@caubo.ca. We have also created an open CyberCommunity group where all members can share information on this issue. Click here to access the group.

Tri-Agencies and the concept of materiality associated with internal charges

Following direction from the CAUBO Board, a series of teleconferences were held this winter with university representatives to outline issues related to the documentation and approval requirements for low-dollar value internal charges incurred by research grants.  The documentation phase is now complete and we are currently seeking a meeting with the Tri-Agencies to invite them to work together to address these issues.   We will keep members posted as developments occur.

Reducing the administrative burden in Canada in research management

A project being undertaken jointly by CAUBO, CASRAI and CARA will focus on reducing undue administrative burdens in various research management processes in Canada, and where federal programs are a source of this burden, to support/inform efforts at Industry Canada to achieve a tangible reduction of the burden. A Steering Committee composed of representatives from CAUBO and CASRAI will oversee this project, whose objectives are to (1) understand the various issues from the perspectives of the diverse stakeholders; (2) identify and prioritize specific issues where tangible solutions are most feasible; (3) convene a working group of subject matter experts to collaboratively develop the documentation and proposed standards for the identified solution; and (4) develop plans for implementation within the local systems of affected stakeholders.

Meetings with Industry Canada are expected to take place this fall. We will keep members apprised with regard to developments on this project.

Universities may soon invest in limited partnership vehicles

CAUBO was pleased to see that Federal Budget 2015 proposes amendments to the Income Tax Act which will allow Canadian public universities, as registered charities, to invest in limited partnership vehicles as a passive investor.  This issue had been raised jointly by CAUBO and the Pension Investment Association of Canada (PIAC) in a letter to the Minister of Finance requesting amendments to section 253.1. Click here to learn more.

Here’s what you told us: Highlights from the CAUBO member networking survey

As reported in the 2014 summer issue, CAUBO announced the impending retirement of the CyberCommunity given that members identified it was not a conducive mechanism to support their need for peer to peer collaboration and networking. CAUBO committed to gain a better understanding of member needs in this area and to identify alternative solutions.

As such, in January 2015 CAUBO conducted a member networking survey.  We received a total of 250 completed responses. Our sincere thanks to everyone who completed the survey!

The feedback that was collected will inform and guide decisions for a replacement for the CAUBO CyberCommunity and help the CAUBO community stay connected.

Survey result highlights

A large majority of respondents (ranging from 92% to 95%) indicated that the ability to dialogue with peers was “important” or “very important” regardless of where those peers worked or whether they worked in similar jobs.

Sharing good practices and documents were clearly identified as the top motives for respondents to dialogue with peers online, with 95% of respondents citing sharing of good practices and 87% citing sharing of documents.

Email was found to far exceed any other means of online dialogue being used by respondents, at 85%, versus just 26% using LinkedIn and 12% using Facebook.
When asked how frequently they actively communicate with peers through online platforms, more than 70% of respondents answered “As a question or problem arises,” which indicates that online dialogue is not seen as a daily or even weekly activity among members.

Nearly 66% of respondents indicated that the information they would want to share is of a sensitive nature and would need to be restricted to a controlled group of participants.

In terms of what role CAUBO should play in facilitating online dialogue, a majority of respondents think that CAUBO should administer groups, archive and store responses, and provide a technical platform.

Stay tuned for details on CAUBO member communication tools in the upcoming year!

Don’t forget to send in your nominations for the 2015 CAUBO Recognition Awards! 

Do you know a CAUBO member whose dedication and commitment to volunteerism on behalf of their field makes them a shining star? Please take the time to nominate him or her for a 2015 CAUBO Recognition Award. It’s the perfect way to acknowledge and thank someone for their valuable contributions to the field of higher education administration in Canada.
CAUBO honours its volunteers through five distinct awards:

• The Emerging Leader Award honours future leaders in the higher education field.
• The Leadership in Learning Award honours a member’s contributions to CAUBO’s professional development efforts.
• The Ken Clements Distinguished Administrator Award recognizes an administrator who has made an extraordinary contribution to the advancement of higher education administration and has demonstrated outstanding leadership.
• The Distinguished Service Award is granted to persons who have made a significant contribution to CAUBO and the management of higher education over a long period of time.
• Honorary Membership is granted upon their retirement to former representatives of member institutions who have rendered exceptional service in promoting the purposes for which CAUBO stands.

