‘We think of them as cash cows.’ International students want to immigrate, but colleges, employers want to boost their bottom lines

Believe this is the last piece in the Star series. Will be interesting to see if this gets picked up or not during the campaign:

When Romina Avila and her husband Arturo Castaneyra decided to leave behind the growing violence in Mexico for a better life elsewhere, the couple set their sights on Canada and its colleges — an increasingly popular ticket for immigration.

By enrolling as international students at the college level — a more affordable alternative to university — they could acquire Canadian education credentials, postgraduate work permits and job experience to boost their chances for permanent residence, a feat Avila’s two older sisters and their spouses had previously accomplished.

“Everyone is looking for the same thing: Enrol in a college, get your one-year work experience and apply for permanent residence,” says Avila, a 32-year-old Mexico City native, who came to Canada with her husband in 2014, a year after Canada launched an aggressive campaign to double its annual number of international students to 450,000 by 2022. That target has long been surpassed.

In 2018, there were 570,000 study-permit holders in Canada — three-quarters enrolled in post-secondary education. The federal government estimated their spending, including tuition, amounted to $21.6 billion and supported 170,000 Canadian jobs.

Canada ranks fourth in the world among top destinations for international education, just behind the United States, the United Kingdom and China, having recently nudged ahead of Australia and France. A survey last year by the non-profit Canadian Bureau for International Education found that 60 per cent of international students planned to apply for permanent residence and 75 per cent said being able to work here after their studies was key to their decision to choose Canada.

A joint investigation by the Toronto Star and the St. Catharines Standard looked at the exponential growth of international students in Canada, especially in colleges. This influx has prompted concerns about whether international education has become an immigration shortcut, a default migrant workers’ program and a money-making business rather than primarily an opportunity for higher learning.

“The policy creates vulnerability, maybe not intentionally, but the way the policy was designed and enacted is what it’s producing,” says Wilfrid Laurier University professor Margaret Walton-Roberts, whose research focuses on international student migration. “There’s this desire to use this (education) stream to get permanent residence. All the way along, there are a lot of people who have an interest in making money out of this group, including the Canadian government.

“It’s been used by the government to prop up the post-secondary education sector. We kind of think of (international students) as cash cows.”

Colleges Ontario, an industry group representing the province’s 24 publicly funded colleges, says the push for international education has been driven by labour and skills shortages as a result of the country’s low birth rate and aging population. Colleges, it says, are better positioned to deal with the changing needs of the job market, with their historical focus on practical, shorter-term skills training and established networks with local employers.

Several years ago, Sang Woo Jo, 28, of South Korea, decided he wanted to immigrate to Canada and work as an auto technician. The best way to do that, he figured, was with a student visa.

Jo already had experience, having worked in Seoul for four years as a mechanic for the automaker Renault. But he didn’t know the English words for car parts and basic maintenance tasks, such as oil changes and tire rotations.

He arrived in 2017 and this spring wrapped up a two-year motive power co-op program at Niagara College, which trains auto mechanics.

“I will never go back to Korea,” he says. “I would really love to stay here … Good people, good country and good pay here in Canada, very good career here.”

After graduating, Jo landed a gig at Audi in Newmarket — a three-year work visa allows him to stay and work.

That’s not surprising for Wayne Toth, co-ordinator of motive power at Niagara College — a program with about 300 students, more than half of them international, mostly from China, Korea, India and the Caribbean.

“There’s a huge demand for skilled trades, especially in automotive,” says Toth. “A lot of (our students) are securing full-time positions when they graduate. There’s a huge number of seasoned technicians that are coming up for retirement.”

And, he says, by the nature of being already far from home, international students tend to be more willing to relocate for work, which makes them good matches for employers.

Niagara College says it routinely gets calls from local businesses, such as Fallsview casino, wineries and personal support worker agencies, seeking graduates.

“In the last year, we’ve seen a big uptick in requests,” says Shawna Luey, associate director of the college’s international student services. “We’re liaising more and more with employers and people in the community that hadn’t necessarily thought about international graduates as ongoing members of their greater community.”

Canada’s immigration department awards points to applicants under the skilled immigrant program based on attributes such as age, education, language proficiency and work experience. As part of Ottawa’s economic plan, the government tweaked the point grid and began rewarding applicants with bonus points if they have a degree, diploma or certificate from a Canadian publicly funded academic institution (up to 30 points) and work experience in Canada in an occupation with a staff shortage (up to 80 points.)

