HUMA Committee Report

 

 

ACCESS AND MOBILITY

The issues of access to post-secondary education and mobility within the post-secondary system are inherently linked to the issue of student financing.  Many of the witnesses, however, told the Committee that as issues, access and mobility involve broad considerations of equity and fairness that in fact, frame the nature of financial supports needed for students in post-secondary education.  The barriers were summarized for the Committee by Thomas Townsend, Director General, Literacy and Learning, Human Resources Development Canada:

First and foremost and perhaps least understood by us is the value of learning that is held within the family unit and by the individual learners.  Second, the attainment of the necessary foundation learning skills that will ensure success in post-secondary studies.  Third, structural barriers that obscure and may impede learner pathways to successful completion.  Fourth, financial barriers; and the fifth is non-financial barriers such as time, family commitments and workplace pressures.  The order that I have raised these in is very important in that financial barriers are not the only barriers.  In fact, in many circumstances they are not the most significant barriers.[2]  

 

A.  Access to Post-secondary Education

 

Access problems are most acutely borne by those in the lowest socio-economic status groups, individuals with disabilities, aboriginals, and rural residents.  The Committee heard from many witnesses who noted that despite efforts by governments to ensure the availability of loan and grant programs to those most in need, that the smallest gains in post-secondary educational participation between 1986 and 1994 were made among those in the lowest socio-economic status group.  Barriers to this demographic are complex.  They include factors such as the influence of parental educational levels, often poorer school performance on entry, aversion to assume debt and lack of financial support. 

These factors also raise issues related to equity, not only in terms of overall access to post-secondary education and training, but also in the nature and duration of education.  The Committee learned that when tuition for the University of Western Ontario Medical School increased from $4,844 to $10,000 between 1998 and 2000, the average gross family income of its first year medical student rose from $80,000 to $140,000.[3]  The nature of this change points to concerns about certain post-secondary programs becoming accessible only to young people with the good fortune to belong to higher socio-economic groups.

It also has the potential to affect the supply of skills.  Graduates of high demand professional programs, who depart the post-secondary system with significantly high levels of debt may emigrate to the United States where higher salaries would enable them to repay their debts more quickly.  Other sectors of society such as the public and voluntary sectors, that have traditionally relied on recruiting from disciplines such as law, may have difficulty attracting or retaining debt-laden graduates who may be drawn even more strongly to the private sector in order to repay high debt loads.  The Canadian Medical Association cited research showing that medical students from rural and remote areas are more likely to return to these areas to practice medicine.  However, as students from rural areas must in any event incur high relocation and travel costs to study, increasing tuition levels may make medical education too costly and reduce the numbers of applicants from rural and remote areas.[4]   We cite this as an example of a situation that likely applies more generally to the student population.

The problems faced by persons with disabilities extend far beyond the issue of rates of entry into the post-secondary system.  Students with disabilities often incur extra costs associated with their disability and can take longer to complete an academic program due to their disability.[5]  As a result, students with disabilities often graduate with significantly higher debt loads and face greater difficulty than non-disabled graduates in paying this debt off, due to their higher barriers to employment.[6] Equally worrisome is the fact that there is a significant gap between the graduation rates of the disabled and the non-disabled population.  While some of this gap is undoubtedly due to financial barriers, we strongly suspect that the provision of appropriate supports and services may have an equal, or even more important, impact.  Scott Murray, Director General, Institutions and Social Statistics, Statistics Canada, related this situation to other groups as well:

…there are significant differences in the graduation rates of those that begin, between the disabled and non-disabled, …there are large and imposing barriers to their completion. This is an illustration with one very vulnerable population; we can repeat the analysis by socio-economic status, by immigrant status, and you see, roughly, the same patterns.[7]

We are concerned by testimony that federal funds for students with disabilities have declined since the federal government signed the Employability Assistance for Persons with Disabilities agreements with the provinces that replaced the Vocational Rehabilitation for Disabled Persons agreements.

The next step is:

• to study further the financial and non-financial barriers to access and mobility, particularly as they affect lower socio-economic groups, persons with disabilities, immigrants, Aboriginals and rural residents.

 

B.  Mobility in Post-secondary Education

Several witnesses identified as a significant barrier to access the constraints on students’ ability to move from one province to another to pursue education and training.  Inter-provincial mobility barriers include differential tuition levels, non-transferability of credits, differing or non-existent recognition of other training and experience, and the lack of portability of student financial assistance in some jurisdictions.

Mobility is not solely an issue of geography.  The problem of portability of academic credits exists both across provinces and between colleges and universities.  While we heard that some provinces, such as Alberta, British Columbia and Ontario, have some transfer agreements for credits between colleges and universities, we suspect that these agreements do not fully address the problem – even in those provinces that have them.  As well, foreign students and immigrants face problems obtaining recognition of their credits, certificates and degrees.

This is equally an issue of concern for trades occupations in training and apprenticeship programs.  Significant inter-provincial barriers in the areas of training credits and qualifying hours in apprenticeships programs hinder mobility.  Provincial legislation, and in some instances collective agreements, exert a direct influence on the provision of, and access to, training.  Education requirements for entry into apprenticeship programs can vary significantly. Although Newfoundland and Prince Edward Island require completion of Grade twelve to qualify as an apprentice construction electrician, for example, Ontario only requires a Grade ten education.[8]  While many of these issues are under the domain of provincial/territorial governments, employers and unions, several witnesses called for federal government involvement in the development of national standards.

 

The next step is:

• to follow closely the federal participation in federal-provincial negotiations concerning inter-provincial mobility and portability in all aspects of the post-secondary education and training system with a view to strengthen the federal-provincial system to ensure access.

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