In accordance with the Royal Military College of Canada (RMC) Institutional Quality Assurance Process (IQAP), this final assessment report synthesizes the external evaluation, internal response, and assessment of the 40 credit Business Administration degree program offered by the Department of Management. It also identifies the strengths of the programs, together with opportunities for program improvement and enhancement, and prioritize those recommendations selected for implementation.
This report includes an Implementation Plan to identify who will approve the recommendations of the Final Assessment Report, who will resource those recommendations, anticipated changes relating to organization, policy or governance deemed necessary to meet the recommendations, who will action those recommendations, and the implementation timelines.
Overview of Program Review Process:
The Program Self-Study report was undertaken in December 2017. For the programs under review, it contained the degree-level expectations, an analytical assessment of the programs, course outlines, program-related data, survey data from the Office of Quality Assurance and appendices with sample examinations and CVs of faculty members. The External Review Committee (ERC) was comprised of Dr. Brent Gallupe, Queen’s University (External); Dr. Byron Lew, Trent University (External); Dr. Kiari Goni-Boulama, RMC (Internal), Dr. Laureline Sangalli, RMC (Internal).
The External Review Committee submitted their report in March 2018, wherein they described how the Department of Management meets the IQAP evaluation criteria and how the department is similar to management departments located at other Canadian universities.
Combined, the Departmental report and the External Review Committee (ERC) report delivers a thorough analysis of the current state of the Department of Management. All involved actors have taken the opportunity to provide useful and important analysis and recommendations about the current Departmental context and the way forward.
Significant Strengths and Weaknesses of the Business Programs:
The ERC identified a number of strengths of the Department of Management, including:
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Innovative and creative teaching, with various modes of assessment and delivery
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Appropriate mix of permanent and non-permanent faculty
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High student satisfaction
Three main concerns were also raised by the External Review Committee:
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Lack of faculty members and support personnel
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Low research productivity
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Lack of financial resources (for research, guest speakers, etc.)
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High teaching loads
Following consultation with the program faculty and staff, the Department Head responded to the Reviewers’ Report, and the Dean of Social Sciences and Humanities, in consultation with the of Head of Department, prepared this Final Assessment Report. Specific recommendations are discussed, and follow-up actions and timelines provided.
Summary of Recommendations and Responses
The ERC identified the following areas of concern and issues that require attention, which we summarize below along with our comments and recommendations:
Curriculum
Recommendation 1:
The Committee finds the curriculum reflects the current state of the discipline, but the small number of faculty limits the number of electives which can be taught.
Departmental Response:
Three new military faculty joined the department in 2018 which has expanded our capacity to deliver senior-level business electives. A civilian hire was also recently added. Since the 2018/2019 academic year, the department has offered additional elective courses.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean agrees with this recommendation, within limits. Examining the 300 and 400 level courses, it can be seen that Management has significant swings in enrollment in English courses and has been achieving greater efficiencies in the French courses. The recommended maximum course size for 300 level is 24 and for 400 level is 18. The average class size for courses is presented below.
| AY | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| E | 20.0 | 15.6 | 18.1 | 14.3 | 9.7 | 14.5 | 20.2 | 18.5 | 15.0 | 28.3 | 26.2 | 22.0 | 14.5 |
| F | 6.3 | 6.8 | 7.0 | 6.8 | 6.8 | 6.7 | 5.0 | 5.9 | 7.2 | 5.3 | 6.3 | 9.4 | 9.8 |
Based on these numbers, Management has sometimes exceeded maximum recommended course sizes in English and can afford to offer more courses, while has been maintaining a minimum viable program in French with reasonable course enrollments. As a whole, the department has the resources it requires to offer the program.
Recommendation 2:
The Committee finds some innovation and creativity in content and delivery has been present, particularly in the interpretation of private-sector concepts to meet the military’s perspective and the in the application of military-based cases.
Departmental Response:
Our faculty are encouraged to include examples from the Department of National Defence during their teaching and often do so.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation and encourages the department to continue to strive for innovation and creativity, particularly as it pertains to military relevance and context.
