All Posts Tagged With: "cuts"
Funding cut and tuition to rise in Nova Scotia
Presidents and student groups complain
Nova Scotia flag by Makaristos/Wikimedia
University presidents and student groups in Nova Scotia are angry about a new three-year funding agreement that includes a three per cent funding cut and a three per cent tuition rise, which is roughly equivalent to annual inflation.
After a four per cent cut last year, plus inflation, there is now a $75-million hole in budgets system-wide, John Harker, chairman of the Council of Nova Scotia University Presidents and president of Cape Breton University told the Chronicle Herald.
The Nova Scotia chapter of the Canadian Federation of Students called the agreement “disappointing.” In a release, chair Maxime Audet said this: “tuition fee increases coupled with reductions in government funding means students in Nova Scotia will be paying more and getting less.”
Continue reading Funding cut and tuition to rise in Nova Scotia
Students petition to save USask language program
Cuts slated to reduce course offerings, increase class sizes
Some students at the University of Saskatchewan are hoping that a petition signed by nearly 2,000 people may prevent major cuts to the university’s language program.
Knowledge of proposed cuts to the Language and Linguistics department had spread amongst students through instructors and two town hall meetings held by the College of Arts and Science, which houses the program, though the university’s budget has not been officially released, according to The Sheaf. The rumoured changes include reducing the German language program to one third year course and increasing class sizes. For example, first year Spanish courses could be pushed to hold 125 students.
One instructor explained that having 40 students in her German tutorial was overwhelming enough.
“I did not know how to incorporate every student, especially as they all have different questions about the course material,” Elena Hagemann, a tutorial leader for a third year German course, explained to the Sheaf. She also felt that a class of 125 students “would be of no use” to students.
Hearing of the changes prompted students in the department to circulate a petition to stop the cuts to their program. In three days alone, the students were able to collect 1,944 signatures on campus. Officials in the College of Arts and Science were presented with the petition at a town hall meeting last Friday.
“I’m apprehensive, but feeling a lot better than last week,” Josh Kroeker, a first year student in the department who helped draft the petition, told the Star Phoenix.
David Parkinson, U of S vice dean of humanities and fine arts, said that it was low demand for language courses that led to plans to reduce the program, and questioned whether students who signed the petition to save the courses would then register for them.
However, he told the Star Phoenix he was “inspired” by the students’ organized and well-prepared presentation, but added that reducing costs is still a reality for the college, as it is with many units on campus.
Parkinson explained that the university wants to continue teaching all the language courses currently offered, but that they may not be taught every year. Right now, the university is primarily concerned with making sure students in the program who are planning to graduate in the next year can complete all their required credits if any courses get axed.
Unpaid time off comes to UWinnipeg
University makes cuts to balance the budget, but avoids layoffs
In order to balance its budget, the University of Winnipeg is demanding all departments reduce costs by 3.5 per cent, but no layoffs are planned.
Support staff will see only a modest pay raise of 1.5 per cent, while many unionized, as well as non-unionized, staff and management have volunteered to take up to 10 furlough days, or unpaid time off. The university executive, including president Lloyd Axworthy, will see their pay frozen, a move that follows a voluntary 10 per cent pay cut last spring. How academic staff will be impacted is yet to be determined, as the university is currently in negotiations with the faculty association.
While there are no plans to layoff staff or faculty, the university is employing a strategy of “vacancy management,” meaning many job openings will go unfilled depending on the importance of the position. Manitoba universities are required by law to balance the books.
Increased pressure to stay in the black was motivated by a smaller government operating grant, which saw a two per cent increase this year, down from five per cent in previous years. The U of W’s budget is $100 million with $49 million coming from the government. At $6800, the U of W received less than two thirds funding per student as other Manitoba universities. The University of Manitoba received approximately $10,500 per student from the province while Brandon University received about $11,700 per student.
Unlike other provinces, the Manitoba government does not factor student enrollment when calculating operating grants. According to Dan Hurley, in the external affairs office of the university president, if the U of W had received per student funding at the same level as the University of Regina ($8,500), which is of comparable size, the U of W “would have added $12 million in revenue to the University each year.”
Additionally, the U of W has an $8.6 million loan that it was recently forced to take out to comply with an order from the provincial pension commission to repay current and past pension plan holders outstanding disbursements. Servicing the loan will cost the university $530,000 annually over the next 40 years.
Tuition will rise five per cent for students, in accordance with provincial regulations.
BC government cuts $16 million in education funding
Last-minute cuts incense hundreds of students
It’s understandable that in tough economic times, governments will make funding cuts. The BC government’s latest $16m cut to education funding, however, is completely inexcusable.
Not only is it in clear violation of the BC Liberals’ May election platform promise (p. 26) to “maintain this year’s funding levels for student aid,” but according to BC MLA Gary Coons, “the Campbell government delayed telling students the programs had been cancelled… in order to hide the cuts until after the election.”
Indeed, several students who applied for the March deadlined Premier’s Excellence Award – a $15,000 scholarship awarded to the top high school students in the province – recently telephoned the Ministry of Advanced Education requesting the results of their applications. They were told that the judging process was complete and that the winners would be notified shortly.
When the news came that the scholarship was eliminated, most students, including myself, reasonably assumed that this year’s winners would still receive their awards and that the program would cease to exist next year. Alas, this was not the case.
After several phone calls to various government representatives, it has been confirmed that the program will be eliminated immediately, meaning even those students who applied and were apparently selected as recipients this year are out of luck.
This failure to notify students before they spent hours applying for the scholarship – or at least before they spent months anxiously awaiting the results – has been met with understandable outrage.
Other cuts include eliminating the Nurses Education Bursary at a time when the province is in dire need of more nurses, as well as the:
Permanent Disability Benefits
Debt Reduction in Repayment
BC Loan Reduction for Residential Care Aid and Home Support Worker
Health Care Bursary
Early Childhood Educator Loan Assistance
Brandon to leave 5 per cent of prof jobs empty
University needs to find $1.2 million in cuts to balance its budget
According to the Winnipeg Free Press, Brandon University is going to leave five per cent of its professor positions vacant for the next school year.
Jobs won’t be eliminated, but 11 of 220 faculty positions will be left vacant next year, according to the school’s vice-president of finance.
The university needs to cut about $1.25 million, and is attempting to balance its budget by leaving the jobs vacant, digging into reserve funds and making a variety of small cuts across the school’s campus. For more, click here.
