Canada’s largest private English-language school files for bankruptcy, leaving 1,300 students scrambling

Not surprising, given that previous immigration levels were unsustainable, resulting in business models being equally unsustainable. Hard of the students of course:

…According to Languages Canada’s 2025 Annual Survey Report, member institutions welcomed just 81,636 students recently — down nearly half from the 150,112 students enrolled in 2019. The organization attributes the drop to federal study permit caps introduced in January 2024 and unpredictable visa policies, which choked the pipeline of students entering Canadian colleges and universities through preparatory language pathway programs.

In 2019, the language-education sector directly and indirectly generated $6.75 billion in economic activity for Canada and supported 75,000 jobs, Languages Canada reported. Peralta says those revenue figures have now been cut in half.

ILAC’s collapse comes less than a week after another major international chain, EC English, closed its operations around the world, including three campuses in Canada.

Languages Canada told the Star it has found new academic homes for all 471 students impacted by EC English’s closures at its campuses in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver. 

Staff at ILAC were given virtually no notice of the closure. One ILAC teacher, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of harming future employment prospects, described receiving an email late Friday morning urging staff to attend an urgent virtual town hall call at 4:15 p.m.

During the brief meeting, ILAC chief executive officer John DeFranco read a prepared statement informing staff the school was closing immediately after failing to secure new investors….

Source: Canada’s largest private English-language school files for bankruptcy, leaving 1,300 students scrambling