Click on each award’s name to read the criteria for nominating one of your colleagues.

The awards will be presented in a special ceremony on the Tuesday morning of the CAUBO 2015 Annual Conference in Saint John, New Brunswick.

Nominations close April 3, 2015. Please submit your nominations by email to ALarabieChase@caubo.ca or by fax to 613-563-7739. To download a nomination form, click here.

Two Upcoming FREE webinars!

Using an Active Shooter Scenario Video to Strengthen Campus Safety

May 12, 2015, 12:00 – 1:30 p.m. ET
The University of Alberta has successfully used a video about responding to an active shooter scenario, along with associated support materials, to improve safety on their campus for faculty, students and staff. Presenters Philip Stack, Associate Vice-President, Risk Management Services, University of Alberta and Terry Langley, Staff Sergeant, Edmonton Police Service will share their success story and explain how you can effectively use this video on your own campus. You can view the video here: http://protectiveservices.ualberta.ca/information/safety/activeshooter

The Story the Numbers Tell

May 29, 2015, 12:00 – 1:30 p.m. ET
The University of Colorado successfully turned their annual report on its head by rethinking the way they share financial information. Robert C. Kuehler, Assistant Vice President/University Controller and Travis Chillemi, Strategic Communication Technology Manager from the University of Colorado will provide an overview of the “The Illustrated Guide to the Annual Financial Report,” showing how the information was rethought and repackaged to be more user-friendly.

Robert and Travis will also provide an overview of the business case they made for this approach and how they effectively managed this change initiative, and will discuss the benefits that the University of Colorado experienced and the lessons they learned from making their financial statements more accessible.

Participants will be able to send text messages to the speakers through the GoToWebinar tool in order to ask questions and make comments.

Registration for these FREE webinars will open soon – watch the CAUBO website for details!

2015 Q&P Awards: Show us your best!

CAUBO is now accepting submissions for the 28th annual Quality and Productivity (Q&P) Awards.  This is a great opportunity for you to share your institution’s innovative ideas and success stories with your colleagues across Canada!

The Awards are split into two main categories: Open and Themed. As universities continue to cope with financial challenges across the country, once again this year the theme will be “Achieving and Demonstrating Operational Effectiveness within Higher Education Administration.”  The Open category considers submissions that fall under any other topic.

Three national prizes are awarded in each category, and each of these prizes carry a cash award – $2500 for first prize, $1500 for second prize, and $1000 for third prize. There are opportunities for Honourable Mentions in both categories, but no cash prize is attached to these awards.

The application form is available for download here.

The submission deadline for the 2015 Q&P Awards is January 16, 2015. Please note that this is significantly earlier than in previous years. We can’t wait to see what’s happening at your institutions this year!

Strategic Planning Update

Members of the CAUBO Board of Directors and National Committee Chairs met in early December to discuss the work completed so far on the strategic plan for 2015-2020. Work on the plan is ongoing; watch for more information in the January issue of University Manager magazine.

CAUBO’s University Investment Survey gets a major redesign 

The popular and well-regarded University Investment Survey is currently undergoing a complete redevelopment, led by CAUBO analytical staff and supported by a member working group that includes two members of the Treasury and Investment Committee, as well as members who work in the IT and Institutional Research fields who volunteered to provide technical input.

The new system will allow for improved ad-hoc reporting and trend reporting, and will better allow for future updates. Based on user feedback, more detail will be added in key information areas, while underutilized portions will be eliminated. Respondents completing the survey will see a more streamlined process with improved ease of data entry, while users of the report will see similar data to that previously published, but with added detail with regard to asset allocation in particular.

Members who completed last year’s survey will automatically receive notification to participate in the 2014 survey in January 2015.  Others who may be interested in participating should contact Elizabeth Taylor, CAUBO Analyst, at etaylor@caubo.ca.

Follow the Tides of Change to Saint John for CAUBO 2015! 

Are you planning to attend CAUBO 2015 in charming Saint John, New Brunswick? Here’s what awaits you:

If you haven’t yet booked your hotel room for CAUBO 2015 in Saint John, rooms are still available at one of the two conference host hotels, the Delta Brunswick (soon to be a Four Points by Sheraton). Click here to visit the conference website for more information about accommodations. We look forward to seeing you on the East Coast in June!