Andrei Evangelista of the Philippines tried twice to immigrate to Canada: in 2010 as a skilled worker and in 2014 as a live-in caregiver, but was refused both times. After working as a nurse abroad for nearly a decade, he enrolled in the postgraduate gerontology program at Niagara College in Welland and arrived in 2018.

He worked part-time as a personal support worker, and as a cashier at Walmart, earning in a day what he earned in a week back home.

“My goal was to be out of the Philippines and get a better paying job,” says Evangelista, who just completed his one-year diploma program this spring and started a full-time job at a nursing home in Halifax on a postgraduate work permit. He plans to apply for permanent residence after he earns the Canadian experience to meet the point threshold for immigration.

In 2016, about 30,000 former international students became permanent residents in Canada. In 2018, that number almost doubled to 54,000, according to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada.

Last year, Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen announced a new program to expedite student visa applications for those from China, India, the Philippines and Vietnam by fast-tracking processing from months to just 20 days. The four countries made up 60 per cent of Canada’s international student population in 2018. In July, the program was expanded to Pakistan, and to Morocco and Senegal this month.

“International students make significant contributions to the schools and the colleges and the universities and the communities in which they reside. The diverse perspectives that they bring to our classrooms enrich the educational experiences of Canadian students,” says Hussen.

“International students are the ideal future Canadians,” he adds. “That’s because they have Canadian post-secondary education and, in many cases, Canadian work experience. They also speak one, if not both, of our official languages. All of which is a recipe for a newcomer’s success in Canada.”

York University education professor Roopa Desai Trilokekar, whose research focuses on international education, says there’s no doubt most international students enrolled in our colleges have their eyes set on immigration.

“Today’s international education is a business. Our education (quality) can suffer if we bend too much to an open market,” cautions Trilokekar, who attended university in the United States in the 1970s as a visa student from India before immigrating to Canada in 1996. “If we don’t have enough check and balance, it’s going to open a different can of worms.”

Australia began an aggressive campaign to recruit international students in the early 2000s and saw its international enrolment peak in 2009. That growth slowed down after a series of attacks on international students from India amid rising racial tension.

In a comparative research study, Trilokekar and co-author Zainab Kizilbash, identified a number of challenges in Australia’s education and immigration systems, including unethical recruitment and graduation practices as well as lower admission standards.

“They encouraged the admission of non-genuine students who were looking for backdoor entry into Australia’s workforce,” the study says. “In addition to distorting Australia’s international education sector, these practices also negatively affected the integrity of its migration program.”

Canada has already taken a page from Australia’s experience by introducing a list of designated learning institutions for prospective students and limiting post-graduation permits to those who attend publicly funded universities and colleges, which are under more stringent government monitoring.

Even if you get an acceptance from a Canadian school, it still doesn’t mean Canada will let you in. In fact, last year, more than a third of student-visa applicants were turned away for a variety of reasons, such as failing to convince an immigration officer their main intent was to pursue their studies.

Immigration officials also require schools to submit a compliance report twice a year that verifies the academic and enrolment status of international students at their institutions. Cases are referred for further review if a student is suspended, asks for a leave, defers enrolment or has poor attendance.

According to the immigration department, the number of study permits revoked has tripled from 1,538 in 2016 to 5,502 in 2018, with 1,048 students stripped of their student status in the first two months of this year alone. A similar trend was reported in the number of study permit extensions being refused for students failing to meet their obligations and graduation timeline.

International students can lose their study permits if they get caught working more than the 20 hours a week permitted by the federal government. The opportunity to work during the academic year was introduced as a way to help students pay for their studies and earn Canadian work experience for immigration.

Critics, however, say international students have increasingly joined the revolving door of migrant workers, mostly to fill low-paying jobs in Canada.

“They come, live and work here mostly in low-wage retail, labour and factory jobs, sometimes through temp agencies. They are no different from other migrant workers, except for the added component and costs of the actual studies,” says Syed Hussan of Toronto-based Migrant Workers Alliance for Change, a national advocacy coalition of migrant workers, grassroots organizations, unions, faith groups, activists and researchers.

Migrant workers’ advocates say they first heard from international students around 2016. They raised issues such as owed wages and wage theft as well as complaints about workplace abuse and exploitation. The advocates initially referred them to unions and settlement services, but came to the realization there’s a “total absence of any meaningful services and advocacy” for this overlooked group.

