International students at the University of Victoria are complaining about the tuition increases they face. Specifically, while fees for Canadian students are rising by two per cent, theirs will jump by four per cent.
They point out that they already pay three times the amount charged domestic students. While Canadian residents pay about $5,400 for one year of a humanities program, foreign students have to come up with $17,000.
On one level, the differential makes sense. The fees charged to domestic students cover only about a quarter of the cost of a degree.
The rest is made up from a variety of sources, some of which include investment income, donations, sales of campus products and so on. However, the largest contribution by far comes from government grants and contracts, and those are funded by B.C. taxpayers. It’s only reasonable, then, that foreign students, whose families pay no taxes in B.C., face the higher tuition fees.
Even then, they’re getting a good deal. International students at Simon Fraser University pay $21,600 for one year of humanities, and at the University of B.C., $24,500.
There is, though, another side to this issue. About 3,240 international students attend UVic. Some come to improve their English, some for the experience of living and studying in a foreign country.
But some might also decide, when their degree is complete, to seek permanent residency here, and eventually, perhaps, citizenship. It’s in our interest to encourage this joining of cultures and experiences.
Canada has a long history of welcoming immigrants. Indeed, our future economic well-being is dependent on replacing baby boomers who are nearing retirement with young workers and entrepreneurs from abroad.
Over the next three decades, the number of Canadians aged 65 and older will exceed, for the first time in our history, those 15 and younger. In part, that’s because birth rates in Canada have fallen below the minimum necessary to maintain our population at its present size.
It makes good economic sense, then, to encourage foreign students to come here.
Moreover, young people who leave their country of birth to study in Canada are in one sense the cream of the crop. It takes gumption and confidence to take such a step.
At UVic, about 900 of these students are studying engineering, science or business — all skill sets that Canada needs. Universities in B.C. do not graduate enough engineers to fill all the job vacancies available, with the result that foreign-educated professionals are brought in. Far better to train them here and invite them to stay on.
There is also the importance of presenting Canada to the world as a compassionate and generous society. These are difficult times.
The Middle East is in flames, China is threatening its neighbours, North Korea is fast becoming a nuclear threat and Russia has invaded parts of Ukraine. Things have reached the point that the government of Sweden has reintroduced compulsory military service, and the country is renovating its Cold War fallout shelters.
This is not the time, then, to make foreign students less welcome, or price them out of coming here.
To be fair, that is not the university’s wish. The provincial government has limited tuition increases for domestic students to two per cent. With operating costs growing faster than that, the shortfall must be made up somewhere.
Still, this is an issue that all of our universities must reflect on. Their responsibilities do not stop at the campus gate. Our reputation abroad is also a concern.
UVic’s motto, translated to English, reads: “A multitude of the wise is the health of the world.” The world is at our door, and asking for entry.