Recommendation 3:
The Committee believes that the current modes of delivery, such as lectures, online delivery of courses, case studies, hands-on computer exercises, lab tutorials, guest speakers, critical thinking exercises, amongst others, are appropriate, effective, and similar to civilian university mode(s) of delivery.
Departmental Response:
We shall continue this practice.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation and encourages the department to continue to offer a variety of modes of delivery that are appropriate to the content.
Teaching and Assessment
Recommendation 4:
The methods of assessing student achievement, as provided in the course syllabi that were provided, such as individual and group assessments, examinations, tests and quizzes, hands-on projects, computer-based exercises, etc., are appropriate and effective for assessing achievement of defined learning outcomes and DLEs.
Departmental Response:
This will continue to be the practice of those teaching in the program.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation and encourages the department to continue to assess students in a variety of methods, as is appropriate to the course content.
Recommendation 5:
The External Committee believes that the current means of assessment clearly demonstrates achievement of the BA Program’s objectives and RMC’s Degree Level Expectations.
Departmental Response:
Assessment strategies will continue to be broad and of sufficient depth to meet DLEs by including various assessment tools at sufficiently high levels of critical thinking, commensurate with the expectations of the degree.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation and encourages the department to continue to use appropriate assessment tools to meet DLEs.
Recommendation 6:
The Committee believes the Management Department is doing the best it can with very limited resources to deliver the BA Program. The Committee feels that the Department’s use of existing resources is commendable, but more human, physical and financial resources are needed to provide students with an academic learning comparable to civilian universities that offer similar academic programs.
Departmental Response:
Three new military faculty and one full-time civilian tenure track member joined the department in the summer of 2018. In addition, a full-time administrative assistant was hired to support the department on an indeterminate basis. The department supports the recommendation for increased financial resources. The program will continue to advocate for increased institutional funding available to support faculty research. The Dept has encouraged increased funding to Massey Library to undergo major infrastructure renewal in order to provide a better learning environment to students.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation. As noted, the department has seen posting of military faculty and an indeterminate civilian hiring to bring it to its full complement. Management has seen the same decrease in discretionary funds supporting student activities over the last decade as other departments. This decrease has only been partly offset by funding from the RMC Alumni Association, with some years seeing full funding and others seeing partial. Including sufficient funding to support student programming would be beneficial.
Quality Indicators
Recommendation 7:
The Committee supports the Department of Management’s use of AACSB standards for assessing the types and quality of faculty teaching in the Department’s courses in the BA Program. The Committee feels that the Department has an appropriate mix of permanent and non-permanent faculty teaching on the Program. However, the Committee believes more faculty are needed.
Departmental Response:
The department will continue to consider the AACSB guidelines during faculty recruitment to ensure an appropriate balance of skills commensurate with the needs of the department and the needs of the Canadian Armed Forces, our principal client.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation as it pertains to mix of faculty members, but, as demonstrated by class sizes, believe that sufficient faculty members exist to teach the current program. The Dean encourages the department to initiate AACSB accreditation for the program by the next review.
Recommendation 8:
Students reported a very high level of satisfaction with the teaching they received. Specifically, they mentioned the accessibility and approachability of faculty providing more tailored teaching than in bigger schools.
Departmental Response:
Small classes are a trademark of the RMC education. Due to this, faculty remain easily accessible by their students.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation and commends the department for the high degree of student support it receives.
Recommendation 9:
Small classes are a trademark of the RMC education. Due to this, faculty remain easily accessible to their students.
Departmental Response:
Our students continue to be successful both in the MBA program and also other graduate programs.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation and commends the department for the high degree of student support it receives.
Quality Enhancement
Recommendation 10:
The Committee believes these renovations and the changes the RMC library is currently undergoing will contribute to enhanced program quality and an improved learning and teaching environment.