The migrant workers’ alliance then reached out directly to international students, and since then more than 1,800 people have reported a range of issues from labour standards, to housing, wages and immigration.

“Migrant students don’t have many rights to access to begin with and there is a complete lack of information about their rights in Canada,” Syed Hussan says. “The point is the immigration system is designed to create and reinforce temporary status with the promise for a better life. And everyone is taking advantage of these students. Many of them end up doing low-wage work and later being forced to leave.”

In canvassing international students about their employment experience, alliance members uncovered some troubling incidents:

• A group of six 17-year-olds from Brazil enrolled in a six-month language program say they were sent to clean offices in Toronto and Mississauga in the evening — without pay — as part of a “language training on-site practicum.”

• A Pakistani student, who completed a two-year post-grad diploma in computer programming and was on a postgraduate work permit, says his employer had him deposit his paycheques, then forced him to withdraw the money and hand it back over in exchange for a reference letter for his permanent residence application.

• Two students from India say they were hired to load trucks at a warehouse and split $350 in wages for the 25 hours they each put in on the job every week. The hourly rate amounted to just $7.

Minister Hussen says the government takes the integrity of the international education system very seriously, but he believes these cases are a minority and blames the problem on unscrupulous recruiters who mislead and misinform students.

“The vast majority of international students are fine. They come, they know the rules and abide by them. They have a great experience,” Hussen says in an interview.

“The story of international students has been a very positive story. They make great contributions to our economy and amazing contributions to our classrooms. Some of them choose to stay and become permanent residents and help us fill unfilled jobs and bring much-needed skills to Canada.”

Fred Gibbons, president of Northern College in Timmins, says international students have become an increasingly important source of labour in smaller communities at businesses such as Home Depot, Canadian Tire, local grocers and the service industry.

“They’re doing the part-time jobs that many of our kids don’t want to do anymore and in many respects there aren’t the kids around to do the jobs anymore,” says Gibbons. “They’re being embraced by the employers. They’re saying these students show up on time, they’re polite, they’re punctual, they’re reliable.”

Former international student Varunpreet Singh, a student co-ordinator with the migrant workers alliance, says international students are vulnerable to exploitation because of Canada’s increasingly “temporary” immigration system, which brings in migrants on temporary status with the promise of permanent residence through a myriad of confusing pathways.

“What’s most challenging is these students are so afraid to come out and share their experiences. They have invested so much in the process with the hope of staying. There is so much pressure on them to succeed,” says Singh, 27, who enrolled in George Brown College in 2014 before completing a master’s degree in architecture at University of Calgary two years ago. He became a permanent resident in February.

“The blame is not just on the employers who pay these students below minimum wage and exploit them, but on the system that allows the abuse to take place.”

Last year, Ireland rolled out a scheme to offer amnesty to former international students who had overstayed and gone underground after finishing their studies and failing to secure permanent residence. “Offering permanent residence upon arrival is the only solution to these problems,” Singh suggests.

Victoria Esses, director of the Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations at Western University, says international students make ideal immigrants because theoretically they are already acculturated and have better English skills and an education more familiar to Canadian employers.

“You don’t have to be a PhD to be a skilled immigrant,” says Esses. “The thing that we need to pay attention to is how we are integrating international students. Being isolated in a classroom or in residence (from Canadian students) is not going to help them integrate.”

While schools tend to focus on international students’ initial orientation upon arrival, Esses says they require continuous support throughout their studies and in the transition into the labour market and permanent residence.

One of the challenges in integrating international students is, as temporary residents of Canada, they are not eligible for immigrant settlement services, and universities and colleges can only provide limited support beyond their academic and social needs.

Phoram Ghelani, a former international student from India, says many families like his have to borrow money to enable their children to study in Canada and, once here, the students must work to pay their own bills and sometimes even support their families back home.

“To us, immigration and international education are the same thing. We don’t see any difference,” says Ghelani, who came to Toronto from Rajkot City in India’s Gujarat state for the one-year hospitality and tourism operations management program at Humber College in 2014, after finishing an undergraduate degree in commerce from Saurashtra University.

“Even if we only get a sh–y job here, we still make more money than doing a decent job in India. Canada’s economy runs on immigrants and immigration. The product it sells is immigration, permanent residence,” adds the 25-year-old, who worked as a chef with his one-year post-grad work permit and was granted permanent residence in December. He now works as a banking adviser.

Critics say if Canada increases enrolment without investing in support for international students, the quality of education will suffer and the whole international education system will become, by default, simply a way to earn money and permanent residence.

