How smart is your city?

By macleans.ca - Thursday, May 20, 2010 - 5 Comments

Find where your community stands on the Composite Learning Index

The Canadian Council on Learning has scorecards for over 4,500 cities and communities in Canada with five years worth of results and trends—plus interactive maps and charts to help you compare your city/town to one next door or one on the other side of the country. Find your city/town now.

Canada's most wired cities

By macleans.ca - Thursday, May 20, 2010 at 5:00 AM - 3 Comments

Which parts of the country are most ‘connected’?

City	Per cent who spent on Internet services	Access to Broadband Internet
Regina	79.8	98.0
Victoria*	76.9	100.0
Saskatoon	81.1	95.4
Toronto	78.3	90.8
St. John’s	75.8	92.8
London*	76.5	87.9
Halifax	75.1	89.5
Montréal	63.1	98.1
Calgary	82.8	68.1
Vancouver	76.0	86.9
Charlottetown	68.8	88.5
Edmonton	76.3	81.5
Québec*	56.0	96.1
Winnipeg	68.7	84.9
Saint John	69.5	76.7
Cape Breton*	67.8	85.5
Fredericton*	68.6	76.0
Moncton*	62.6	81.5

Source: Statistics Canada, special tabulation, unpublished data, Survey of Household Spending, 2008. Note: Unless indicated, data reflects Census Metropolitan Areas.
Source: Industry Canada’s Broadband Office, 2007.
* Data for these cities only available at the economic region level.

CLI Measure: Proportion of Canadian households reporting annual expenditures on Internet services in the home.
CLI Measure: Proportion of Canadian households with access to broadband internet service, including wirless, digital subscriber line (DSL), or cable.

Canada's most active cities

By macleans.ca - Thursday, May 20, 2010 at 5:00 AM - 1 Comment

Which Canadians spend money on sports?

City	Per cent of households who report expenditures on sports and recreation
Edmonton	52.6
Victoria*	51.8
Halifax	51.1
Regina	50.6
Saskatoon	49.9
Calgary	48.8
Fredericton*	45.3
London*	45.2
Winnipeg	45.2
St. John’s	44.7
Vancouver	41.8
Toronto	40.7
Saint John	40.5
Charlottetown	39.7
Québec*	39.0
Cape Breton*	37.1
Moncton*	35.0
Montréal	32.2

Source: Statistics Canada, special tabulation, unpublished data, Survey of Household Spending, 2008. Note: Unless indicated, data reflects Census Metropolitan Areas.
* Data for these cities only available at the economic region level.

CLI Measure: Proportion of Canadian households reporting annual expenditures on sports and recreation facilities.

Canada's most cultured cities

By macleans.ca - Thursday, May 20, 2010 at 5:00 AM - 9 Comments

Who in Canada are the big readers, show-goers and museum patrons?

City	Learning to Be Score	Per cent who spent on reading	Per cent who spent on the performing arts	Per cent who spent on museums
Victoria*	7.6	84.6	49.1	43.2
Saskatoon	7.4	80.7	55.3	36.0
Regina	6.9	77.3	45.8	37.7
Calgary	6.8	81.9	39.3	42.8
Halifax	6.5	78.6	43.9	37.0
St. John’s	5.9	71.8	48.1	28.1
Edmonton	5.6	70.3	39.8	26.4
Fredericton*	5.5	83.8	43.9	25.5
Winnipeg	5.5	77.3	39.1	30.7
Toronto	5.4	68.7	36.1	33.9
London*	5.4	67.1	-	-
Charlottetown	5.1	75.4	47.0	22.9
Vancouver	5.1	64.1	40.7	27.6
Québec*	4.6	81.8	39.7	-
Moncton*	4.4	74.8	35.8	29.3
Saint John	4.3	75.8	35.1	19.7
Montréal	4.0	71.5	35.9	25.5
Cape Breton*	4.0	70.7	27.0	-

Source: Statistics Canada, special tabulation, unpublished data, Survey of Household Spending, 2008. Unless indicated, data reflects Census Metropolitan Areas.
* Data for these cities only available at the economic region level.