Happy Holidays!

The staff of the CAUBO National Office in Ottawa extend our best wishes to each of you for a happy, safe and relaxing holiday season!  CAUBO Connection will return in the new year.

Deferred Maintenance Report now available!

In June, CAUBO published “Deferred Maintenance at Canadian Universities: An Update,” its new analytical report containing data collected during a study conducted in fall 2013. The report is now available to read on CAUBO’s website by clicking here.

We welcome your feedback and your suggestions for further study on this or on other aspects of university administration. Please contact Elizabeth Taylor, Analyst at etaylor@caubo.ca if you have questions about the report.

Fall Workshop: Higher Education Budgeting Basics: Concepts, Creation, and Connections

Save the date! On November 27 and 28 in downtown Toronto, this two-day highly interactive beginner-level workshop will focus on basic higher education budgeting concepts, budget development and management, and its connection to an organization’s mission and goals.  Participants will be provided with practical tools and strategies to apply to their day-to-day work, and will gain a greater understanding of their institution’s budgeting practices and higher education finances in general. Registration will open shortly; watch the CAUBO website for details.

Fundamentals of the Research Enterprise (FORE) Course: Limited spaces still available for fall offering!

CAUBO’s online FORE course begins on October 6 and runs until December 4. This course will assist university administrators in understanding the overall context of university research, including its funding, regulation, and administration. Registration fee is $550 per person and there are only a few spaces left! Click here to register now before it fills up.

French-language Symposium in Partnership with BCI

CAUBO and the Bureau de coopération interuniversitaire (BCI) have joined forces to present the first-ever joint Francophone symposium for financial services professionals, at the Chateau Laurier Hotel in Quebec City, October 30 and 31, 2014. Representatives from finance departments at francophone universities outside of Quebec are welcome to attend what promises to be a great event. Registrations for the event are now being accepted; please click here (French only) for more information and to register.

CAUBO Strategic Planning Survey Coming Soon

CAUBO’s 2015-2020 strategic planning process is now underway, and will continue throughout the fall and winter. The first step in the process is asking members what they need to perform their role as effectively as possible. To that end, a survey will be sent out to all of our members in the coming weeks, asking for your opinions and ideas about how CAUBO can help you excel, innovate, and grow, in order to better meet the challenges faced by university administrators at institutions across Canada. When you see the survey, please do take the time to complete it. We need all of your feedback to ensure that the plan accurately reflects your needs.

The new strategic plan will be presented to members for review and approval at the 2015 Annual General Meeting in Saint John, NB. We look forward to sharing it with you!

CAUBO 2015 Website Launch 

The website for the CAUBO 2015 Conference “Tides of Change” in Saint John, New Brunswick will go live in mid-September, with information about accommodations, transportation and tourism.  Watch the front page of the CAUBO website for the link under Highlighted Events! Conference registration will open in February 2015. Please note that due to space constraints in Saint John, registration for the 2015 conference will be limited and will likely sell out by the early-bird deadline. We recommend registering early to avoid disappointment.

Reminder: CAUBO members pay member prices for NACUBO and EACUBO events! 

In an effort to expand your professional development opportunities, CAUBO has partnered with NACUBO and its Eastern chapter, EACUBO, to offer reciprocal member pricing on events. Visit www.nacubo.org for a list of upcoming events. If you see an event you’d like to participate in, click here or contact the CAUBO National Office (clymburner@caubo.ca) for the appropriate discount code.

CAUBO 2014 – Making it Happen in Victoria

Nearly 700 delegates helped make it happen at CAUBO 2014 in Victoria, BC from June 15-17. The city welcomed delegates with beautiful weather, keynote speaker Jon Montgomery brought his fantastic Olympic attitude – and his gold medal – to the party, and plenary panelists Janni Aragon, Elizabeth Denham and Paul Stokes reminded everyone to be more social and transparent while also keeping privacy in mind.  A night at the Royal BC Museum kicked things off in style, and Beatles cover band The Sutcliffes sent everyone home with a twist and shout!

