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Analysis:
Ontario – A Leader in Learning
Bob Rae’s Report on Post-Secondary Education

A Balanced Report: 50 per cent good news – 50 per cent bad news

The report presented by Bob Rae gives Ontarians a sense of hope. The report recognizes post-secondary education as an essential pillar in the well-being of individuals, the community and the economy. Steelworkers strongly support the "overarching goals for reform" in the Rae report:

• Great Education
• Opportunities for More People
• A Secure Future for Higher Education

The report calls on the provincial and federal governments to increase substantially their financial contribution to the running of the system and to the resources allocated to poorer students.

Rae calls for a new Post-secondary Education Act that will ensure multi-year stable funding to post-secondary institutions, grants and cheaper loans for poor and middle class students and autonomy for the institutions as part of a regulatory framework. This is a good start to change the culture of the province. The new Act should be developed in consultation with the community and the workers of the post-secondary institutions.

The report does not call for participation of support staff and their unions in the development of the new Act, or in other areas where consultations are called for. For example, consultations on modernization of the college mandate are to involve the "industry." We can assume unions are part of the industry (not only employers) but it is not mentioned. In the setting of multi-year targets, the report calls for consultation with students and the community. We can assume unions are part of the community but, again, they are not mentioned.

We are especially concerned about the lack of mention of support staff as part of the stakeholders to be consulted when the institutions are developing their multi-year plans for "revenue requirements."

The collaboration and transferability of studies and degrees proposed by the report is important. The current piecemeal system does not work. Still, allocation of resources for support staff to make this possible is not spelled out in the report.

Academic renewal is important. The report proposes a $700 million fund for hiring faculty and developing their skills, which we support. But a similar funding mechanism is also needed for support staff. Nobody would suggest only hiring and training new surgeons to increase the number of operations performed in a hospital or the whole health care system. Everybody understands that behind the surgeon, nurses, cleaners, technicians, etc. are needed. As we urged in our submission to Mr. Rae, Steelworkers now call on the government to ensure that:

• resources should be assigned to the hiring of new support staff when a new faculty member is hired. Support staff should encompass technical, maintenance, clerical, custodial and others.

• the allocation should represent an appropriate ratio between support staff and faculty (a minimum of 1:1).

• unions representing support staff in campus should be involved in the determination of the ratios at the different educational institutions.

• hiring should include progressive equity practices to ensure proper representation of minorities and other discriminated groups.

The report mentions the need for "quality assurance" to "ensure the improvement of the student experience, including the area of student services." Many parts of the report and most of the proposed "recommended actions" explicitly or implicitly mention the need for more and better student services (including student assistance programs, registration, financial support, laboratories, libraries, etc.). Better student services could not be provided without valued, well-trained, fairly compensated and properly treated support staff. Still, Steelworkers do not believe that "better services" should be used as a proxy for "more resources allocated to support staff."

This is parallel to the resources required to hire and train new support staff and it is directed to the retention of quality, established support staff.

The report clearly calls for an increase in tuition fees. We believe tuition fees are already too high. Ontario has the second highest tuition fees in Canada. Only Nova Scotia’s fees are higher. The report assumes an immediate increase to $6,000 from the current level of less than $5,000, and increase of 20 per cent. The report says tuition should only increase after the government establishes a better system of grants and loans and provides new money to the institutions.

The report not only calls for tuition fees increases, it also changes the way in which tuition fees are set. In the current setting most fees are set by the government (some degrees are deregulated with universities charging more). The report proposes that the new increases will be set by the individual institutions. Different institutions will be able to charge different tuition fees for the same degrees. Setting tuition fees would function as part of some loose regulation framework that the government will have to set up.

To compensate for tuition increases the report proposes the re-establishing of grants and the revamping of the loans system.