“Is it right?” asks Laurier’s Walton-Roberts. “Not if people are not getting something of value out of the process. So what’s the thing of value that they want? Is the thing of value they want permanent residence or a particular education? If they are getting it and if the college process is the means to get there, the question to ask is, is that a problem?”

Avila, the George Brown graduate from Mexico, says although she initially came to Canada with her husband for the ultimate purpose of immigration, she had grown to love the community worker program she enrolled in.

“We do feel we are used as cash cows to subsidize the Canadian education system. We do feel we have no rights as international students. I didn’t want to go back to school, but this is the best way to immigrate to Canada,” says Avila, who has an undergraduate degree in psychology from Mexico.

“The college experience does make it easier to find a job and meet people and network in Canada. I’m here because of international education. It does open the door for me.”

Source: ‘We think of them as cash cows.’ International students want to immigrate, but colleges, employers want to boost their bottom lines

‘I’ve given up everything.’ Explosive growth in international students comes at a steep cost

Good long read on how attracting international students keeps on becoming more of a business for community colleges and viewed as a possible path to residency.

Issues raised include concerns on weak academic standards given business pressures, the appropriate levels and mix of international students among others, and that attendance and performance of many students given part-time work and financial needs:

Hyungee Bae is putting it all on the line — every ounce of energy and every cent — to study at Centennial College’s state-of-the-art aerospace and aviation campus. She’s banking on it landing her a job in Canada and, hopefully, one day, citizenship.

“My parents say, ‘I don’t know if you’re brave or a fool,’ because I’ve given up everything,” says Bae, 28, who left South Korea where she taught English and lived in the comfort of her parents’ home.

This fall, she is among the biggest cohort of international students ever in Canada. There are more than 572,000 here, a 73 per cent hike since 2014, when immigration policy changes made it easier for students who study at publicly funded institutions to work and apply for permanent residency.

Canadian education has become so lucrative that international students pumped $21.6 billion last year into campuses, communities and the economy nationwide.

Growth has been particularly explosive in the college sector. International students, heartened by Canada’s safe and welcoming reputation, have been drawn to the college system’s focus on job skills and training. In fact, enrolment of international students in colleges surpassed universities for the first time in 2018, with students choosing college as a cheaper and potentially faster route to post-graduate work and immigration.

A joint project by the Toronto Star and the St. Catharines Standard surveyed all 22 of Ontario’s publicly funded English colleges and found international student enrolment rose 155 per cent over the past five years to more than 86,000 out of about 300,000 students. And while many international students seem satisfied with their educational experience, this unprecedented growth has brought significant challenges: Reporting found students struggling with English proficiency and insufficient support; and teachers feeling stressed and overwhelmed.

The influx has resulted in governments, recruiters, academic institutions and employers directly, and indirectly, profiting from international students, who are willing to pay hefty tuition fees and, in some cases, put up with abuse and exploitation, for the dream of making a life in Canada.

“International education is not an education program anymore, it is an immigration program,” says Earl Blaney, a London, Ont., immigration consultant who doubles as an education agent in the Philippines. “(Most students) are studying for permanent residence. It has nothing to do with learning.

‘It’s Canada’s gold rush and everyone is in this game.”

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Bae sits in the lobby of Centennial’s Downsview Campus Centre for Aerospace and Aviation, overlooking a hangar filled with aircraft.

The $72-million campus, which includes a drone lab, was funded by federal and provincial government grants and the college’s own cash surplus generated by international enrolment. It opened earlier this year, creating instruction space for about 1,000 students, tripling the size of the program.

Bae, whose tuition this year is $20,400 for the aviation technician-aircraft maintenance program, compared with $5,300 for domestic students, looks admiringly at the “high-tech” surroundings.

“I spent this much money and if the facilities aren’t good I’d be disappointed,” says Bae, who chose college over university because fees are considerably less and programs shorter. “I know all the money we pay goes to the campus. It’s like a business for the college.”

Virginia Macchiavello is a driving force behind the growth at Centennial, which boasts the highest number of international students at any Ontario college. They make up half of the college’s 28,000 student population.

“(I’ve been) accused of being an entrepreneur — not in a good way,” says Macchiavello, associate vice-president, international education, business development. “But we really do believe in education.”

Revenue from international students has allowed the college to make capital investments, expanding and updating campus facilities. Just last year, Centennial generated $210 million in revenue from tuition of international students, and the college ended the 2018-19 fiscal year with a budget surplus of $59.6 million. It also has a $33 million endowment fund — created in part by using 1 per cent of international revenue — to pay for scholarships and academic programming overseas.

