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Daniel W. Lang fonds Series
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Manuscripts and publications

This series documents Professor Lang’s writings, unpublished and published, over a forty-year period. He has written two books, Financing universities in Ontario (2000) and Mergers in higher education: lessons in theory and practice (2001), which was translated into Chinese and published in Shanghai in 2008. He has contributed chapters to eleven books, and had numerous papers published in refereed journals, along with review essays, other publications, papers, and reports. The research files (some contain original documents) for and a copy of his doctoral thesis, are also present in this series. The titles, where they exist, to these research files were those used by Professor Lang.

The listing of manuscripts and publications is not complete. For a complete listing of Professor Lang’s publications, see his curriculum vitae in B2011-0003/001(01). Some of his reports not present in this series can be found in other series.

Digital files from B2018-0001 include correspondence and drafts for his book Mergers in higher education: lessons in theory and practice (2001), as well as a report for the Atkinson Foundation, A Primer on Formula Funding: A Study of Student-focused Funding in Ontario (2003).

The files contain a combination of correspondence, drafts, background and research material and notes. The arrangement is chronological by date of document or date of publication.

OISE/UT

This series begins with files that Professor Lang’s broad activities within OISE/UT as recorded in his performance assessments, activity reports and course evaluations. There are followed by files on the Provost’s OISE Committee of the late 1970s through the mid-1980s, which include material on the first pass at the thorny issue of the possible integration of OISE into the University of Toronto. Most of the files relating to the Higher Education Group, with which Professor Lang was primarily associated at OISE, contain material spanning almost 20 years on examination questions.

The bulk of this series, however, relates to the merger of OISE with the U of T to create, in 1995, OISE/UT. Professor Lang’s personal work binders on the merger are present, as are legal and other documents on the merger, followed by implementation files, including those of the Academic Implementation Task Force and on the issues relating to OISE’s property. The series concludes with files on the OISE/UT Joint MPHEd program with the Faculty of Medicine (2003-2004).

Professional activities: Council of Ontario Universities

The Council of Ontario Universities (COU) was formed on December 3, 1962 as the “Committee of Presidents of Provincially Assisted Universities and Colleges of Ontario,” with its current name being adopted in 1971. The mandate of the COU is to “build awareness of the university sector’s contributions to the social, economic and cultural well-being of the province and the country, as well as the issues that impact the sector’s ability to maximize these contributions.” It works with Ontario’s publicly assisted universities and one associate member institution, the Royal Military College of Canada. This series documents the activities of a number of its committees and task forces, which are detailed below, approximately in order of activity.

Professor Lang was a member of the COU’s Committee on Enrolment Statistics and Projections from 1976 to 1990. In 1982-1983 he sat on its Special Committee on BILD Administrative Procedures and from 1987 to 1991 was a member of its Research Advisory Group. In 1991 he was invited to be part of a small task force to present proposals to the government for an income contingent repayment plan for Ontario students. Throughout much of the 1990s, he was involved with the COU’s Committee on University Accountability and the Performance Indicators for the Public Postsecondary System in Ontario project, better known as the Performance Indicators Project, the purpose of which was to assess the overall Ontario postsecondary sector.

He was also a member of four task forces: Audit Guidelines (1998-2000), Secondary School Issues (1998-2005), Student Financial Assistance (2006-), and Quality Assurance (2008-2010).
The Task Force on Secondary School Issues was established to assess the evaluation of students in the new secondary school program of studies and to make recommendations regarding the monitoring of grading practices and standards.

The COU’s Quality and Productivity Task Force work was to outline “all the quality and productivity initiatives” undertaken to “showcase results for the government’s increased investment in universities.” Its report, presented in March 2006, was followed by the COU Task Force on Quality Measurements, chaired by David Naylor of the University of Toronto. It was charged with addressing the “broad issues related to quality measurement, developing the long-term strategies for COU’s work with the government and the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario (HEQCO).” [1]

Files in B2018-0001 include correspondence with U of T and COU colleagues, as well as further records related to his role on the COU’s Committee on University Accountability. Also included are further records about the COU's Task Force on Quality Assurance (2008-2010), including its subsequent transition and implementation phase.

The files in this series contain correspondence, memoranda, notes, minutes of meetings, drafts of reports, and assorted background reports and other documentation.

NOTES

  1. Task Force on Quality Measurement terms of reference, March 2006, in B2011-0003/043(03).

Professional activities: Ontario. Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities

Professor Lang’s first major collaboration with the then Ministry of Colleges and Universities began in 1991 when he was a member of the Minister’s Task Force on University Accountability. Later he was involved in several joint projects with the Ministry and its successors [the Ministry of Education and Training (from 1995) and from 2000, the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities] and the Council of Ontario Universities; in particular, their Steering Committee on Ontario Graduate Survey (1997-), their Joint Steering Committee on OSAP (1998-2001), and their Key Performance Indicators project (2000-2005). In 2006 he became a member of the Ministry’s Joint Working Group on Student Access Guarantee. From 2008 to 2011 he was the Ministry’s Working Group and Steering Committee on Transfer. Not all of these activities are documented in this series.

In 2006-2007 the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities undertook two inter-related research projects “aimed generally at learning about the characteristics of ‘first-generation’ students.” The first, “College Choice”, focused on the factors that influenced students in seeking post-secondary education and their choices of institutions to attend. The second, dubbed Project STAR (Student Achievement and Retention), “sought to determine the factors that influence the academic performance and retention of students in the first year of university.” It was sponsored by the Canada Millenium Scholarship Foundation and Statistics
Canada.

Files in B2018-0001 document Professor Lang's role as Special Advisor to the Deputy Minister, in particular his involvement with the negotiations between the Government of Ontario and Ontario universities regarding the second Strategic Mandate Agreement (SMA2), and Ontario colleges regarding the Colleges Applied Research and Development Fund [CARDF].

Also included are files regarding the creation of a francophone university in Ontario; the Joint Working Group on Student Access Guarantee, regarding the modernization of the Ontario Student Assistance Program (OSAP); and the Steering Committee on Transfer Credits.

Professional activities (other)

This series documents professional activities other than those described in the two previous series. Included is material on consulting and special projects, boards of governors of educational institutions that Professor Lang sat on, and his association with a number of other educational agencies and groups in Canada and elsewhere. Of the last, the most documentation is on the Ontario Council on University Affairs, the Premier’s Council for Economic Renewal, and the Sweden/Ontario Bilateral Exchange Seminar for Senior Academic Administrators (1982-1983). The arrangement in this section is by name of organization or event.

The files may contain any combination of correspondence, memoranda, minutes of meetings, notes, and reports.

Files from B2018-0001 include further records documenting Lang’s active involvement with the Board of Trustees of the Toronto School of Theology (2008 - ; Chair, Institutional Evaluations Committee, 2014-2017) and the Board of Governors of Saint Augustine’s Seminary. His work as Chair of the Strategic Asset Study Committee (2011-2014) for the Archdiocese of Toronto is also documented.