“Ontario is giving colleges and universities a multi-billion-dollar funding boost, while also lifting a seven-year tuition fee freeze in order to address severe financial strain.”
So does that mean that Ontario will not be the province with the lowest post-secondary funding in all of Canada? It would have to increase funding by 55% just to catch the next worst province (Alberta).
Funny, the headline could have been, “Ontario fucks every post-secondary student.” Wonder why they went with this.
A shit move in the right direction. But even that’s suprising from this government given their previous moves regarding higher education.
In the right direction? And here I am thinking that the developing nation where my parent’s grew up, where citizens have access to free university makes Canada’s system seem like it’s behind.
The right direction as in increasing the funding for education institurions, which they have been starving for years with significant effects in those orgs. Right direction as in slowing the destruction of the system. Of course the way they did it was to fuck students - a shit solution. With that said, this is the better solution than slowly killing these institutions while keeping tuition low. Reason being that the students and their parents who are the bulk of the affected voters see lower prices while the degradation of the institutions isn’t as obvious. This can go on for a long time hiding the damage. If however students and their parents see the higher prices, they may vote for a premier who runs on free tuition instead of Ford. We actually had a means-tested free tuition in Ontario for a little bit.
From the student’s point of view, they are reducing the government’s contribution to education. Students previously could get up to 75% grants (leaving 25% as loans) but now must take 75% as loans no matter what. Students that are one year through a four year program and have made major life decisions based on funding commitments they have received are now totally fucked because they don’t even get grandfathered. They just get fucked.
This would be pretty bad for students who don’t have a family safety net, the ones that go it alone on OSAP grants for living expenses.