Departmental Response:
Infrastructure improvements to both Girouard and Massey buildings continue. The changes to the Massey library are especially beneficial. A Learning Commons has been developed to accommodate those students who seek a suitable space to engage in academic discourse and study.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation. The Massey Library upgrade was completed with the intent of turning it into a modern student learning centre.
Recommendation 11:
Key services contributing directly to the academic quality of the BA Program are: 1. Library Services, 2. Physical Plant, 3. College Information Services (CIS), 4. Division of Continuing Studies, 5. Language Centre, 6. Registrar, 7. Writing Centre, and 8. Vice Principal of Research/Dean of Graduate Studies (VPR/DGS)
Departmental Response:
The Department agrees with this recommendation. Each service continues to be valued partners in meeting the program's mission.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation. There are many partners upon which the department depends.
Recommendation 12:
The Committee believes that for the BA Program, the level of service from the Physical Plant is appropriate. For the Division of Continuing Studies, the level of service is appropriate. For the Language Centre, the level of service is sufficient. For the Registrar, the level of service is appropriate, sufficient and reliable.
Departmental Response:
The program remains grateful for the support of other organizations in the institution. There are currently no expectations that this will change.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation. Since the ERC, the Division of Continuing Studies has been disbanded and its functions integrated across the university, placing more responsibility and authority for distance courses and programs at the department level.
Library Services
Recommendation 13:
The Committee believes more library resources are needed. The loss of subscriptions has significantly reduced access to the academic literature.
Departmental Response:
The department recognizes the negative impact on library resources by reduced financial support. Mitigating strategies continue to be inter-library loan and access to the Queen's University library by physical visit or online (available to those who teach there as well).
Dean’s Response:
The 2017 Special Staff Assistance Visit (SSAV) put in motion some institutional changes that will result in increased resources being provided to the library, including ensuring that standard digital resources being available to students on a more consistent basis. While the SSAV process has not and will not fully resolve the library resource issue, it has provided some momentum and resources towards addressing this problem that were not foreseen when the ERC undertook its review. Furthermore, a review of current limitations on the Chief Librarian’s delegated authority for the purchase of electronic journals (e-journals) is currently underway. Improved access to consortia pricing for e-journals will improve the experience for faculty and students.
College Information Services
Recommendation 14:
The Committee believes that CIS is doing as much as it can with the limited resources it has. Students and faculty both commented on the low level of support that CIS is able to provide.
Departmental Response:
Faculty typically exercise some flexibility to mitigate the impacts of IT failures on the student body in terms of course delivery. Many of these networks are now managed by Shared Services Canada (SSC) and are outside the span of control of DND, let alone RMC. The program continues to advocate for return of these networks to RMC CIS for improved local management.
Dean’s Response:
IT support is an important issue in ensuring that students are able to undertake their courses as required. The Dean has addressed concerns with the level of IT support to the Cmdt, Director of Support Services (DSS) and Principal. An IT service review was conducted in 2015 by DSS that may inform this work. Interruptions of LMS that affect our students will be reported in order to ensure improved service in the future. Effective April 2020, CIS support transitioned from RMC to CDA, so ensuring service levels are maintained will require additional effort.
Writing Centre
Recommendation 15:
The Writing Centre has seen a dramatic reduction in resources over the last 5 years. The Committee believes the Writing Centre is a valuable resource for the BA Program and its services effect the academic quality of our programs.
Departmental Response:
Although the Mgmt dept supports increased staffing of the Writing Centre, our critical thinking course (BAE264) does include a writing component and the arts core includes two full-year language-credits. This provides some opportunity to support the development of writing skills among our student body from directly within the program.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean agrees with this recommendation. Following one of the recommendations of the SSAV, RMC has established a College Success Centre with the mandate to provide learning support to students. The standing up of the College Success Centre has both the RMC Writing Centre and the Math Assistance Centre available to students. In peak periods of demand – around final exams – both centres have been been run with extended hours. A permanent Director of the Writing Centre was hired in 2021. The business model of the centre is a combination of contract support, volunteer support and faculty workload assignment.
