The province’s introduction of the Ontario Student Grant (OSG) plan brought forth questions about what it entails for funding from post-secondary students.
The Charlatan sat down with Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne in an exclusive one-on-one interview to talk about the possible confusions regarding the OSG and the state of education funding in the province.
The Charlatan (TC): I think both of us would think that the most confusing part about the OSG plan is the “free” tuition: That there are caveats, one of them being the $3,000 contribution students are expected to make in order to access these grants. Do you still worry about how it’s being marketed?
Kathleen Wynne (KW): So let’s just be clear. The $3,000 is not a requirement, so the grant is not contingent on that. That’s just the general expectation but it is not a requirement. The reality is that for students in families where the income is $50,000 or less who are applying to a program, the average tuition cost will be free. And in fact, students in that income bracket, many times they will get more than the tuition cost. For many of those students between $50,000 and $83,000, it will be free depending on program and but up to $50,000 that average tuition cost is free.
(TC): About the $3,000 contribution, you said it’s not set in stone. How come it was put in the budget plan in the first place? A lot of confusion came from that as well.
(KW): I think students who have applied for student assistance know that there is that sort of discussion with officials, there’s that expectation that many students will have a summer job, they will be able to earn some money and it’s around $3,000 that they will bring to the mix. As a student applies, they look at what their ability to pay is. The other thing I want to add is that if students in that income bracket are going into a program that costs more than the average tuition, it’s not OSAP [Ontario Student Assistance Program] that the grant will not necessarily cover that but the universities are required to top up that tuition payment. So it is a real change in the way we are doing tuition and supporting students in the province.
(TC): You have said the language around the grant plan is “evolving.” How so?
(KW): Well actually the discussion is evolving across the province but we’ve been very clear, we put it in our budget plan. I’m having this conversation with you because I want to make sure that everyone around the province understands that as of 2017, that group of students in that income bracket will be able to access tuition grants that will make their tuition free, the average cost of tuition free.
(TC): There are students who come from families with incomes over $83,000, some of them do need to require some kind of financial aid. What will they expect given the new changes surrounding the budget?
(KW): So you’ll remember that we have had in place for a number of years the 30 per cent off tuition and so for students in that category from $83,000 to $160,000, they will still qualify for the 30 per cent off tuition. So nobody is going to be worse off in terms of their access. And the other thing is each student when they make their application, there are other considerations. It depends what the number of students in a family that it is supporting, whether the student is going away from home to go to school. All of those considerations are part of the calculation.
(TC): How come the new grant plan doesn’t necessarily affect part-time students and mature students?
(KW): It does affect mature students and independent students. And in fact, there is a change because the 30 per cent off tuition grant only began when students graduated from high school and was only good for the four years after high school. Now, whether students have just left high school or not, they can qualify for the OSG. Basically, there’s lifetime access, of eight semesters and for twelve semesters for students with learning disabilities. That means that students who have been out of school for some time can come back and they will still qualify. That was something that I felt very strongly about because adult learners who have been out of the system for a while often are the most motivated and we need to support them in getting back into school.
(TC): Will there be more changes, for example, to OSAP before the election?
(KW): It’s two years until an election so I can’t say there won’t be any. But this change actually doesn’t come into place until September 2017, because it takes some time to get the systems up and running, so this is the biggest change that we will make. There may be other refinements that we need to put in place but this is happening September 2017 and it’s a very big deal for students.
(TC): I want to talk briefly about post-secondary education funding in Ontario. Right now, percentage-wise, the Ontario government provides the least for post-secondary schools and students provide the most to fund these schools. Do you think the level of funding right now for post-secondary institutions should be at the level it is?
(KW): Well actually if you take into account all the supports that we have in place for students in universities and college, it’s not actually the most expensive in the country. I assume that’s what you are saying, it’s the most expensive for kids to go to school or it’s the lowest funding.
(TC): But also in terms of percentage funding compared to any other province, Ontario provides the least, at least according to Statistics Canada.
(KW): Again, you’d have to show me exactly what numbers you are looking at but my understanding is that once you take into account all the supports that we put in place for students, we are not actually the lowest, it actually increases to the middle of the pack so we actually support our university sector to a much higher degree.
(TC): But do you expect any funding increases for universities in the near future?
(KW): We continue to work with universities to refine the funding model actually. That’s something that is happening right now. There is a very big discussion among universities and with the government about whether the way the funding model works makes sense. Not necessarily about more money but how the funding model actually supports the universities. So I think you’ll see more information about that in the future. But I say there is a discussion right now, because colleges and universities aren’t funded in the same way, so there are questions about whether there are changes to the funding model that need to be put in place.
(TC): I think in relation to that, next year the tuition fee framework will have to be revised. Do you expect any sort of changes to what it is right now?
(KW): Well I think that’s the discussion, what are those changes, what do we need to be looking at? My concern, quite frankly, has been to make sure that all students have access, so that’s why we made this change to tuition, that’s why we made the student assistance change because the way that the grants and loans were working was not working for low income and low middle income families. If you look at the statistics there were a much higher percentage of young people form high income families than low income families going to post-secondary and that’s what needs to stop.
(TC): In the grand scheme of things, where do you put changes with the OSG plan?
(KW): Education is the reason I’m in provincial politics. I believe that it is the most important thing that government can do because even things like health outcomes flow from having an educated population and if we’re going to grow the economy in this province, and create jobs which has to be any governments top priority, and it is our top priority, education is a critical building block of that economic growth and prosperity. It’s an extremely high priority for me, and when I say education, yes it is about tuition but it is right from early learning right up to post-secondary and post-graduate.
This interview has been edited for clarity.
