Our Deans and Directors’ Virtual Roundtable provides a forum for leaders of university continuing and extension education units to discuss strategic challenges, operational adaptations, and financial realities, with a focus on enhancing program quality and aligning with university goals during uncertain times. This platform facilitates the sharing of insights and collaborative strategies to ensure the delivery of community-focused lifelong education that supports broad civic engagement and workforce enhancement.
2025 – 2026 Roundtables
As we enter 2026, we invite you to join a new CAUCE DD Roundtable series.
Theme: Working Together During Lean Times: Leadership, Partnership, and Sustainable Practice
University Continuing Education units are navigating lean resources, restructuring, and rising expectations to “do more with less.” At the same time, our role as connectors, linking learners, communities, employers, and institutions has never been more critical.
This virtual series (January and March), bracketing the in-person DD meeting in Toronto, will create an intentional community of practice where leaders can:
- Share how they are responding to current financial and structural realities
- Explore what lean leadership looks like in practice in Continuing Education
- Identify and strengthen strategic partnerships (internal and external) that not only support sustainability and growth but align with the strategic priorities of the university
- Surface practical strategies for maintaining program quality while operating in constrained environments
A brief 1–2-page summary document will be shared with participants in advance of both virtual meetings, outlining objectives, key discussion questions, and how feedback will be used.
Deans and Directors’ Listening Session: Financial, structural, and strategic pressures
Date: January 28, 2026
Time: 3:00 – 4:00 pm ET
Description: The January roundtable will serve as a shaping and listening session. Its core purpose is to gather input about the financial, structural, and strategic pressures units are facing, and to use that input to refine the focus of the in-person meeting in Toronto. Participants will be invited to reflect on where they are feeling the greatest pressures to do more with less, how restructuring or mandate changes are affecting their units, and which kinds of partnerships, models, or leadership practices they most need to explore with colleagues. The session will combine a short, shared framing with small-group conversation. In facilitated breakouts, participants will discuss their realities around budgets, restructuring, partnerships, and talent, and will work together to surface the questions and issues they believe must be addressed in Toronto. A short plenary discussion will bring these threads together and identify the key themes and questions that resonate across institutions.
By the end of the January roundtable, we expect to have a focused set of priority questions and topics to share with presenters and facilitators for the Toronto meeting, along with a clearer picture of common challenges across units. The emphasis will be on practical, honest reflection that can shape a meaningful and relevant in-person conversation for leaders working in lean times.
Deans and Directors Meeting
Date: February 26 – 27, 2026
In-person | Toronto, ON
Description: The DD meeting this February 2026 will build directly on what is heard in January. Presenters and facilitators will be invited to respond to the questions and themes generated in the January virtual roundtable, sharing examples and approaches to lean leadership, partnership-driven strategies, and sustainable practice. The in-person meeting will provide more time for deeper dialogue, institutional comparisons, and the development of practical ideas and tools that leaders can take back to their units. Key themes and takeaways from Toronto will then be brought forward into the March virtual roundtable.
Deans and Directors Looking Ahead: Moving from insight to next steps
Date: March 24, 2026
Time: 3:00 – 4:00 pm ET
Description: The March roundtable will close the loop on this cycle and look ahead. It will begin with a concise synthesis of the main insights, tensions, and examples that emerged from the Toronto meeting, with an emphasis on what seems most useful or transferable across different institutional contexts. The session will then invite participants to reflect on which ideas or models feel actionable in their own settings, and where they see potential for collective learning or shared experimentation. Through a combination of focused discussion and brief plenary reporting, the March session will concentrate on moving from insight to next steps. Participants will consider what kinds of support or collaboration they need, whether around business models, internal and external partnerships, or investing in staff and faculty capacity when budgets are tight, and where CAUCE might play a role in sustaining that work.
The expected outcome of the March roundtable is a short list of shared priorities and possible avenues for ongoing collaboration, such as informal communities of practice, thematic working groups, or future roundtables. The overarching aim is to strengthen a network of DD who can support one another in leading agile, sustainable, partnership-based continuing education units.
Registration Information
A calendar invitation with the Zoom link will be sent to all our institutional Deans and Directors. Please contact the secretariat at info@cauce-aepuc.ca if you do not receive an invitation.