Vice Principal of Research / Dean of Graduate Studies
Recommendation 16:
It is not clear from the Self Report what services the VPR/DGS provides. The reduction in faculty research output in recent years maybe partly due to a reduction in resources to this office.
Departmental Response:
A reduction in faculty research output is not attributed to VPR/DGS but rather due, in part, to a reduction in financial support to research activities undertaken by faculty. Faculty are encouraged to seek grants external to RMC. Faculty are also encouraged to leverage case-writing as a means to be academically productive without requiring significant financial resources.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation. Faculty members in Management have access to the same research resources as all faculty members. The Canadian Defence Academy Research Program (CDARP) promotes and maintains a base of high quality research capability at RMC to ensure staff expertise in the programs of undergraduate and postgraduate curricula, fosters research excellence to sustain the quality of intellectual pursuits at RMC, and enables faculty members to support the mission of the CF and DND through defence related research. Funds available for CDARP are currently at historic lows and faculty research would benefit from reinvestment in this strategic fund. In addition, faculty members have access both to Defence Research and Development Canada research contracts and partnerships and are eligible for funding through national granting councils, particularly from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).
Future Plans
Recommendation 17:
The first recommendation under “Faculty and Staff”, calls for the hiring of bilingual faculty. The External Review Committee supports this recommendation.
Departmental Response:
Four additional bilingual faculty have since been recruited into the department.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation. Unilingual faculty members are hired by exception only and there have been no such hires in Management (or its previous incarnations) in 25 years.
Recommendation 18:
The second recommendation calls for hiring processes to be initiated earlier to allow for time for approvals, particularly for hiring that will replace retirements. The External Review Committee supports this recommendation.
Departmental Response:
Full-time hires are subject to public service regulations. Only after an individual has vacated a position can a new hire be hired into the same position number.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation. A Memorandum of Understanding exists between Treasury Board and the Faculty Association which allows for faculty members to commit to retirement three years ahead of their retirement date. This allows the hiring process to be sequenced in such a way as to have the start date of the new member coincide with the retirement of the incumbent.
Recommendation 19:
The first recommendation under “Resources and Administration” requests more funding for research activities.
Departmental Response:
Financial resources are extraordinarily limited and spending those funds is administratively burdensome.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean agrees with this recommendation. CDARP is at historically low levels of provision and faculty members would benefit from a reinvestment in this area. Regarding spending research funds, as public servants, faculty members at RMC must adhere to the National Joint Council Travel Directive and to the Financial Administration Act. Many of the bureaucratic hurdles are linked to these guidance documents, the latter of which has standing in law. There are, however, many occasions where the levels of delegated authority for travel have changed and with those levels, the procedures for gaining approval. There is much to be said for encouraging delegation of authority to lowest practical level and ensuring processes are reasonable, known by being fully promulgated and kept as stable as policy. Travel policies do require faculty to plan ahead – often months – and would benefit from an increase in flexibility to allow quicker approvals at a lower level.
Recommendation 20:
The second recommendation calls for larger classrooms to handle larger class sizes.
Departmental Response:
Currently, sufficiently large classroom sizes are available. Rather than renovating existing space, it's been the program's practice to split courses having more than 50 students into different sections in order to decrease the student:faculty ratio thereby improving program delivery.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation, but notes that the department has been permitted to hire teaching assistants for classes above 24 students and been allowed to split large class where the size is excessive.
Recommendation 21:
The Committee calls for a review to determine future office space requirements.
Departmental Response:
Office space is assigned on an ad-hoc basis. Most years, there are a sufficient number of office spaces in Girouard to accommodate faculty.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation. There have been two space allocation studies conducted since the ERC, neither of which have resulted in a change to the status quo allocation.
Other Comments
Recommendation 22:
Some courses could be replaced with more meaningful and useful courses for students in the Arts Faculty and in the BA Program in particular.