A dozen years ago, when Linda Franklin became president and CEO of Colleges Ontario — an advocacy group representing the province’s public colleges — campus facilities were far from the gleaming, light-filled structures they are today.

“A lot of these colleges had very sad buildings,” she says, recalling 50-year-old portables. “That was their reality. And I remember at the time one president saying to me, ‘We’ve got to fix this because a post-secondary student has to feel when they walk in the doors that they’re walking into some place that matters.’ ”

This transformation is, in part, being financed by international students in a province where domestic enrolment is declining. Ontario college revenue is largely made up of tuition and government grants, which on a per-student basis are the lowest in the country and not keeping up with rising costs of the system. To supplement their income, colleges have turned to international students, whose education is not subsidized by taxpayers and who typically pay up to four times more in tuition than their domestic counterparts.

At St. Clair College in Windsor-Chatham, the 2019-20 budget shows for the first time that international student tuition is the largest source of revenue, with a projected $71.8 million. By comparison, operating grants are $41.3 million, and tuition for its budgeted 7,600 domestic students is about $24.3 million. This fall, the college, which has seen its population of international students grow from just about 500 in 2014 to 4,200, increased tuition for new international students by 15 per cent.

Ross Romano, minister of training, colleges and universities, says the province wants schools to be entrepreneurial, adding, “The more revenue they generate, the better the institutions they can be.” He welcomes the growth in international students and hopes they consider staying in Ontario, noting, “We have an economy that’s booming.

“(International students) know they are going into a place where they are going to get a quality education, a world-class education, and they know there’s an opportunity for a great job at the end of that education,” he says. “When people are working, everybody wins.”

John Tibbits, president of Conestoga College in Kitchener, says local labour market demands have been a driving force in the college’s outreach to international students. And college surveys show about 80 per cent of Conestoga students have consistently indicated they plan to stay in Canada.

The revenue they generate has been a lifeline, given the drop in domestic enrolment across much of the sector because of a declining birth rate and high school students choosing university over college. Administrators point out international students aren’t taking seats from domestic students — they’re sitting in seats that would otherwise be empty.

“We would have faced significant downsizing … if we hadn’t gone to the international market,” says Tibbits. “We’re filling a lot of programs that we would have probably had to cancel.”

Increased enrolment from international students has allowed the college to deliver more programming, also benefiting domestic students. For instance, in 2018, Conestoga expanded its Waterloo campus, and in Brantford it purchased three buildings, and leased two, allowing it to grow enrolment there from 100 students to more than 1,000 this fall. And in a record year, Conestoga hired about 90 full-time faculty and staff, mostly front-line workers delivering student services.

Enrico De Francesco, who teaches hospitality at Ottawa’s Algonquin College, says when he started there in 1989, all his students were domestic. Now, about 90 per cent of his first-year students are international.

“A lot of colleges saw this international opportunity as the goose that lays the golden egg,” says De Francesco, who represents the college’s school of hospitality and tourism for Ontario Public Service Employees Union Local 415.

“It’s a business, right? Schools run based on the funding and money they can make. If there’s no funding, they have to find their money somewhere — and international students are a good draw.”

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At the end of the first week of school, Bae is exhausted. She wakes at 6:30 a.m. to head to campus, and she waitresses late into the night at a Korean restaurant to cover tuition and rent. She’s also mentally spent, having to concentrate extra hard in class since English isn’t her first language.

“(If) there are words I don’t understand I have to look it up, so it takes more time than domestic students.”

Bae is determined to succeed. After all, she uprooted her life in Seoul, where she got an architecture degree and taught English to children after school. She has chosen a program she hopes will lead to good job offers and eventually permanent status, since graduating here garners extra points on a residency application.

But to get into the workforce, she first needs a diploma — without it she can’t apply for a post-graduate work permit.

That’s a big reason international students graduate at much higher rates when compared with domestic students. According to the Star’s analysis of colleges, 89 per cent of international students graduated in 2018, compared with 69 per cent of domestic.

Franklin of Colleges Ontario believes the difference is largely because domestic students can quit school to work — something international students can’t legally do.