A gallery of photographs from the 2014 conference is available here. If you attended the conference and want to check out sessions you missed, or review ones you attended, the CAUBO Live Learning Centre has now been updated with all available 2014 recorded content. Access is free for all 2014 delegates, and can be purchased by session, by topic or by full conference package for those who were unable to make it to Victoria.

We hope to see you at CAUBO 2015 in Saint John, NB, June 14-16, 2015!

Register today for CAUBO’s online course “Fundamentals of the Research Enterprise”

This course assists university administrators in understanding the overall context of university research, including its funding, regulation, and administration. It will explain why so many areas of the university are involved in research administration, and will explore some of the challenges that arise from the sharing of responsibilities between the university and researcher, as well as the balancing of resource allocation between the university’s two principal missions of teaching and research.

Dates: October 6 – December 4, 2014

Registration Fee: $550

Maximum of 16 participants

For a complete course description, please click here.

Format:

The FORE course is delivered in a hybrid format consisting of both independent and group study. The independent study materials are provided to participants in the form of PDFs; live learning sessions are delivered via virtual meeting. All course participants will take part in a technical orientation session to help them get comfortable with the technology used to deliver this course.

Register Now – For complete course details and to register, please click here!

The course has limited space and will be filled on a first come, first served basis.

* Please note this online course is offered to employees of Canadian Universities only.
PHAC Webinar – Registration Now Open!

CAUBO/CAURA Webinar: Human Pathogens and Toxins Act and Biological Risk Management in Canadian Universities

Thursday, September 25th, 2014
12:00 to 13:30 ET

Presenter: Sandra Fry, Director General, Centre for Biosecurity, Public Health Agency of Canada.

In this interactive webinar, the Centre for Biosecurity will present a summary of the Human Pathogens and Toxins Act, as well as biosafety and biosecurity program updates at the Public Health Agency of Canada to support the full implementation of this Act. The Agency recognises that any program and regulatory framework must be evidence based and proportional to the risks. In this vein, some risks will be presented that have been associated with research activities, for a discussion of proposed strategies to reduce biosafety risks while minimising additional regulatory burden on academic institutions. Finally, preliminary analysis of input received from the public comment process on the proposed Human Pathogens and Toxins Regulations will be presented.

This webinar builds upon the presentations given by Ms. Fry at the pre-conference risk management seminar at the CAUBO Annual Conference and Dr. Kirsten Mattison at the CAURA Annual Conference; both this past June.

The capacity for this event will be 100 participants. Given the limited space we encourage you to register early. You are encouraged to have one or more colleagues join in the same room. This way you can discuss the webinar easily afterwards and this will allow for more participation in the event.

Click here to register now!

REMINDER: CAUBO 2015 Call for Presentation Proposals now open!

Share your expertise, experience and efforts to strive towards excellence with your peers! CAUBO is seeking conference presentations for 2015 that demonstrate new approaches and innovative thinking in higher education administration.

The theme for the 2015 conference is “Tides of Change.”  This is reflective of the power of the tides of the Bay of Fundy, the highest tides in the world, and the emerging energy sector in New Brunswick, with Saint John centered as the energy hub for the Province.  Universities have seen significant fundamental changes of late, at times in tumultuous environments, and must embrace change and harness its energy to compete and excel in the future.

Submissions will be considered for one or both of the following opportunities:

A pre-conference presentation for one of eight functional-area-specific seminars
A 75-minute concurrent session at CAUBO’s Annual Conference

Please include a summary of the two to four main content elements of your presentation. Submissions will be accepted from universities/colleges as well as our corporate partners; however, all corporate presentations must include a university/college co-presenter.

Click here to learn more and complete the submission form. Send us your ideas today! The deadline for submissions is September 4, 2014.

Volunteer with CAUBO!

CAUBO relies on the engagement and active participation of members in order to deliver the right products and services to meet members’ needs. CAUBO’s Board of Directors, National Committees and Conference Coordination Teams are all composed of volunteers. Many of the presenters at CAUBO’s annual conference, annual workshops and webinars are also volunteers.

We are always looking for new volunteers. There are many ways for you to get involved with CAUBO’s programs and services. If you are interested in becoming a volunteer with CAUBO for the 2014-2015 year, please complete our form.

