After learning Friday its indigenous social work program could lose its accreditation if it doesn't hire more faculty, Laurentian University is assuring students it will ensure the program remains in good standing.
The accrediting body, the Canadian Association of Social Work Education, made a site visit to Laurentian last week, and said the program is short two professors, as well as a half-time administration position.
The Indigenous Social Work Student Council immediately took to social media to cry foul about the situation.
In a Oct. 7 Facebook post, the council's president, Mary Jolin-Lake, said the accreditation team indicated the program “is the most underfunded program he has seen in Canada.”
“The loss of accreditation is a devastating blow for all those who have invested time in building the program and for us students,” the post said. “The lack of funding does not rest on our director's shoulders, but on Laurentian University’s president, as he is responsible for our funding.”
Later, after Laurentian told the students it would take steps to rectify the situation, the student council praised Indigenous social work students for raising awareness of the issue on social media.
“It is because of the continued dedication and support of the students in this program that has led them to respond to our fears so quickly,” the Oct. 9 post said.
Sudbury.com attempted to contact Jolin-Lake, but she did not immediately respond to our request for an interview.
Laurentian's vice-president, academic, Pierre Zundel, told Sudbury.com the university will take steps to hire the necessary faculty before a final decision is made on accreditation in January.
“What they (the accrediting body) did is essentially said they would be setting a condition for re-accreditation of increasing the number of faculty members to bring the ratio of students to faculty to a more sustainable level,” he said.
He said this has already been communicated to the Indigenous social work students, and he's going to meet with them later this week.
“Essentially what's happening in this program is it has had dramatic growth in the last five years,” Zundel said.
“We went from something just short of 100 in 2010 to almost 200 in 2015. This is kind of being a victim of your own success. The number of faculty members has not kept pace with that growth.”
The university was aware of the situation, and had been in discussion with the Indigenous social work department for “some months” to determine what kind of faculty needs to be hired, he said.
When asked if the situation is embarrassing for the university, Zundel said he doesn't know about that, but it would have been nice if the discussions about the program's faculty had been concluded earlier.
“But you know what?” he said. “The focus is on let's get these positions hired, and let's get this done.”
Alexandra Wright, executive director of the Canadian Association of Social Work Education, said she couldn't comment on the situation other than to say no formal decision would be made until January.
She said the process is “confidential.”
