essco advocacy
Advocacy is one of the most important functions of ESSCO and serves all of its three main objectives. We advocate for engineering students in the province by representing student interests to government and provincial stakeholders, outlining student needs and providing recommendations for their fulfillment.
At ESSCO, our advocacy starts with researching student issues through our Working Groups, collecting large samples of data to understand the student take on issues ranging from co-op to sustainability to mental health. We outline these student opinions in a collection of reports, presentations and media, and use it to address our concerns with professional engineering organizations and school administrators each year.
Visit our Advocacy Blogs page to see what ESSCO has been up to.
ESSCO working groups
EQUITY, DIVERSITY AND INCLUSIVITY
The primary goal of our working group is to improve the state of equity, diversity and inclusion in engineering. Beyond making a report for advocacy, We want to have an impact students at a fundamental level by providing resources a How-To Guide to help ESSCO’s member schools in the form of a ‘How To Guide’ that can be used to solve problems that they may face regarding any aspect of EDI.
Beyond diversity, every person, engineer or otherwise, needs to feel like they are included in their community and that their views are valued in order to reach their full potential. Engineers solve problems, and having a diverse population of problem solvers provides many more view points and therefore better solutions to the problems we face in our world today. To sustain a diverse population in our industry, all people need to be treated equitably and feel included. As ESSCO’s population is made up of so many unique individuals and as we journey towards becoming professional engineers, we want to make sure that what makes us unique is valued and sustained.
If you have any questions about the work we do or if you want to get involved, please feel free to contact us at ediworkinggroup@essco.ca!
ACADEMIC TEACHING QUALITY
The Academic Working Group’s goal is to improve students’ academic experience in post-secondary education. In the previous year, our team conducted research on teaching quality at all 17 engineering schools in Ontario and then presented our findings to the Engineering Deans of Ontario (EDO). In 2020/2021, the Academic Working Group will be focused on student academic key success factors and implementing personalized learning. Student academic key success factors are the notable methods and practices that highly effective students utilize to become academically successful. On the other hand, implementing personalized learning is focused specifically on how professors can incorporate personalized learning, an acclaimed teaching methodology, into their courses. The research will be conducted using a variety of mediums such as interviews, surveys, and research papers.
If you are interested in joining our team or want some more information, you can reach us at academic@essco.ca.
Click here to check out the Engineering Professors’ Teaching Quality Report (2019-2020)
leadership credit
The goal of the Student Leadership Credit Working Group is to create a standardized program that will grant Ontario engineering students a reward for the time they commit to different extra-curricular activities on their campus. This reward would serve as an acknowledgment of the different skills students have gained through their campus involvement and would come in the form of a credit to be used in place of different courses (ie. electives) or to use towards a special certificate once they have graduated (similar to co-op programs at some universities). There are many opportunities to gain meaningful skills and experiences through extra-curricular involvement on Ontario campuses, many of these skills and experiences cannot be given in a traditional classroom. By creating a platform that connects and rewards student leaders, the overall quality and legitimacy of their work will increase.
If you have any questions about the work we do or if you want to get involved, please feel free to contact us at leadershipcredit@essco.ca!