ACCESS TO OPPORTUNITIES PROGRAM

In 1998 the government announced the Access to Opportunities Program (ATOP) as an incentive for universities and colleges to produce more graduates in designated high-technology fields. Each institution submitted a growth plan to show how it would increase enrolment. In return, the government provides one-time and on-going funding on a per-capita basis for each new eligible domestic student enrolled. As this program is a significant source of new funding for Carleton, this report presents an outline of how we are doing in meeting our enrolment targets under this plan.

Commentary:

Enrolments are counted as eligible for ATOP only if the students are eligible for provincial BIU funding; in particular, international fee paying students are not eligible.
Enrolments in ATOP-eligible programs for 1998/99 comfortably exceeded the plan approved by the Ministry.
Enrolments in 1999/2000 exceeded the plan by a small margin. The B. Engineering program exceeded the targeted enrolment while the Computer Mathematics and Computational Sciences programs fell significantly below target.
Enrolments in 2000/01 fell short of the ATOP plan due to shortfalls in Computer Science, Computational Sciences and Computer Mathematics.
Preliminary numbers indicate that enrolments in 2001/02 will again fall short of the ATOP plan. The main areas falling below the target are Computer Mathematics, Computational Sciences and B. Computer Science.