Starting this January, college and university students will be dealing with changes to the Ontario Student Assistance Program (OSAP) and Student Access Guarantee (SAG) application process.
According to Tyler Charlebois, a spokesperson for the Ontario Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities, the provincial government has allocated $81 million to improve the application process.
“We’ve heard from many student groups about the challenges and issues related to getting aid. We’re trying to make [the application] easier and quicker,” he said.
Access and distant commuter grants will be directly deposited into the bank accounts of applicable students to avoid paperwork and long lines to claim the money, Charlebois said.
Students can now earn $100 a week without OSAP taking money away. In the past, students could only make $50 a week and any extra income resulted in money being taken away.
The modified repayment assistance plan looks at the predetermined monthly payment plan determined after graduation and reassesses it over time so that payments can be modified to meet the income of the individual.
No student will pay more than 20 per cent of their current income to repay loans. According to Charlebois, if a recipient’s income does not change for 15 years after graduation, the leftover debt will be waived.
Second-year Carleton University mechanical engineering student Wojciech Wyporski said he thinks the improvements are a good start.
“If I get a job next year, it’ll help a lot because I’m not given a lot of money as it is,” he said.
“We’re realizing the struggles students have,” Charlebois said. “We recognize not everyone graduates and goes onto a six-figure salary. Students should be able to attend post secondary on their [academic] ability, not their ability to pay.”
The new budget is expected to help 210,000 students this year, Charlebois said. There has also been a 56 per cent increase in the number of college and university students receiving support through OSAP.
Second-year Carleton film student Ruty Skvirsky also said she receives OSAP.
“If the number of students that need OSAP is rising, the issue of making post-secondary education more affordable needs to be addressed,” she said.
However, Skvirsky said she thinks the changes will have little effect on accessibility. “Another problem I have is that OSAP does not take into account tuition fee increases. If my tuition goes up, I might not be able to pay for it, because the amount I can take out in loans has a cap.”
“They're hardly making education more accessible,” she said. “A large portion of someone’s ability to go to school still depends on their socioeconomic standing.”
According to the OSAP website, additional benefits include additional support for married students and students with children.
The government's Open Ontario Plan will help raise Ontario's post-secondary education rate to 70 per cent.