As the Ontario government gets set to review its regulations on university tuition fees, students are asking what their money is being used for. To help answer this question, the Ontario Undergraduate Student Alliance (OUSA) today released Rising Costs: A Look at Spending at Ontario's Universities, a research report outlining how university expenditures changed from 2005 to 2010.

"Per-student funding increased more than $3,000 over the last five years due mostly to increases in government contributions and student fees well above the rate of inflation. Students wanted to know how much went to improving the quality of their learning experience," said Sean Madden, President of the Ontario Undergraduate Student Alliance (OUSA).

The report finds that salaries, benefits, merit-based and graduate scholarships, demand for support services, indirect costs associated with research and new capital projects were the system's primary cost drivers. More than 70 per cent of the increase in funding from 2004-05 went to salary, pension and benefit costs largely for existing full-time academic faculty and administrators, as well as increased use of part-time instructors.

"The affordability and accessibility of our post-secondary education system is at risk if students' costs continue to rise at double the rate of inflation. Increased government investment in post-secondary education is a critical and necessary component of a sustainable way forward. However, the system is also going to have to demonstrate an ability to contain costs in a fair and progressive manner," continued Madden.

"It is our hope that this report will spark some discussion on how government, institutions, faculty and students can work together to improve quality with current resources and ensure a sustainable, affordable, high-quality university system for years to come." 

OUSA will be hosting a roundtable discussion on the Rising Costs report and on innovative ways to improve quality of the undergraduate learning experience. The event will be held on Thursday, December 8th, 2011 from 9:30am - 11:30am at the Sutton Place Hotel, in the Amsterdam Suite. Please register each individual below, and contact info@ousa.ca if you have any questions or concerns.

To register for the public event, go to: bit.ly/risingcosts

 

From November 4th to 6th, OUSA held its Fall General Assembly at the University of Windsor. The conference provided an opportunity for student delegates from all of OUSA's member schools, as well as a few observers, to get together and talk about post-secondary education policy and priorities. The conference opened with the Deputy Premier and Minister of Finance, the Hon. Dwight Duncan speaking about the economic challenges facing Ontario and how they will affect universities and colleges. Students were also excited to hear Dr. Ian Clark speak about his new book Academic Reform, which discusses policy options for improving the quality and cost-effectiveness of undergraduate education.

There was a great deal of debate and dialogue among students during the conference, which culminated with the unanimous approval of three new policies: System Growth, Accountability and Tuition.  In addition, amendments to the Aboriginal Students policy were approved, in keeping with findings from our consultations with students this fall. Finally, students have tasked Steering Committee and Home Office with preparing policy on four topics for the Spring General Assembly: student health, rural and northern students, credit transfer, and mature students.

Also, for the first time ever, OUSA had a live webcast of the plenary proceedings from General Assembly. Over 150 viewers tuned in at some point during the five hour meeting.

See everyone in March 2012 at McMaster University!

The past month was marked by some very significant events - the election of a new Legislature; a Cabinet announcement resulting in a new Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities; campus visits that took us all across Ontario; our Fall General Assembly at the University of Windsor; the launch of a new report and magazine issue; and the odd break for sleep and nourishment.

I am particularly proud of the work that we were able to do throughout the election campaign at all of our campuses, and anecdotal evidence suggests that turnout on university campuses was up from 2007. The result of the election - the re-election of Premier McGuinty - meant that much of the past month was dominated by advocacy and consultation to ensure that the new tuition grant is rolled out in the best way for students.

Campus visits were a highlight for me as well. It is always great to be back on campuses, listening to and getting feedback from students, and being reminded of how diverse the needs are of the students we represent. I also had the pleasure of attending OCUFA's annual teaching awards and hearing from some amazing teachers in Ontario. Finally last week, I sat on an interesting panel at the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario's conference on financial literacy.

I wish I could say things will slow down a bit now, but it will likely be full bore until Christmas with the launch of the Ontario Post-Secondary Student Survey, our upcoming Student Advocacy Conference at Queen's Park, and our roundtable on how to improve quality in Ontario's universities.

I've always associated November with the feeling of anticipation; never more so than since I've been with OUSA. The beginning of November has been an admittedly feverish and hurried type of anticipation, with our fall General Assembly taking much of our time. Our three policy papers on tuition, accountability and system growth were presented and all three were approved with revisions. I congratulate our policy paper authors on jobs well done. Furthermore, I would like to thank Chris Rudnicki and Kristen Holman for their work over the summer, providing a research base for policy papers I'm personally quite proud of.

The Ontario Post-Secondary Student Survey has been rolling out all week across Ontario campuses. I'm excited for the analysis of these results, and I'm certain the data will help us refine our understanding of attitudes towards student financial assistance and quality.

As we head into December and our annual Student Advocacy Conference, I must underline how excited I am to put the policies that we've worked hard on all year into action. 

October was a whirlwind of policy activity! We released Rising Costs: A Look at Spending at Ontario's Universities, our first research report of the fall, and are hosting a roundtable discussion on university expenditures and quality in December. During October, I also continued to meet with Aboriginal students to discuss OUSA's Aboriginal policy paper. I was privileged to have illuminating discussions with students from Waterloo, Windsor, and McMaster this past month, and look forward to chatting with students from Laurier Waterloo and Laurier Brantford in the coming weeks. Finally, October ended with a very successful fall General Assembly. Sean, Natalie, Luke, Kristen and I were pleased to see our System Growth policy pass unanimously. A special thank you goes out to Luke and Kristen, students at large, for taking time out of their busy schedules to write a portion of the paper. Now that the fall General Assembly is over, I am looking forward to starting work on the student health paper, a topic which many students and stakeholders would agree, is a very relevant topic in post-secondary education right now.