Calling for re-establishing grants for low-income students is an important start. The amount allocated in the report for the maximum grant is very low. Full grants to cover tuition fees only go to families making up to $22,615 per year. The report proposes sliding grants for families making up to $35,000, with a minimum grant of $500. In the case of two parents working full-time at minimum wage (around $32,500 family income per year) their child will only qualify for the minimum grant of $500. After a family income of $35,000 per year the student could only applied for Ontario loans because there are consider middle-income students.

The report recommends improvements to the student loan system. The weekly maximum loan is increased to $175 per week and the minimum family contribution (in relation with their income) for qualification is reduced. This is an improvement compared with the present situation, but still does not change the basic premise that students will end with high debts at the end of their studies. It only facilitates how they get credit.

The report also gives a role to the federal government in different areas of funding. This is important. The federal government has the resources and the responsibility to support post-secondary education. On the other side, the report does not spell out the alternatives in case the federal government does not contribute as expected.

The call for exclusive councils and special support for Francophone students, aboriginal students and students recognizes the special needs of these groups.

The "first generation" strategy is a commendable goal. At the same time, the report calls for measures to "stimulate interest and planning for higher education" in families without previous participation in post-secondary education. The terms "interest" and "planning" are interpreted later in the report as "Families who need to be shown how Learning Bond and student assistance can make higher education manageable." The report patronizes these families. Families know and understand the availability of credit to fund post-secondary education. They make a clear choice; they do not want to increase their indebtedness. The report adopts the mentality of RRSP sellers who try to get people to buy mutual funds. The issue is not education of the families. The issue is debt.

The same direction is presented by the report in the suggestion to create a new "parent loan." The report recognizes that some families do not have the opportunity to save money for their kids (it even mentions a family paying for a mortgage). The new loan scheme will not be subsidized and it is almost an obligation for the parents to take it for their children to be eligible for OSAP. The report presents several examples of how this will work. But the report never explains how the family that has a mortgage and cannot save will be able to continue paying the mortgage and, on top, pay the new loan for the education of their children.

The new opportunities for aboriginal students, students with disabilities, "first generation" students and other excluded group are important. On the other side, the government should work with industry to develop new policies for job creation and integration of these new workers in the workplace.

International Education and Students – We support the opportunity for Ontarians to study abroad as well as the opportunity for international students to study in Ontario. We are opposed to seeing international students as "cash cows" for institutions that will have the "right" to set tuition fees and will need "resources" to be able to fulfill its "multi-year mandate." We are concerned that the "recommendation" to allow international students to work "off campus" will increase the pool of cheap labour available in the province.

Better information and participation targets are desirable goals. Still, they do not replace proper support for students for poor families, immigrants and other excluded groups to joint the post-secondary system.

Higher Education Council – The report proposes a new Higher Education Council to monitor and recommend directives for the sector. Steelworkers support such a council but believe it should represent democratically the constituencies interested and committed to the future of post-secondary education in the province of Ontario. We cannot accept a council of "experts" that will monitor and set-up targets without proper representation of all stakeholders.

The Higher Education Council will set up targets and measures for improvement. The report talks about "benchmarking" and "best practices" in the sector to achieve the goals of the council. The terms "benchmarking" and "best practices" bring a bad taste in most of our workplaces. Benchmarking and best practices are terms utilized to masquerade "doing more with less." A proper, democratic and open discussion of what to benchmark and against whom to benchmark should precede any activity by this council.

Research Council – The report also calls for the creation of a council to advise the Premier on research issues. Correctly, the report asks the universities to improve their primary research targets. It recognizes the value of that type of research as opposed to supporting only applied research. This council will work on research priorities and commercialization of research results. The main concern is the composition of this council will be experts and representatives of the "donor community." We consider quite inappropriate that "donors" sit in this council. Donors to research funds are, usually, large corporations that contribute to projects that will benefit them. As donors they have a lot of power deciding what kind of applied research will be conducted by the public system. Sitting in the research council they will also have a voice in what type of primary research is needed and how to commercialize the results.