Why volunteer with CAUBO?

• Take on a leadership role and hone your skills
• Stay on the leading edge of higher ed issues
• Learn and grow personally and professionally
• Make valuable peer contacts and build relationships
• Have your work recognized and rewarded

If you have questions about volunteering with CAUBO, please contact Elizabeth Taylor, Analyst at etaylor@caubo.ca.

Seeking member input on issues that affect you

CAUBO University Investment Survey review

The CAUBO Treasury & Investment Committee is reviewing the content and structure of the Investment Survey report, and is asking for members’ feedback through an online survey.  Your comments will help us to ensure the Investment Survey reflects current investment management practice and that we provide the most relevant possible information to our members.

The online survey covers both the endowment and pension reports and the main report and supplement, and applies to report users and survey respondents. Depending on which and how many of these roles you represent, the survey will take up to 20 minutes to complete; we recommend that you have a recent report at hand for reference.  If you have any questions regarding the survey, please contact George Dew (gdew@caubo.ca).  Thank you for providing your valuable feedback!

Talk to us about taxes!

CAUBO is currently running a survey to help us learn about members’ information needs in the areas of sales and income tax.  The survey asks you to identify what type of tax resources you need to assist you in your day-to-day work, what resources you currently use, and what key subject areas are of interest to you. It should only take you a few minutes to complete, and will help us better direct our services to members. Click here to get started.

Public Service Body Rebates

Members dealing with GST/HST/QST issues should be aware of a recent Canada Revenue Agency administrative announcement regarding Public Service Body rebates, which may impact your administrative procedures.  CAUBO, with the support of the Taxes Committee, is currently working to determine whether it is possible to alleviate the impact of this change.  Members are asked to inform CAUBO if this issue arises through a CRA audit or in other communications with the agency. More information about this issue is available here.

Collaborative Procurement across Canada

Collaboration in one form or another seems to be a common theme among universities in all parts of this country.  CAUBO’s Procurement Committee asked members from each region to offer some insight into the collaboration initiatives, efforts, and challenges they are currently experiencing. Click here to read about what’s happening in collaborative procurement across Canada right now.

CAUBO 2014: Still time to register!

Don’t miss CAUBO 2014 “Making it Happen!” in beautiful Victoria, B.C.! Nearly 500 delegates have already registered for what’s sure to be an amazing event. Hear inspiring keynote, plenary and session speakers, enjoy warm west coast hospitality, and reconnect with friends and colleagues from across Canada.

This year the popular pre-conference seminars move to Sunday, and a brand-new seminar on the topic of Ancillary Services, coordinated by NACAS, has been added to the schedule.

It’s not too late – click here to register now! We’ll be waiting for you on the west coast.

ICR Report now available

CAUBO recently released a report on the Indirect Costs of Research (ICR). This report presents the results of a survey administered jointly with CAURA in spring 2013 and reviews key areas of policy and practice with regards to ICR at Canadian Institutions.

This initial study provides us with a current snapshot of the “state of the union” and, as such, is intended to help build a foundation for further work on this issue.

It is acknowledged that to be successful, any such future exercise must be driven by a common desire by all stakeholders (administrators, researchers and sponsors) to improve awareness, understanding, management and level of funding of this critical expense.  We hope the information contained in this report will form the basis of productive discussions towards that end and thus solicit your cooperation in sharing this report with all relevant stakeholders at your institution.

Building bridges with NACUBO

CAUBO is pleased to announce a partnership with NACUBO (the National Association of College and University Business Officers). In this partnership, effective immediately, CAUBO and NACUBO will link to one another’s websites and extend member pricing to the other association’s members for event registration and product purchases.

CAUBO members wishing to participate in a NACUBO program or purchase a product should contact the CAUBO National Office (clymburner@caubo.ca) for the appropriate discount code. NACUBO members wishing to participate in a CAUBO event or purchase a CAUBO product on the CAUBO website will be extended member pricing by selecting “member price.” CAUBO staff will confirm their status as an employee of a NACUBO member institution.

“I’m very happy to see us building bridges between our two associations for the benefit of all our members and of the higher education sector.”

– Nathalie Laporte, Executive Director, CAUBO

“While our educational systems may be different, we share common issues and opportunities to learn from one another.”

