3. Why are we advocating for lower tuition fees?
We chose the topic of post-secondary costs for our advocacy project
because it is something that each of us can relate to. We are all
Centennial College students and have all experienced paying for
tuition and other necessities such as textbooks. We've also faced the
challenges that come with paying fees and at times, it can be a difficult
task. Also, we have a group member who is an international student
and some group members have paid tuition, or know people who are,
using financial assistance services like OSAP or have worked while
going to school, so we can input different perspectives on this issue.
Going to college or university is the next step for a higher education
and a pathway to careers. There are many who are able to move on to
post-secondary education, but some face the challenge of tuition and
other costs, such as textbooks and residency, as it does cost quite a bit
of money. Those who want to move on to post-secondary tuition
should not have to any barriers, like expensive tuition.
4. Rising Tuition in Canada
• From 1993 – 2015, tuition fees in most of the provinces in
Canada have tripled.
• It is expected that from the 2014-2015 school year to the
2017-2018 school year, the cost of post-secondary tuition
will increase even more, Ontario by 13%.
(Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, September 2014)
5. Working to Pay Off Tuition and Other School Fees
• Compared to 40 years ago, the number of minimum wage hours students
had to work to be able to afford the cost of tuition have doubled and
tripled. Some now even have to work six times the hours.
• In 1975, the national average of hours someone has to work to pay tuition is
230. In 2013, the national average increased to 570 hours.
• Ontario requires 708
hours of work to afford
tuition, the most out of
all the provinces.
(Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives)
6. Some facts about OSAP
What is OSAP?
• OSAP is a financial assistance program for students who are attending or are
going to attend college or university.
• OSAP offers two kinds of money; grants, which is money that does not have to
be paid back, and student loans that will have to be paid back. This money is
provided by the Ontario government and the federal government. You can get
OSAP even if you’re attending or will attend a school in another country, as long
as the school is approved by OSAP.
Who is eligible?
• Canadian citizen
• Permanent resident
• Protected person
International Students are
not eligible for OSAP.
The government also considers:
• Status of the person applying for OSAP
• The school they will attend
• Program of study
• Course load
• Duration of study
• Education costs
• Their financial contribution as well as their family’s
http://www.jsrdf.orghttp://www.jsrdf.org
7. We interviewed an OSAP student to gain insight on their experiences with
paying tuition using OSAP money and the process and difficulties they may have
had to get it. We asked different questions like, “What does OSAP cover in
school fees?” “Is there a time frame to pay back OSAP?” and “Was it hard to get
OSAP?” What we learned from this interview was that OSAP mainly covers
their tuition fees and any leftover money will go to textbooks and other school
fees. But when they started working and getting more hours at work, OSAP put
that into consideration and they got less money, and are only able to get enough
for tuition. We also learned that there is no time frame to pay back OSAP, but
there are people who are still paying back OSAP even when they’ve finished
school and already have careers.
OSAP Student Interview Summary
8. Working Student Interview Summary
From interviewing a working student we learned that more than half of people’s
wages go into paying for post secondary tuition fees. This leaves very little money
for the student to spend on any other necessities in life. They do not have enough
money for food, clothes, and paying off all the bills. We also learned that working
part time and doing your studies can affect your mental health greatly. It adds on a
lot of stress because you might not find time to do the course work since your
working so many hours. It can also affect your appetite and therefore your health.
Because of high tuition fees people have to work part time which makes it very
difficult to take a full course load. Therefore it would take most students at least a
year longer to complete their studies because of this problem.
9. International Student Interview Summary
This interview was done with an International student because we wanted to show
the expense of Post Secondary education. During thus interview questions are
asked like what amount you pay as an International student. The answer was “we
pay $14,000 for one year”. Another question that was asked was what benefits you
get as an international student, to summarize this answer they only get insurance
benefits only if there is an accident that causes injury. They are not supposed to
participate in scholarship because they are supposed to have their tuition fee
coming in the country. They are only allowed to work certain hours during the
school term. Books are not covered.