Departmental Response:
The program is part of the Faculty of Arts and therefore subject to requirements of the Arts core courses, which pertain to all programs within the Arts.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports the review of the Arts core, but not necessarily with the stated intent of replacing courses that are particular to the BA program. Since the ERC visit, a committee has examined the entirety of the core curriculum. In September 2018, the RMC Faculty Board established the Core Curriculum Committee to review the “Core Curriculum used at the Canadian Military Colleges in order to ensure that it continues to support the educational needs of the Canadian Armed Forces’ (CAF) Regular Officer Training Programme” and to make recommendations based on this assessment. The committee delivered its report in July 2020, with nine recommendations. The first two were that (1) Faculty Board and Senate should adopt the Core Curriculum Learning Outcomes proposed in Part Two of this report, and thereafter include them in the IQAP manual and (2) the existing CMC Core Curriculum meets all of the Proposed Learning Outcomes and thus should be preserved. As this report was supported by Faculty Board, Faculty Council and the Senate, this would suggest that the common core will remain stable until the next review.
Recommendation 23:
Lack of electives and choice of electives in the BA Program.
Departmental Response:
The addition of three new military faculty members to the program in the summer of 2018 has enabled the program to over more senior business electives for the 18/19 academic year than has been past practice. Keeping these positions filled is instrumental in continuing to offer more electives in future years.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean agrees with this recommendation. To achieve economies of scale, optimum size for 300 level and 400 level optional courses is 24 and 18 students respectively. The department is encouraged to offer sufficient electives to meet the requirements of its students, while keeping close to this class size. It does not mean that an unlimited number of optional courses can be offered. Since 2010, 33 courses (9 in English and 24 in French) have been cancelled due to zero enrollments; a further 14 courses have been offered under the minimum class size (five in English and three in French). Since the ERC, preregistration has been implemented, which allows identification of student demand for particular subject areas, reducing – but not eliminating – the cancellation of classes and wasting of scarce instructional resources.
Recommendation 24:
This Committee recommends that renewed, strong efforts be made to increase the resources and funding to all of RMC and to the BA Program in particular.
Departmental Response:
The addition of new military faculty to the program has substantially decreased our dependence on sessional faculty.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean supports this recommendation, while noting that additional resources are contingent upon demonstrating a requirement for them.
Recommendation 25:
The issue is the “marriage of convenience” of the Management Department and the Economics Department about five years ago. The Committee therefore recommends that the benefits and costs of the current merged arrangement be compared with the alternative of two separate departments, and that this discussion involve all members of the Management & Economics Department, along with the appropriate representatives of the senior administration.
Departmental Response:
The department structure changed as of July 1, 2018, with the Economics faculty rejoining the Politics Department to form the Politics and Economics Department. The management faculty now constitute the Department of Management.
Dean’s Response:
The Dean agrees with this recommendation. Several structural alternatives were evaluated, from status quo, to Economics as a standalone department, to rejoining Political Science. The latter was preferred almost unanimously by members of the three disciplines and so there is now a Department of Management and a Department of Political Science & Economics.
Recommendation 26:
The 2015-16 Self-Study Report indicates that faculty were especially concerned with the fairness and transparency of the tenure and promotion processes, the lack of sufficient research funding, university policies that do not support research related travel, the insufficient and inadequate library resources, and the lack of a senior administration supported plan to replace the faculty who will retire in the short term.
Departmental Response:
The only recent retiree has since been replaced as the result of hiring process over the last academic year. No other faculty members have announced retirement plans and consequently, there are no plans to replace current faculty. Although administration is cumbersome, faculty within the department have travelled internationally and continue to do so to attend international conferences. Faculty will be encouraged to seek funds from the department, CDARP or from external funding sources for travel to research conferences if there are no funds are currently available to them. As is common practice throughout the public service, annual performance reports are provided to faculty on an annual basis, endorsed by management, outlining employee performance and expectations with the objective of providing faculty with sufficient guidance to work towards promotion/"tenure".
