Student leaders should lobby for the provincial government, rather than individual universities, to provide tuition cuts. The current method student leaders at Carleton University use to advocate for the lowering of tuition has been directed at the university’s administration. This work at the university level is important but ultimately ineffective.
Each year, students pay more for university. Between 2006 and 2017, Ontario university tuition increased by a total of 40 per cent. Even with current tuition freezes across the province, student aid and funding fails to accommodate ever-increasing tuition costs for international students.
Those who are able to lower tuition effectively at Carleton are not at the university itself but instead are members of the provincial government. Post-secondary tuition has become harder for some Ontarians to afford because of cuts to the Ontario Student Assistance Program (OSAP). The cuts resulted in large losses of funding, particularly for students who come from low-income families; up to 40 per cent of Ontario post-secondary students had their tuition fully covered by OSAP until cuts were made in 2019. That level of funding is unmatched by any other revenue source that Carleton could draw from.
If students want tuition to be lowered, they should be demanding that funding be provided from their elected officials at the provincial level. If student organizations such as Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) shifted focus from advocating at the university level to the provincial level, they might be more successful.
There is precedent for this. Provinces where students fight tooth and nail against any rise in tuition do better in keeping tuition low. Compare the public response to the 2012 tuition hikes in Québec to the announcement of cuts to OSAP in 2019. For Québec, a proposed annual tuition hike of $325 over five years resulted in the longest student tuition protests in Canadian history. It was also the largest—about 400,000 students protested province-wide.
The protests in Québec resulted in elected officials speaking with student leaders and the planned hikes were cancelled, in part due to the size and duration of these protests. Toronto protests in 2019 against OSAP cuts paled in comparison when they only garnered thousands of participants. Students can more effectively fight against tuition hikes when large numbers of students direct their advocacy to the provincial government.
At Carleton, the responsibility to organize and fight at the provincial level is largely left to national student organizations like the Canadian Federation of Students. This method is counterproductive both for the goal to lower tuition and for the goals of those larger organizations to empower students.
Calls for lower tuition would be more powerful if each student government directed their energy towards pressuring the province in conjunction with larger national student organizations. It is up to student leaders to develop and facilitate the momentum for advocacy.
Failure to deliver on lower tuition is a routine gut punch to the student population that breeds a feeling of hopelessness. Student leaders can do better; the fight for affordable tuition is not impossible. But the way in which student leaders have approached fighting for the lowering of student tuition is fruitless.
Before the upcoming provincial election, Ontarians have the opportunity to use their voices more effectively. Students must provide a bold framework of demands from the provincial government such as returning to pre-2019 OSAP levels and expanding the funding in subsequent years. Demands must ensure governments create a plan to reduce the tuition costs for students through provincial funding and support. Student unions are in the best position to amplify the long-unheard cries of the student populace to people who actually have the ability to change it.
By doing this, in conjunction with other student organizations across the province, we can have a more effective and concerted effort in advocating for student tuition. The fragmented approach that student leaders currently employ is broken.
Focusing efforts misdirected towards Ontario universities will allow students to take wasted momentum and direct it provincially—lobbying for lower tuition more effectively.
Featured graphic by Sara Mizannojehdehi.