10. Our group created a survey on survey monkey to gather information on
how aware and how affected students by the high cost of school fees.
We come to a conclusion that most of the students are not aware if the
tuition fee went increase or decrease. Also, because of the high cost of
the tuition some students are struggling to continue their study in college
and university. From this research we decided to do a petition and social
media particularly Facebook to bring awareness to our community as
well the Ministry of Colleges and University.
Survey
13. SENDING A LETTER
We need change. We want affordable education not only for people today, but also for
future generations who want to attend college. We want everyone to have an opportunity
to extend their learning and skills in programs that interest them without any barriers, like
expensive tuition, pulling them back from doing so. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Feliza Fanto Amena Gowher Viola Nogra
Sophia Phillips Rizell Salalila Syvil Williams
14. We sent a letter to the Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities to bring
awareness of our issue as the ministry is responsible for developing policy
directions for colleges and universities, distributing funds assigned by the
provincial legislature to post-secondary schools and providing financial-
assistance programs for post-secondary students. In the letter, we included our
experiences with paying tuition fees that is costly and what we learned from the
research that we conducted on this matter. We talked about wanting change for
everyone to be able to go into post-secondary education without facing the
barriers of expensive tuition costs. We also included facts like how much
international students and domestic students in our program have to pay every
year just for tuition to show just how much we have to pay. to pay. What we
learned from this action plan is that doing something small like sending a letter
can still bring awareness and make a change.
16. As a group we decided to donate to the daycare in
the progress lab school because most of the parents
that have children attending day care are students.
We decided to donate diapers to help out parents
with extra expenses.
In addition, the Quality Assurance Criteria requires
that the centre has spare diapers at hand at all times
in order to meet the standard at the Progress child
care which relies on donation.
18. Our group researched different stakeholders. Like the Centennial Alumni
and the College Student Alliance. For one of our action plans we decided
to fundraise money online to donate to one of our stakeholders which was
the College Student Alliance. The fundraising website is called Fundly
and our campaign title is “Accessible and Affordable Post Secondary
Education.” We have also posted this fundraising website on our
Facebook page so everyone had a chance to participate and donate. As
a group we wanted to make difference in a person’s life so we were
hoping to donate the money to help out for a scholarship.
We raised $100 dollars and will be donating it to the College Student
Alliance. We have learned that just donating some money to the College
Student Alliance definitely helped a student will their tuition fees. We have
also learned that many people feels strongly about this issue.
20. Our group used Facebook for our social media campaign. We created a
Facebook page and invited friends, families and relatives to join and
comment about our advocacy on lowering cost of school fees for post
secondary education. We aim to spread more awareness of the problem
every students encounter every school year. We posted videos and
quotes that relates to what we are advocating for. What we learned on
this action plan strategy of using social media, specifically Facebook is
seems people are aware but become hopeless about the issue. Probably
because it has been an issue for a while and nothing really change in the
system of education.
22. Rationale for Petition
• As college students we understand how difficult it is paying
the high tuition fees for post secondary education.
• For our strategy we reached out to the other struggling
students and encouraged them to sign a petition on
lowering the post secondary tuition fees.
• Our goal was to approach students that are working, not
working, on OSAP and international students, to show that
the high tuition fees effects all students and it is a problem
that needs to be fixed.
• We also sent this petition along with a letter addressing this
issue to the Ministry of Colleges and Universities, in hopes
to making a change.
23. How it went
• Almost every student we approached to sign the petition was very
understanding and agreed that the tuition fees needs to be lowered
• We had all OSAP, working, not working, and international students
sign the petition. The majority of students who signed were
international students and they had a lot to say about this topic.
• Many of the comments that we received were that “It is not fair that
international students have to pay at least triple the amount that
domestic students are required to pay.”
• The students were very interested and happy that we were taking a
stand and advocating for lower post secondary education fees. Almost
all the students we approached was ready and willing to be a part of
our journey to changing our future education for the better.