“The single biggest factor, particularly in an economy like this that’s pretty hot — and we have it in spades in the trades — is that these (domestic students) get poached by companies that are desperate for trained labour,” she says. “There’s no need to finish the program because some company is going to hire you. And in some cases, they’re hiring you at a great salary, so you can get a house and a mortgage and a snowmobile and a car. And, so why would you go back (to school)? We constantly face that challenge.”

Tibbits of Conestoga suggests higher grad rates are also because many international students already have post-secondary experience. In fact, according to a 2016 report by the non-profit Canadian Bureau for International Education, the number of international students enrolled in Toronto colleges who had a university degree was 50 per cent, compared with 18 per cent of domestic students.

Ama Osaze-Uzzi, 29, graduated in the spring from George Brown College’s social service worker program. She already has an undergraduate degree in banking and finance from the University of Abuja in her native Nigeria and a master’s degree in management and international business from Birmingham City University in the United Kingdom. With poor job prospects in the U.K. and Nigeria, she started over in Canada, where she hopes to become a permanent resident.

“The (program) has been fantastic,” says Osaze-Uzzi, a week before graduation day. “It’s given me a different perspective on how to support people.”

Standards

But graduation rates don’t reveal the whole picture — some of the students are really struggling. Many are just squeaking by to get their diploma.

Teachers say there’s a push from administrators to boost marks for students to get them over the line so that they pass.

“There is enormous pressure for all parties to keep (all) students moving through as a result of chronic provincial underfunding,” says RM Kennedy, chair of the college faculty division at OPSEU, which represents more than 40,000 faculty and staff at colleges. Kennedy, who also teaches at Centennial, says colleges’ financial needs are “trumping” standards.

“Grade inflation is very much part of the system,” says Ravi Ramkissoonsingh, a psychology teacher at Niagara College, who’s also president of OPSEU Local 242, which represents faculty there.

A Niagara College spokesperson said it was not aware of this happening. And a Centennial College spokesperson said it “would never direct faculty to unethically inflate students’ grades under any circumstances.” Franklin, of Colleges Ontario, doubts teachers mark international students more leniently: “I think that would go to the integrity of the program.”

Last year, Niagara teachers raised the alarm when an unusually high number of international students seemed to be performing far below expectations, despite having passed mandatory pre-admission English-language testing. The college ordered those students be re-evaluated for language proficiency and offered them support. Other colleges have since retested their incoming students.

Language

Algonquin’s De Francesco believes the problem lies with language testing done overseas, far from the oversight of Canadian officials. His international students have told him you can pay others to write the test or pay off exam proctors.

“If you saw the level of English that I’m dealing with you’d be saying to yourself, ‘How is this person in post-secondary?’ They can barely express themselves.”

He says essays contain paragraphs that are one long sentence, lack punctuation and are peppered with misused words because students run text through online translators.

Comprehension is also a problem. He recalls an incident at a student-run restaurant that’s part of the hospitality program in which a customer requested a dish and warned of a shellfish allergy. The student nodded, as though fully understanding — then served up a dish with shellfish.

“It’s frustrating to see these young people fail,” says De Francesco, adding some families make big sacrifices so they can afford to send their children here. “Financially, the college needs them. But at the same time, we have to be ethical. We can’t just start accepting every Tom and Jane into the program because they’ve got the tuition to come and they’ll get their visa.

“We want all our students to be successful and knowing that these students don’t have the communications ability … They’ve got a losing hand.”

Given the language barrier, De Francesco says many domestic students balk at the idea of group work, so he’s removed it from his law class. He used to team up international and domestic students, but the domestic kids would end up doing all the work. And if he let groups assemble on their own, domestic students would stick together and the international students would end up submitting something subpar.

“If I had a dollar for every domestic student that’s come up to me and said, ‘No group work. I do not want to do group work’ … I wouldn’t have to teach.”

He also says faculty spend more time supporting and meeting with international students after class, and are so busy trying to keep them afloat, they don’t have enough time for domestic students: “That frustrates us … We want our domestic students to be successful, too.”

Algonquin, like other colleges, runs workshops for teachers on how to help international students succeed, which he welcomes and would like to see expand.

Romano, who became minister in June and recently met with all of the province’s college and university presidents, says he has not heard any concerns about students struggling with language proficiency, or about teachers feeling inadequately supported.

But Kennedy of OPSEU says the exponential growth of international students in Ontario colleges is one of the biggest issues for its members.

“Our members have talked about the stress and impacts of the influx of students,” says Kennedy. “We are not prepared for this. There are not enough front-end services to support these students with housing and counselling in their transition.”

