Cutting-edge research and innovation are core ingredients for a thriving, globally competitive economy and also help produce the breakthroughs that lead to healthier lives and communities. Ontario’s universities play a key role in producing groundbreaking and impactful research and innovation. But doing so requires years of work and commitment that is only possible with stable, long-term investment and support.
The higher education sector is the second largest performer of research and development in Ontario (after businesses), carrying out an estimated $5.2 billion in work, which translated into 34 per cent of the province’s research activities in 2014. This work spans all fields and disciplines and helps produce new thinking and technological breakthroughs that can be felt in factories, government offices, offices and homes across the province. Universities currently accomplish this through:
Research projects that aim to improve lives across all areas of business and society: for example, reducing the harm of oil-and-gas industry flaring; examining new medical uses for wearable technology; and looking at ways of making commercial cross-border traffic between Canada and the U.S. more efficient.
Collaborative work with local businesses, not-for-profits and industries that improves communities across the province, for example, through increasing food access in Northern communities, reducing the rates of bullying, and working with police forces to improve officers’ use-of-force decision-making during confrontations.
Working with the federal government to improve research funding and ensure Canada and Ontario are investing in research across the board, from discovery to innovation.
Increasing investments in the Ontario Research Fund and ensuring it supports a wide range of research and innovation.
Supporting the movement of universities’ ideas and inventions into the marketplace by creating a research commercialization fund.
In our report, you will find a comprehensive summary of what we heard from Ontarians and how Ontario's universities are working across all sectors to help students thrive, support our communities, and drive a growing, dynamic province.
Browse through reports and related materials to find out about Ontario universities' role in everything ranging from university graduate employment to family medicine and community transformation.
