After reading all of Ontario’s University SMAs it is clear that they all share the following basic structure, but many of the common metrics had not been compared to each other.
SMA2 (2017-2020) had a few common metrics, but the measures were not always common. The institutional metrics were not common, and many of the measures were difficult to apply without internal data.
SMA3 (2020-2025) has common metrics and measures, though the implementation faced challenges.
This repository includes the information collected from Ontario Universities, and some colleges, for SMA2 and SMA3s.
Ontario University SMA Comparisons Dashboards
This data is analyzed at Matt Clare's Post-Secondary Policy Blog
All Ontario Canada SMAs can be found on the Ontario government's web site for College and university Strategic Mandate Agreements.
In 2013 in Ontario Canada, what is currently known as the Ministry of Colleges and Universities (MCU), but at that point was known as the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities (MTCU), adopted a policy framework that outlined a goal to pursue greater institutional differentiation in the postsecondary education system (MTCU, 2013). Before the 2014 provincial election, work on the framework began under then-minister Brad Duguid during his two-year tenure as Minister of Colleges and Universities. After the 2014 election, the newly appointed minister, Reza Moridi, ultimately signed the first 24 college SMAs and 21 university SMAs on behalf of the Government of Ontario. The framework included incentive funding in areas with system-wide metrics and measurements defined by the government and institutionally identified incremental funding tied to desired outcomes proposed by each postsecondary institution with performance measurements and indicators.
The roadmap for differentiation was first proposed in the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario’s (HEQCO’s) 2010 report, The Benefits of Greater Differentiation of Ontario’s University Sector (Weingarten & Deller, 2010). Following the roadmap that was outlined by Weingarten and Deller (2010), the SMA framework was created by the MTCU in 2013 and individual SMAs were negotiated between MTCU and each university. The MTCU roadmap outlined the path for differentiation and began what has now been three rounds of negotiations between MTCU and individual universities and colleges for the initial period of 2014–2017, the recently completed 2017–2020 SMA2, and the current 2020+ SMA3.
Ontario Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities. (2013). Ontario’s differentiation policy framework for postsecondary education. http://www.tcu.gov.on.ca/pepg/publications/PolicyFramework_PostSec.pdf
Weingarten, H. P., & Deller, F. (2010). The Benefits of greater differentiation of Ontario’s university sector (p. 52). https://heqco.ca/pub/the-benefits-of-greater-differentiation-of-ontarios-university-sector/