Dean’s Response:
The Dean agrees with this recommendation, but notes a number of areas of progress. Assessment processes have been captured in an Interim Performance Appraisal Process, which was built with input from faculty and continues to evolve. The Dean gives an annual promotion workshop to prepare faculty for promotion. CDARP is available to faculty members, who are also encouraged to seek extramural funding. Since the ERC, an exemption from the event policy (a mechanism for controlling travel) has been received for research travel for faculty members. While at the time of the ERC visit there was a hiring freeze due to a combination of budget reductions and two reviews of RMC (the SSAV and the Office of the Auditor General of Canada), hiring has generally proceeded upon retirement of incumbents where there is a demonstrated requirement.
Implementation Plan
| Recommendation | Proposed Follow-up and Resource Implications | Responsibility for Leading the Follow-Up | Timeline for Addressing Recommendation |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. The Committee finds the curriculum reflects the current state of the discipline, but the small number of faculty limits the number of electives which can be taught. |
Done. The Dept continues to add business electives. Recent faculty hires have allowed us to increase the variety and number of elective offerings. These courses include AAF/BAE464, AAF/BAE 414, AAF 434/BAE434, AAF424/BAE424, AAF404/BAE404. Electives, however, are constrained by the need to ensure all students complete the Arts Core curriculum as part of their RMC education, wherein all military officers must complete a liberal arts and science core curriculum during their undergraduate degree program. A second constraint is that the dept seeks program efficiencies, which preclude elective offerings where student demand is insufficient (i.e. less than 3 student in French and 5 students in English) |
Dept Head, in conjunction with the Dean of Social Science and Humanities and the Curriculum Review Committee will review situation on annual basis. | We will continue to monitor the situation as part of our annual review. |
| 6. The Committee feels that more human, physical and financial resources are needed, |
|
Dept Head |
Complete – human and physical resources. Financial resources will continue to be monitored. |
| 7. The Committee believes more faculty are needed. |
With the recent hires and the reduction in Hons program course credit from 42 to 40, we believe no additional faculty are required at this time in the Dept of Mgmt. The dept is encouraged to continue applying AACSB standards for assessing types of faculty and to seek accreditation. |
Dept Head |
Hiring is completed. AACSB accreditation should be initiated by the next review. |
| 13. The Committee believes more library resources are needed. The loss of subscriptions has significantly reduced access to the academic literature. | The Mgmt dept will determine a list of those additional journals that are required and ensure they are sourced by the library. | Library rep to liaise with faculty members and the library. | Action to be completed by the Library Rep by the end of Apr 2022 |
| 14. The Committee believes that CIS provides a low level of support. | Interruptions of LMS that affect our students will be reported in order to ensure improved service in the future. | Dept Head | Annual monitoring as part of cyclical review. |
| 15. The Writing Centre has seen a dramatic reduction in resources over the last 5 years. The Committee believes the Writing Centre is a valuable resource for the BA Program and its services effect the academic quality of our programs. | The standing up of the College Success Centre has both the RMC Writing Centre and the Math Assistance Centre available to students. In peak periods of demand – around final exams – both centres have been been run with extended hours. A permanent Director of the Writing Centre was hired in 2021. The business model of the centre is a combination of contract support, volunteer support and faculty workload assignment | Dept Head | Completed. |
| 16. It is not clear from the Self Report what services the VPR/DGS provides. The reduction in faculty research output in recent years maybe partly due to a reduction in resources to this office. | In order to strengthen RMC’s research portfolio, the office of VPR/DGS has been split into separate VPR and DGS positions. | Dept Head | Completed. |
| 17. The first recommendation under “Faculty and Staff”, calls for the hiring of bilingual faculty. The External Review Committee supports this recommendation. | Unilingual faculty members are hired by exception only and there have been no such hires in Management (or its previous incarnations) in 25 years. | Dept Head | Completed. |
| 18. The second recommendation calls for hiring processes to be initiated earlier to allow for time for approvals, particularly for hiring that will replace retirements. The External Review Committee supports this recommendation. | A Memorandum of Understanding exists between Treasury Board and the Faculty Association which allows the hiring process to be sequenced in such a way as to have the start date of the new member coincide with the retirement of the incumbent. Non-indeterminate hiring and inventory-based hiring will be used in circumstances where hire scheduling does not coincide with planned and unexpected faculty retirements.The first recommendation under “Resources and Administration” requests more funding for research activities. | Dept Head | Completed. |