– John Walda, NACUBO CEO

This agreement does not include subscriptions to either CAUBO’s magazine University Manager or NACUBO’s magazine Business Officer, nor does it include access to electronic communications or online discussion groups or communities. Institutions will have to maintain membership in the other association in order to receive the full suite of member benefits and to receive member communications.

For more information about this partnership, please contact CAUBO at clymburner@caubo.ca or 613-230-6760 ext. 340 or contact NACUBO member services at membership@nacubo.org or 202-861-2560.

Investment Survey

The annual University Investment Survey will be opening soon, and an invitation to participate has been sent by e-mail to last year’s participants as well to as members who have expressed an interest in participating for 2013.  If you would like to participate in the survey and receive the report, please contact George Dew (gdew@caubo.ca) if you have not received this invitation by the end of January.

2014 CAUBO Recognition Awards – Send Us Your Stars!

Do you know a CAUBO member whose dedication and commitment to volunteerism on behalf of their field makes them a shining star? Please take the time to nominate him or her for a 2014 CAUBO Recognition Award. It’s the perfect way to acknowledge and thank someone for their valuable contributions to the field of higher education administration in Canada.

CAUBO honours its volunteers through five distinct awards:

• The Emerging Leader Award honours future leaders in the higher education field.
• The Leadership in Learning Award honours a member’s contributions to CAUBO’s professional development efforts.
• The Ken Clements Distinguished Administrator Award recognizes an administrator who has made an extraordinary contribution to the advancement of higher education administration and has demonstrated outstanding leadership.
• The Distinguished Service Award is granted to persons who have made a significant contribution to CAUBO and the management of higher education over a long period of time.
• Honorary Membership is granted upon their retirement to former representatives of member institutions who have rendered exceptional service in promoting the purposes for which CAUBO stands.

Click on each award’s name to read the criteria for nominating one of your colleagues.

The awards will be presented in a special ceremony on the Tuesday morning of the CAUBO 2014 Annual Conference in Victoria, British Columbia.

Nominations close March 28, 2014. Please submit your nominations by email to clymburner@caubo.ca or by fax to 613-563-7739. To download a nomination form, click here.

CAUBO 2014 Registration opening soon!

Online registration for the CAUBO 2014 Conference “Make it Happen!” in Victoria, B.C. will open in mid-February. All members will receive an email from CAUBO when registration goes live. In the meantime, check out the conference website for information on travel and accommodations and click here to view a 60-second video about the conference. We hope to see you there!

What You Missed at CAUBO 2013 – video

CAUBO 2013 welcomed more than 500 delegates to Hamilton, Ontario for three days of informative sessions and vibrant networking events. If you didn’t attend the conference, click here to see a 60-second snapshot of what you missed!

New CAUBO study on deferred maintenance

Deferred maintenance remains a significant problem at many Canadian universities.  With municipal and provincial governments again raising concerns about their own growing infrastructure needs, a set of good national data is needed to help university administrators and policymakers understand and communicate the scope of this issue.

In response to this need, CAUBO is undertaking a study with the intent of creating a report that will provide current information on the amount and potential impact of deferred maintenance at Canadian universities. This will build on a previous study conducted in 1999-2000 while providing better and more consistent data.

Sightlines, a company that specializes in benchmarking and analytics of educational facilities, has been selected via an RFP process to complete this study, with support from the CAUBO national office and the Facilities Management committee. The project will officially kick off this month and all CAUBO member institutions will be contacted to solicit their participation. Your input will help establish credible information at the national and regional level. Participating institutions will also have on-line access to their information and analysis, offering them insight into where their institutions stand relative to their peers.

We have contacted facilities management staff members at CAUBO member institutions to seek their participation in the survey.  If you are the senior facilities staff person at your institution and you have not heard from us, please contact George Dew, Senior Analyst, at gdew@caubo.ca.

New CAUBO Tax Webinar Series Starts October 25!

CAUBO, in collaboration with Ryan Canadian Sales Tax Consultants, is pleased to present a series of three new tax webinars that will cover the topics of sales tax, GST/HST and QST, and taxable benefits. These webinars will be presented live on-line, and participants will have the opportunity to ask questions of the presenter.

