By Jordanna Tennebaum
A new shared-credit initiative that aims to improve academic flexibility for post-secondary students won’t be extended to Ryerson University.
Students attending a member institution of the University Transfer Credit Consortium will be able to choose from more than 20 first-year arts and science courses for credit at their home schools.
The seven participants are: Mc Master University, Queen’s University, University of Guelph, University of Ottawa, University of Toronto, the University of Waterloo and Western University.
Members of Ryerson’s administration, however, weren’t aware of the new communal transfer credit system until the consortium issued a press release last week, said Ryerson President Sheldon Levy.
“I would say that after a lot of discussion, that the announcement of the [seven-member organization] was way, way premature. There’s many of them that saw it as a beginning for a more inclusive arrangement of it,” Levy said.
Glen Murray, minister of training, colleges and universities, has expressed his preference for the establishment of a more efficient Ontario-wide transfer credit system an arrangement that Levy said could maximize benefits for Ryerson students.
“I think it’s fair to say that Ryerson would much rather work within the context of the whole system than to be part of any small group,” he said.
In the meantime, students won’t be inhibited by Ryerson’s absence from the consortium, said Keith Alnwick, Ryerson University’s registrar.
“We probably have more established equivalencies than any of the universities on the list. It is unclear that the move would even be a good decision for us,” Alnwick said.
Ryerson University is already a member of a separate transfer credit organization called the Ontario Council of Articulation and Transfer.
It includes membership of all 20 public universities and 24 colleges in Ontario.
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