|
19. The first recommendation under “Resources and Administration” requests more funding for research activities. |
There are three actions that have taken place: (i) Separation of the VPR research function as a separate entity to promote; (ii) Creation of the Research Bursary Fund to support special research requirements of faculty; (iii) Baselining the CDARP program. | Dept Head | Completed. |
| 20.The second recommendation under “Resources and Administration” calls for larger classrooms to handle larger class sizes. | Currently, sufficiently large classroom sizes are available. Classroom assignments lie outside the scope of the department. Class sizes must consider the availability of supporting infrastructure. However, COVID has also brought opportunities for online learning through Moodle and Zoom, resulting in less of a reliance on classroom engagement. | Dept Head | Completed. |
| 21.The Committee calls for a review to determine future office space requirements. | The department currently has sufficient office space due to COVID, as many faculty continue to work from home. Office space, including shared space, however, will need to be re-visited in light of anticipated faculty hires. |
Dept Head, |
Allocated office space, office furnishing and IT resourcing for new faculty hires will be reviewed in Winter 2022. |
| 22. Some courses could be replaced with more meaningful and useful courses for students in the Arts Faculty and in the BA Program in particular. | In 2020, the College Core Curriculum Committee evaluated those courses that are core to RMC’s UG program. Minor adjustments were made – none of which affected the Management Program. | Dept Head | Completed. |
| 23. RMC should examine remedies for students that are unable to take the two electives they want due to scheduling difficulties. |
Since the ERC, preregistration has been implemented, which allows identification of student demand for particular subject areas prior to the establishment of the timetable. |
Curriculum Committee representative |
Completed. |
| 24. This Committee recommends that renewed, strong efforts be made to increase the resources and funding to all of RMC and to the BA Program in particular. | See #6 | See #6 | See #6 |
| 25. Concerning the “marriage of convenience” between the Management Department and the Economics Department, the Committee therefore recommends cost-benefit consideration of the current merger against the alternative of two separate departments. It is recommended that this discussion involve all members of the Management & Economics Department, along with the appropriate representatives of the senior administration. | The Economics discipline has since opted to join the Political Science dept. This structural change has been completed. | Dean of Social Sciences and Humanities | Completed.. |
|
26. The 2015-16 Self-Study Report indicates that faculty were especially concerned with the:
|
Many of these “fiduciary” administrative responsibilities continue to reside outside departmental control, and to a great extent, resource allocation lies beyond the boundaries of RMC. Resources will continue to be judiciously dispersed to maximize RMC’s mandates. |
Dept Head, in cooperation with the Dean of Social Science and Humanities | Ongoing. |
Conclusion
According to the Report, the undergraduate curriculum of the Department of Management reflects the current state of the discipline, with a program well aligned in comparison with other business programs within Canada. Student satisfaction appears high in terms of the teaching received, and with the accessibility and approachability of faculty. This strength may arise from the smaller class sizes and tailored teaching compared to that of larger schools. The Management department has, since initial receipt of the Report, split with the Economics department, which is now co-located with Political Science. To an extent, these challenges result from funding and resource shortfalls, much of which resides beyond the control of the department. The department continues to make every effort to seek improvements in program legitimacy, annual programming, research, and educational offerings, while focusing of the judicious allocation of scarce resources through improved program efficiency and delivery, the utilization of military faculty resources, and increased faculty hires, while continuing to support the central RMC mission and its mandated objectives. The department continues to balance, as best as possible, the needs of its own disciplinary educational program with the overarching educational requirements mandated by the Arts core curriculum. Success on both fronts will, in particular, serve those undergraduate cadets preparing for careers in the logistics domains, along with those who seek professional leadership and management careers in the Canadian military.