Webinar Dates and Topics:

Webinar 1 – Introduction to Sales Tax in Canada
October 25, 2013 – 12:00-13:30 EDT

This webinar will review the most important issues posed by Canada’s value-added and retail sales taxes, including what taxes to charge and when, documentation requirements, and recovery of taxes paid, as well as the impact of sales tax on cross-border transactions.

Webinar 2 – GST/HST and QST – Impact on Universities and Colleges
November 19, 2013 – 12:00-13:30 EST

Complying with GST/HST and QST legislation can be challenging for universities and colleges due to their status as exempt organizations. To help participants navigate these complex rules, this webinar will outline the various exemptions for supplies provided by public sector/service bodies, public institutions and universities and colleges.

Webinar 3 – Sales Tax Implications of Taxable Benefits
January 14, 2014 – 12:00-13:30 EST

This webinar will include a detailed review of the application of GST, HST and QST to automobile standby charges and operating costs, and provide insight and guidance on other items that may qualify as a taxable benefit.

Please note that these webinars will be offered in English and are open only to employees of Canadian universities and colleges or Higher Education associations.

Cost:

CAUBO Members: $100 per webinar or $220 for all three
Non-Member Higher Education Institutions: $130 per webinar or $300 for all three

For more details or to register for the webinars, click here. Please note that registration for Webinar 1 as well as for the full webinar series is now open; registration for webinars 2 and 3 will open on October 18, 2013.

Reminder: Reporting Financial Information for Lobbyist Registration

CAUBO member institutions registered as lobbying organizations under the requirements of the Lobbying Act are reminded that the financial information reported in the registry is to be updated subsequent to the release of the Financial Information of Universities and Colleges (FIUC) report each year.  Specific reporting requirements, as agreed by CAUBO and the Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying, are:

• It is understood that CAUBO members will use exclusively the financial information contained in the published FIUC report.  For this purpose the FIUC report will be considered the only authoritative source of public information on government funding received by a university.
• niversities must report the sources and total amounts shown on each of the first eleven lines of the report “Income by Fund: by Type and by University” when completing the list of government funding received.  The breakdown required is understood to be limited to these specific lines.
• The update to reported financial information is to be completed within fifteen days of the end of the month in which the updated information became publicly available.  The report is considered to be publicly available as of the date on which its release is announced by Statistics Canada.Given that there is a significant lag in the issuance of the FIUC report for a given financial year, the Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying recognizes that the government funding data reported by an institution may lag by a year to eighteen months.  Officials will not question such data unless it is clear that a new FIUC report has been released and an institution has failed to update its financial information within the required time period.Requirement to Register

Universities are responsible for determining if they should register as lobbying organizations and for complying with regulations regarding registration and reporting.  Specific information is available at http://www.ocl-cal.gc.ca.  The following key points are provided for reference but should not be considered complete or definitive.

• The definition of lobbying includes communicating with a public office holder, for payment in respect of:
  • The development of any legislative proposal;
  • Introduction, defeat or amendment of any Bill or resolution;
  • Making or amendment of any regulation;
  • Development or amendment of any policy or program;
  • Awarding of any grant, contribution or other financial benefit (note that certain exceptions apply with respect to the federal research funding councils).
• A not-for-profit organization is required to register and to report lobbying activities if “… one or more paid employees lobby, and the collective time devoted to lobbying amounts to 20% or more of a single equivalent paid employee’s time.”
  Ref:  http://ocl-cal.gc.ca/eic/site/012.nsf/eng/00115.html
• An exception to the registration requirement may apply in the case of faculty members to the extent that they “… communicate an independent opinion on a matter of public policy, and are not paid by their employer or a third party to express that opinion …”
  Ref:  http://ocl-cal.gc.ca/eic/site/012.nsf/eng/00142.html
• Institutions which are registered as lobbyist organizations are required to update on a monthly basis any changes to their registration data, and to report monthly on any oral and arranged telephone or face-to-face meetings with Designated Public Office Holders.Members requiring more information are encouraged to contact the Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying at QuestionsLobbying@ocl-cal.gc.ca.

CAUBO Tax Guides discontinued

The CAUBO Income Tax Guide and the CAUBO Goods and Services Tax (GST) Guide will be removed from service this fall and will no longer be available online through Knotia.