Missing class

Teachers say some international students don’t even show up regularly to class because they’re so busy working, often graveyard shifts, at places such as coffee shops, convenience stores, fast-food joints and hotels. International students in publicly funded, post-secondary institutions are legally allowed to work 20 hours a week during the school year.

Conestoga, like all colleges, monitors attendance as required by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada.

“I don’t want to sound like we’re an elementary school, but if people miss class we follow up,” says Tibbits. “We don’t want people to come here and then sit around, hoping they’ll get Canadian citizenship even if they don’t attend class.”

Absences can also be an early indicator of physical illness, mental health issues, financial woes, housing problems and academic struggles.

“Some (students) are overwhelmed,” says Tibbits. “They’re in a foreign country, with a lot of different rules and they’re under a lot of pressure … If they’re making an effort and struggling, then we’ve got to find every which way to help them.”

Without family nearby, international students tend to spend a lot of time on campus, so the college has, for instance, ramped up food services, and extended library hours.

For Jessica Urdangarin, the supports at Seneca College weren’t enough. A few years ago, she and her husband bought into the dream of immigrating here from Brazil after hearing on the news and at education fairs that Canada was flush with jobs. They saved money, sold their car and packed up their belongings. She applied to Seneca and got a student visa, which allowed her husband to accompany her on an open work permit.

When they arrived in 2017, she says the college provided little support in finding housing off-campus, and the $1,200 she was told to budget for rent was less than what landlords were asking. The couple eventually found a unit, after door-knocking, for $1,800.

Urdangarin, who already had a communications degree, entered a two-year social service worker program that cost about $30,000. Her husband, who has a degree in business administration, got a “survival job” in a warehouse. But it wasn’t enough for them to survive. So, Urdangarin took a job restocking store shelves, from 5 a.m. to 9 a.m., before heading bleary-eyed to school. The juggling act took its toll, and after three months she quit working.

“It was really overwhelming. By the end of the second semester I had a real anxiety crisis,” she recalls, adding failure was not an option. “I left my home country, sold everything and I need to succeed.”

Urdangarin says some teachers didn’t understand that the language barrier meant it could take three times as long to complete assignments. And basic questions to college staff about post-graduation work permits and scholarships were met by “misinformation.” She says she was never told that her bachelor’s degree could earned her transfer credits, which would have saved her money. Nor that she didn’t have to pay for private health insurance because she was covered by her husband’s OHIP.

A Seneca spokesperson says the college doesn’t comment on individual cases. But it is sorry to hear about Urdangarin’s complaints, noting its goal is to ensure all students have a positive experience. “Moving to Canada from another country can be a difficult and challenging time,” says Amar Shah. “We take every measure to make the transition as smooth as possible for international students.”

Information about services are online and employees are ready to help with questions on such topics as studying English, housing, visas and scholarships, says Shah. He notes that all students are told about transfer credits in their admissions package.

Alex Usher, president of consulting firm Higher Education Strategy Associates, doesn’t think international students are getting great value for their money. He says there aren’t enough services for them on campus, and doesn’t think teachers are sufficiently trained to deal with culturally diverse classes where students have various learning styles.

“We’re throwing them in the deep end,” he says. “We’re scraping the easy money too often and not investing in the services that make it good for them, which means, I suspect, in a couple of years those sources may dry up because those students talk … Word of mouth matters.”

For now, Randine Fogarthy is spreading the good word about Canada, even though her early days were difficult and she’s still without a job in her chosen field. She came from Jamaica to attend Centennial’s community development program, which she graduated from in the spring. During her first months here she slept on a friend’s couch, felt homesick and slumped into depression.

“It was painful,” recalls the 24 year-old. “It was just an adjustment, overall, to this whole new country … I’m not used to seeing other people that don’t look like me.”

Fogarthy begged her mom to let her return home, but was encouraged to stick it out. She eventually made friends. She immersed herself in campus life, joining the student union. And she became an international student ambassador, showing newcomers the ropes, such as how to take the TTC, and where to look for jobs.

“I wanted to be that person that could help them along — the way I wanted to be helped when I first came.”

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In a bustling office at Centennial College’s Scarborough campus, staff are busy promoting the college to the world. At the helm is Macchiavello, leading a recruitment team of 80 in Canada and 80 abroad, who work out of 12 foreign offices.

When she started at Centennial in 2007, studying in Canada wasn’t a pathway to residency. Back then, students were coming to Canada’s career-focused colleges to learn skills to meet the labour needs of their own countries.

