Rising costs causing concern
Posted Aug 30, 2010 03:34:41 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Students are carrying an increasing share of the cost for their education. New figures show that Ontario universities are collecting as much money or more from students in tuition and fees as they do from government in operating grants. The University of Waterloo is the first school to breach the barrier, collecting more from students than it does from the government in the form of grants.
It’s a model that Ontario’s Undergraduate Student Alliance says abandons our public university model in the province.
“This shift into this private American college model and having the students funding the greater proportion than the government is really moving away from the unique characteristic that really made Ontario so proud,” says Alliance president Meaghan Coker.
A recent study points to a similar trend nationwide. The report by TD Economics shows that tuition fees accounted for 36 per cent of university revenue in 2005, up from just 13 per cent in 1980.
Here in Ontario, Coker says students are paying the highest tuition rates in the country while contributing the second greatest amount to the budgets of their schools through those tuition fees.
“It’s imperative that the government increase operating grants to universities to at least the per student national average,” Coker says.
Coker acknowledges that there has been support from the current Ontario government over the past five years through the Reaching Higher Plan, increases to the student financial aid system and an overall post-secondary funding increase of $6.2-billion. But she also believes the government needs to begin looking at post-secondary funding as something that will bring a solid return.
“Twenty-two per cent of the population has a university education and they contribute 41 per cent of income tax while only receiving 14 per cent of government transfers,” Coker explains. “Statistics like that only prove that our society will become overwhelmingly healthier, there will be lower crime rates, higher voter engagements, more charitable donations.”
Coker warns that students will be funding more and more of the operating costs at a university and she’s eager to keep the debate alive as to how we define a public education system in Ontario.
