Table of Contents
Background
The Teacher Education Application Service (TEAS) is a not-for-profit, centralized application service for applicants to the 13 faculties of education at Ontario universities.
Admission personnel at the universities developed TEAS. The Ontario Universities’ Application Centre (OUAC) operates TEAS to facilitate the application process for teacher education programs and to reduce duplication in application processing. Each faculty of education is completely autonomous in reaching its own admission decisions, with TEAS providing only the application processing service.
Applicants can apply for admission to all 13 universities and their varied teacher education programs using 1 common application. TEAS transfers the data entered in the application to the universities that the applicant selects. Each of the universities and programs has its own admission policy and reserves the right to determine if degrees granted by postsecondary institutions are suitable for admission.
Applicants should be aware of the variations in the admission requirements and ensure that they qualify for consideration before indicating they wish for TEAS to forward their application to a particular university. TEAS processes and forwards applications to all requested universities and programs regardless of the applicant’s qualifications or the completeness of their application. There are no refunds.
Governance
The Association of Education Registrars of Ontario Universities Terms of Reference
Preamble
The Association of Education Registrars of Ontario Universities (AEROU) has been in existence since 1978.
Ontario faculties of education centralized their admission application processing service through TEAS at the Ontario Universities’ Application Centre (OUAC) in 1980.
The group usually meets twice annually to consider admission and registrarial policy matters for the mutual benefit of institutional members, review the application processes and services of the OUAC, assess progress and plan for the ongoing development of the service.
Section 1 – Title of the Committee
The committee is known as the “Association of Education Registrars of Ontario Universities” (AEROU).
Section 2 – Purpose of the Committee
- To advise the OUAC on application fee levels,
- to advise the OUAC on the operation and development of TEAS,
- to consider admission policy matters for the mutual benefit of institutional members,
- to coordinate activities that facilitate and improve the admissions and related information services of Ontario’s faculties of education,
- to make recommendations on admission application process and admission policy matters to other committees as appropriate,
- to provide a forum for the open exchange of ideas without prejudice,
- to liaise with any or all of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation, Ontario College of Teachers, and Qualifications Evaluation Council of Ontario and
- to coordinate program promotion and recruitment activities as determined by members.
Section 3 – Composition of the Committee
Institutional representation at AEROU requires that a university be a member of the Council of Ontario Universities and offer a consecutive teacher education program applicants apply to using the TEAS application process.
AEROU is composed of the senior administrative official responsible for admission at each Ontario faculty of education, or their designate. A second university representative may be invited at the discretion of the senior administrative official.
Resource persons who attend meetings may include:
- The OUAC Executive Director
- The OUAC Director, Business Services
- The OUAC Manager, Graduate and Professional Programs
- The OUAC Assistant Manager, Graduate and Professional Programs
- The OUAC Manager, Application Systems
- Other resource persons invited by the Working Group
Section 4 – Voting
Each institution has 1 vote in the consideration of any motions raised by AEROU. A motion is carried with a majority of votes, with the Chair casting the deciding vote in the event of a tie.
A quorum consists of 6 institutional members who have voting authority.
Section 5 – Executive Officers of the Committee
A Chair and a Vice-Chair of AEROU are selected from among the institutional representatives. The Chair and Vice-Chair normally serve a term of 2 years once renewable, for no more than 4 years of consecutive service and these terms of office should be staggered.
The Secretary of AEROU is a representative from the OUAC.
Section 6 – Sub-committees
As deemed necessary by the AEROU group, sub-committees may be formed from time to time to work on various projects. A Technical Studies sub-committee is recognized as a standing sub-committee.
Section 7 – Schedule of Meetings
AEROU meets for regular meetings twice annually, once in the fall and once in the spring. The Chair may call other meetings, as needed.
Minutes of regular meetings are distributed within 1 month following the meeting date.
(Revised April 8, 2005.)
Processing Services Provided by TEAS
- Collecting supplementary fees for the universities to cover their administrative costs
- Corresponding with applicants for clarification of the general application data
- Developing systems
- Distributing supplementary PDF documents uploaded by applicants via Secure Applicant Messaging (SAM)
- Following up on all rejected fees
- Maintaining a Frequently Asked Questions list for applicants
- Maintaining electronic transcript request services for Ontario transcripts
- Maintaining the AEROU listserv
- Managing telephone, email and live chat inquiries
- Performing annual statistical reporting
- Performing daily distribution of data to universities
- Performing internal and external system tests
- Preparing the TEAS application and Application Guide
- Processing fees for electronic transcript requests
- Processing fees, including university fees
- Processing fee waivers, as required
- Programming systems for department processes
- Providing access to a portal where universities can run various reports containing application data
- Providing an email verification process for all new accounts to ensure that applicants enter valid email addresses
- Providing for electronic transcripts
- Providing links to supplementary forms as part of the online application
- Providing tools for universities to process their own late exceptions
- Providing upload functionality via SAM
- Providing vouchers for university purchase that applicants can apply toward the cost of an OUAC application
- Receiving all applications and monitoring deadlines
- Sending applicant data via data sheet PDFs
Fees
The TEAS base application fee is $159 (which includes 3 choices of faculties of education or programs) plus a supplementary fee for each university selection. All fees are non‑refundable. The amount paid must correctly reflect the number of university selections made.
There is an additional choice fee of $51 for each university/choice above 3. Transcript request fees vary by institution.
The supplementary fees, collected by TEAS but remitted directly to the universities, assist the universities in covering a portion of the costs associated with the admission assessment. Supplementary fees are determined by university, not by the number of programs selected at each university.
The TEAS base application fee is reviewed every year, as directed by the OUAC Budget and Advisory Committee. The universities set the supplementary fees.
Supplementary Fees (in Canadian Funds)
Brock: $75
Lakehead: $75
Laurentian: $80
Nipissing: $80
Ontario français: $70
Ontario Tech: $75
Ottawa: $92
Queen’s: $85
Trent: $80
Western: $80
Wilfrid Laurier: $95
Windsor: $75
York: $100
TEAS will not forward applications to the universities until the OUAC receives full payment.
Payment is part of the final Submit process. The OUAC uses Flywire for Canadian and international payments. Applicants can use Flywire to pay Canadian dollar fees in their local currency from anywhere in the world, at anytime.
If applicants are unable to pay using Flywire, payment by cheque may be allowed on a case-by-case basis only.
TEAS must receive payments for applications by the stated deadlines.
Fee Transfer
The OUAC’s Finance Department prepares 2 fee levies each year, 1 in mid-February and 1 in late September. There is a 2.2% credit card recovery charged against the levy transfer, as well as the supplemental fee charge of $2/fee.
Statistical Summary Report
TEAS prepares monthly statistical reports, which are available on the SSH server. The OUAC sends an email to the universities to advise when the files are available.