These two guides have not been updated for several years, and maintaining them in their current form cannot be done in a cost-effective manner.  Rather than continuing to produce these very broad guides, CAUBO will take this opportunity to consider how to focus on current, university-specific information needs.  The CAUBO Taxes Committee will be soliciting member input to clarify these needs and determine how we can best meet them.

The existing guides will be archived and will remain available through the CAUBO website.  However, users should be aware that they are not current, and are encouraged to make use of the other information resources available to them for general taxation questions.

Reminder: Indirect Costs of Research survey open until May 24

The Canadian Association of University Business Officers (CAUBO) and the Canadian Association of University Research Administrators (CAURA) are currently conducting a study with the intent of producing an analytical report on the management of indirect costs of research at Canadian universities. The objective is to identify good practices and increase awareness of the impact of indirect costs within the university community.

A link to a survey on current university practices regarding the measurement, recovery and allocation of indirect costs has been sent to the Vice-President, Administration and the Vice-President, Research (or equivalents) of each Canadian university. We value your institution’s input and would appreciate your support in coordinating with your colleagues to ensure that your institution prepares a single response to the survey. The deadline for completion of the survey is May 24. If you have any questions about this study please contact George Dew, CAUBO’s Senior Analyst, at GDew@caubo.ca.

Looking forward: Fall workshop on Project Management

CAUBO member and experienced facilitator Dwight Fischer, Assistant Vice President & CIO at Dalhousie University, has volunteered to present a fall workshop on project management. As with all CAUBO professional development offerings, this topic will be tailored to CAUBO members and addressed within the unique context that we face in the higher education sector.

Dwight has developed and conducted workshops on this topic over the past 15 years. In addition, he has written on this topic and led several enterprise-scale projects at universities and colleges in New England and Nova Scotia.

Workshop dates and location are currently being finalized and will be announced to members as soon as possible. If you’d like to be added to a waiting list to gain access to priority registration for this workshop, please email David Elliott, CAUBO’s Professional Development Coordinator, at delliott@caubo.ca. You won’t want to miss this great professional development opportunity.

New CAUBO online course: pilot in progress, fall offering planned

A pilot version of CAUBO’s new online course entitled Fundamentals of the Research Enterprise (FORE) is now in progress. Click here to read the course overview.

CAUBO plans to offer the FORE course again in the fall (dates to be confirmed), and the waiting list already has over 20 people on it. If you’re interested in participating in the course, please email David Elliott at delliott@caubo.ca to add your name to the list for priority access to registration for future offerings.

CAUBO 2014: Call for Presentation Proposals – Deadline is September 4, 2013!

Share your expertise, experience and efforts to strive towards excellence with your peers! CAUBO is seeking conference presentations for 2014 that demonstrate new approaches and innovative thinking in higher education administration.

Areas of interest include:

• Finance, Treasury, Taxes
• Human Resources / Organizational Development
• Facilities Management / Deferred Maintenance
• Procurement
• IT / Project Management / Business Intelligence
• Auditing and Governance
• Administration at the faculty or service unit level
• Risk Management / Environmental Health and Safety
• Leadership
• Sustainability
• Strategic Planning

The theme for CAUBO 2014 is “Making it Happen.” As University Administrators, we use our expertise, commitment, communication skills and tenacity to “make it happen” – whether “it” means effecting change, ensuring compliance, or building collaboration between academic and administrative units. We are driven to innovate, to problem-solve and to look at issues from every angle in order to move forward successfully. The University of Victoria invites you to come and share your leadership successes, your strategies for making it happen within your own institution, and your action plans for the future.

Submission Criteria

All proposals are due by September 4, 2013. You will be notified of the status of your proposal by the end of January, 2014 at the latest. Click here to complete the submission form.

• Individual or panel formats welcome.
• Submissions will be considered for one or both of the following opportunities:
• A pre-conference session for one of CAUBO’s National Committees (Sunday, June 15, 2014).
• A 75-minute main conference session at CAUBO’s Annual Conference (Monday, June 16 and Tuesday, June 17, 2014).
• Submissions will be accepted from universities/colleges as well as corporations. However, all corporate presentations must include a university/college co-presenter.