CLI Measure: Proportion of Canadian households reporting annual expenditures on printed reading material.
CLI Measure: Proportion of Canadian households reporting annual expenditures on live performing arts.
CLI Measure: Proportion of Canadian households reporting annual expenditures on admissions to museums and other activities.

Canada's most socially engaged cities

By macleans.ca - Thursday, May 20, 2010 at 5:00 AM - 0 Comments

Which Canadians are best at learning to live together?

City	Learning to Live Together Score	Volunteering rate	Per cent who regularly socialize with other cultures	Per cent who spent on social clubs
Saskatoon	7.1	65.1	74.1	27.7
Victoria	6.8	46.8	86.1	28.8*
Winnipeg	6.1	53.5	84.6	17.2
Regina	5.8	51.2	76.5	16.4
Edmonton	5.8	52.2	80.6	17.1
London	5.7	58.7	73.9	-
Calgary	5.7	50.3	76.6	18.8
Toronto	5.6	47.6	89.0	14.3
Hamilton	5.5	52.3	76.8	-
Charlottetown	5.1	56.2*	54.1	16.3
St. John’s	5.0	46.4	47.3	23.4
Vancouver	4.9	44.6	82.8	9.2
Halifax	4.9	56.5	66.3	16.9
Abbotsford	4.8	52.0	86.7	-
Ottawa – Hull	4.7	51.3	53.8	-
Montréal	4.5	36.7	69.8	17.0
Moncton	4.4	48.6	67.3	19.0*
Saint John	4.3	51.3	50.9	16.6*
Sherbrooke	4.1	44.1	66.5	-
Québec	3.8	36.0	50.1	25.4*
Trois-Rivières	3.5	36.5	43.2	-

Sources:
Statistics Canada, Canadian Survey of Giving, Volunteering and Participating, 2007
Canadian Council on Learning, Survey of Canadian Attitudes toward Learning, 2008
Statistics Canada, special tabulation, unpublished data, Survey of Household Spending, 2008
Note: Unless indicated, data reflects Census Metropolitan Areas.
* Data for these cities only available at the economic region level.

CLI Measure: Proportion of Canadian engaged in unpaid work as part of a group or organization
CLI Measure: Proportion of Canadians who socialized with people from other cultures a minimum of a few times a month.
CLI Measure: Proportion of Canadian households reporting spending on membership in or contributions to social clubs or organizations.

Canada's smartest cities 2010: overall rankings

By macleans.ca - Thursday, May 20, 2010 at 5:00 AM - 131 Comments

This year’s bragging rights go to . . .

Is your city one of Canada’s smartest, a place that has what it takes to help you get ahead? Or is it falling behind? Check out how Canada’s major cities stack up, and whether they’re improving (Regina, for instance, has shot up from 17th to fifth in three years) or slipping down the list. While some of the results were to be expected (Victoria is a regular contender for the top spot), others may come as a surprise (Halifax beat Toronto). Those near the top of the Canadian Council on Learning’s annual list do, however, have one thing in common: opportunities for lifelong learning.

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Canada’s smartest cities 2010

By Nancy Macdonald - Thursday, May 20, 2010 at 5:00 AM - 44 Comments

Learning across most of the country has stalled. Is your city a bright spot?

Photograph by Geoff Howe

A decade ago, urbanists had just about written the obituary for St. John’s, Nfld. The fate of the hard-luck port town, like much of Newfoundland, was wedded to the fisheries. Between 1992, when the cod moratorium was announced, and 2006, the province lost 11 per cent of its population—the youngest, brightest and most productive 11 per cent, as Newfoundlanders will tell you. Everyone figured St. John’s would become a wasteland, because it had such low learning and employment opportunities, says Paul Cappon, president and chief executive of the Canadian Council on Learning (CCL), an Ottawa-based non-profit that ranks more than 4,500 Canadian cities and communities annually.

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