The preparations for the annual CSSE conference, to be held at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, are well underway, with a record number of proposal submissions to CASEA. The Program Committee will meet in Manitoba in late January or early February, and program information will be sent to authors sometime after that meeting. Expect to hear something by late February or early March.

We are hoping for several nominations for each of the annual CASEA awards: master’s paper, doctoral dissertation, and distinguished service. For deadlines and submission procedures, link through to the Awards page on this website.

The latest figures on membership are very optimistic. As of October 2003, CASEA had 159 registered members, 97 of whom were up to date with payment of fees. This is a considerable increase over the number of 118 registered members as of December 2002, and it means that our coffers should be in much better shape than they have been in the recent past. Our recruitment efforts appear to be paying off, and I encourage all of you to continue inviting new scholars to join and encouraging veterans who may have left us to return to the fold.

The CSSE Board of Directors met in Ottawa on October 24-26, 2003. Some items from the discussion are likely to be of interest to CASEA members.

1. Information on SSRHC research funding: First, the number of applications and grants has risen by 23% over the last 3 years, and the INE grant initiative was particularly fruitful for education researchers, with 39% of the grants and 60% of the funding going to the study of education. Researchers in education appear to be requesting higher budgets than in other disciplines, for unknown reasons. Second, researchers in general spend less on students that indicated on applications, which is of concern to the funding agency. Third, researchers need to outline more effectively in their applications the impacts of their research. Fourth, Aboriginal issues are not prominent in applications coming from the education field, but this issue is high on the government and the Council’s agenda. Finally, the success of education students in the new Master’s grant was much lower than expected: Only 32 Master’s students in education received funding whereas numeric indicators suggested that about 120 students should have been funded. It would be helpful if advisors and deans/department chairs familiarized themselves with the selection criteria and helped the students to improve their application documents.

2. Registration fees for the annual Congress, to be held at the University of Manitoba, are $100/$150 for the Congress and $75/$100 for CSSE. The CSSE Board of Directors has taken the position that it is opposed to the Congress being held at universities that do not have an academic unit in education, as happened in 2003 in Halifax. Board members will carry to the Federation the message that, if such an event occurs in the future, CSSE will explore the possibility of holding its own conference for that year.

3. Members of the Canadian Association of Deans of Education have begun to develop a pan-Canadian accord on two items: (a) leadership in relation to public discourse on education and (b) principles related to teacher education and teacher mobility. Input will be solicited from faculties of education across the country, and a draft copy of the accord is expected t be ready for distribution and discussion at the annual conference.

4. The New Scholar Fund continues to grow, and there is now enough money in the endowment to distribute two awards at the 2004 conference. Administrators of the fund are looking for additional donations. If you are interested in contributing to this important initiative, please contact Don Fisher (University of British Columbia).

5. The Canadian Journal of Education, under the editorship of Sam Robinson (University of Saskatchewan) and François Larose (Sherbrooke), is now in good shape, with new issues being distributed on a regular basis. Authors are encouraged to submit English manuscripts to Sam and French manuscripts to François.

6. This year will see the election of a new president and new English vice-president for CSSE. In recent years, CASEA has benefited from a strong representation on the Board, and it would be helpful if that trend were to continue. To that end, I encourage you to consider running for one of these positions yourself or to nominate other CASEA members.

This report gives you an indication of what I thought was important from the Board of Directors’ meeting. For a different perspective on the meeting or for additional information on the CSSE news front, please contact Tim Goddard (University of Calgary).

See you in Winnipeg in May.

Submitted by Coral Mitchell, Brock University