Dear CAFCE Members,

Welcome back after what I hope was a restful winter break. Chinese New Year brings in the year of the Dragon on January 23 and your CAFCE Board is off to a fire-breathing start! We had our first meeting of 2012 on Jan 17, and would like you to know some of the highlights of what we are working on:

First, we have learned that CAFCE will be inducted into the Co-operative Education Hall of Honour, located at the University of Cincinnati. This is a terrific honour for all of our members as it recognizes the quality work we do in co-operative education across the country. For more information about the Hall of Honour please see: http://www.uc.edu/webapps/propractice/hallofhonor/Home.aspx

Another plug for co-op in Canada can be found on page 28 of  the January edition of the Job Postings magazine (volume 14 issue 4). The article starts out: "You co-op kids get the best of both worlds: an enriched education and work experience (even a paycheque). Check out the rest for a nice boost!

The Board was presented with a proposal from WACE who have invited us to consider collaborating in the publication of a Guide to co-op programs across Canada. The audience for this guide would be High School counsellors and teachers. WACE has a similar publication in the US which does generate some profits for them through advertising revenues. The Board would be interested in your thoughts, specifically if you think your institution would be interested in paying for advertising, or if you think employers would pay for advertising. Please contact a Board member with your feedback.

Further on the financial side, we are really pleased to report that membership revenues are up from last year. Additionally, we have had good response for the January 31 Pro-D session being organized by your Pro-D committee and International committee. Thank you everyone for your support and efforts!

National Co-op Week is March 19-22, 2012 and we will be sending you more information and materials to help you celebrate this week. Furthermore, the National Co-op Week Committee is hoping to hold a session at the CAFCE 2012 conference in Whistler where interested members can provide suggestions and help us make this an even stronger event.

Speaking of the conference, July 29 – August 1, 2012 is our CAFCE 2012 conference and the website is up and running http://www.cafce2012.com/index.html . We have close to 50 registrations so far and some great presentations and speakers planned.  Whistler is very busy during the time of our conference – so remember to book your accommodations early.

Our next Board meetings will be in Toronto  Feb 23-24. Until then, please stay in touch with your Board rep and let us know if you have any questions or concerns.

Norah McRae
President, CAFCE
president@cafce.ca

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