Today, they’re coming here to meet our labour needs, spurred by the 2014 federal strategy that treats students as prospective immigrants: Students are given a visa and allowed to work for one to three years after graduation. Further policy tweaks in 2016 reward them with bonus points when they apply for permanent residency. Since then, immigration applications from international students have skyrocketed, and the number accepted has risen from 30,000 in 2016 to 54,000 in 2018.

Federal Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen says there’s no cap on the number of international students allowed into Canada — it boils down to demand and the capacity of schools to accommodate them. But not every study visa application gets accepted.

“We are confident in the fact that this is a demand-driven system,” he says, adding he expects schools are providing “good-quality education for both Canadian and international students.

“We are fortunate to be increasingly the destination of choice for international students who want to come and spend their dollars here, who want to add to our institutions, who want to add to our classrooms — some of whom stay.”

Those who arrived in late August at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport were greeted by Destination Ontario kiosks set up by post-secondary schools and municipalities to provide guidance.

Exhausted from a 20-hour flight from India, Dhwani Bhatt, 27, was delighted to see the welcoming ambassadors as she cleared customs. She already has a master’s degree in electronic and communication engineering. But she’s come for a one-year cybersecurity program at Centennial that costs $17,000.

“Cybersecurity is a booming field and Centennial College has a top-notch program,” she says. “I’m so excited to be in Canada. It’s my dream to visit this country. I look forward to a new start in Canada.”

Students left the airport in all directions. And while most headed to GTA colleges, there has been a greater pull to far-flung communities.

Just last year, for instance, international student enrolment at colleges such as St. Clair in Windsor-Chatham, Cambrian in Sudbury and Canadore in North Bay basically doubled over the previous year.

At Northern College in Timmins, attracting international students is crucial for a region where population decline is accelerated by young people moving away. There, international student growth has skyrocketed — in 2011 there were none, while this year they comprise about 42 per cent of the college’s 1,600 students.

“We’re very invested in ensuring they stay,” says Audrey Penner, vice-president academic and student success at Northern, “that they settle in the north, take up work or begin a business.”

It’s a sentiment Immigration Minister Hussen has heard across the country: “Their ability to help the local communities, to fill unfilled jobs, contribute to local economies, is one of overwhelming success and the feeling of the community is, ‘We want more.’ ”

Still, there have been challenges. In Windsor, for instance, the influx of international students at St. Clair led to complaints from residents worried areas were turning into student ghettos, with homes bursting at the seams with too many occupants. Parking and transit were also becoming issues.

“There were growing pains,” says Ron Seguin, the college’s vice-president, international relations, campus development and student services. “International education is a market and the market is not totally predictable.”

The college is building a second residence with 512 beds and has expanded housing services. It has also worked with the transit authority to add more buses.

Student mix and diversification

Durham College in Oshawa has capped international students at 15 per cent of total population to give it time to build up capacity and supports.

At Centennial, and elsewhere, there’s a push to diversify the pool of international students. The first reason, says Macchiavello, is to ensure a global experience for all students and enrich the classroom experience. Secondly, hosting students from one region is risky, since various factors — think geopolitics, economics, conflict and natural disaster — could impact the flow of students.

A few years ago, when the Ebola crisis hit Africa, St. Clair suddenly lost 100 international students because they couldn’t get through the visa process due to health concerns. That’s why the college is setting aside revenue to mitigate future risk in case of a similar event.

Centennial is reducing the number of students from India. Two years ago, 57 per cent of all international students were from there, last year it was 43 per cent and the goal is to get that figure down to 33 per cent by 2022. Meanwhile, it’s boosting the number of students from countries including Vietnam, Brazil and China.

“Geopolitics is big,” says Macchiavello, noting the diplomatic dispute between Canada and China over the arrest of an executive of telecom giant Huawei. “Some of the colleges would be in big trouble right now if China closed its doors because of Huawei.”

Uncertainty in the U.K. over Brexit and the perception that the Trump administration is unwelcoming have also prompted students to choose Canada.

Back on Centennial’s Downsview campus, Bae says she didn’t consider any other country. Canada was her number one pick. She knows studying here with the goal of attaining residency is a gamble — there’s no guarantee. But it’s a chance she had to take.

“I might regret it if I don’t get permanent residency or if I have to go back to Korea,” she says. “But I would regret it if I never started this.”

Source: ‘I’ve given up everything.’ Explosive growth in international students comes at a steep cost