Star editorial: Necessary reforms on international students and CILA statement

2024/01/25 Leave a comment

Even the Star supports these restrictions:

After weeks of foreshadowing, the federal government moved this week to cap the number of international student visas over the next two years. File this policy change in the “better late than never” category.

The number of international students flowing to this country has grown by such epic proportions it is difficult to reach any conclusion other than the federal Liberals were simply sleeping on this file. There have been no shortage of red flags, from Statistics Canada reports warning of the strain on affordable housingand access to social services to provincial auditors warning of an unhealthy dependence on international student fees by post-secondary institutions which are being underfunded.

Over the past two years, the number of international students in this country jumped from 617,000 to more than a million. About a third are in public universities but the overwhelming majority are in public colleges or private schools, often offering substandard education and a backdoor route to permanent status in this country. Immigration Minister Marc Miller, in announcing he is cutting the number of study permits by 35 per cent to 364,000 this year, is right to target the shady operators who are preying on international students and not doctoral and postgraduate international students at public universities. Miller says hundreds of the private schools should be shut down.

“It is not the intention of this program to have sham commerce degrees and business degrees that are sitting on top of a massage parlour,” Miller said in making his announcement.

There are a number of threads to unravel from this announcement. First and foremost, as the minister stressed, this is not an indictment of foreign students. They are hardly responsible for a housing crunch or fears over access to stretched social services. International students were more likely the victims, living in crowded, substandard housing, dealing with a much more expensive country that they had anticipated and receiving diplomas which Miller says were being churned out like “puppy mills.” It was creating reputational damage to this country.

But these students would not be in this country without federal approval, so Miller is correcting a problem that his government largely created. According to a memo obtained by The Canadian Press, the Trudeau government was warned in 2022 that there was a widening gap between immigration and housing supply, largely driven by the increasing number of international students and temporary foreign workers admitted to this country.

This cap will be most acutely felt in Ontario, home to 51 per cent of international students. The Doug Ford government has twice been warned about a reliance on international student tuition fees, once in November by his own panel on colleges and universities, and in 2021 by the auditor-general who warned him not to increase a dependency on foreign student fees without a post-secondary education plan in place. The panel reported in November that the Progressive Conservatives had the lowest per student post-secondary funding in the country following a tuition cut and freeze that meant colleges and universities had reached the point at which revenue from international student tuition fees was “fundamental to the sector’s financial sustainability.” Now Ford is forced into some tough decisions. He will have to decide what schools can bring in international students and what schools should be eliminated, while protecting universities in financial trouble.

Finally, the Liberals – and all governments at all levels – must handle matters of immigration, including temporary foreign workers and international students, with utmost delicacy. To their credit, Canadians have held together on a consensus on the accommodation of immigrants. And to their credit, Canadian politicians have largely resisted any base urge to exploit frustration and anxiety in this country by playing the immigration card.

But the numbers are increasing. Some 500,000 immigrants will arrive next year and this country is going through a population boom during challenging economic times. Immigration will dominate much of the upcoming U.S. presidential election and delicacy is not a feature of debate to the south, particularly from Republicans.

It would not take much to bust that Canadian consensus. We trust our politicians to be vigilant on that score.

Source: Necessary reforms on international students

Sensible recommendations in CILA’s statement on Canada’s international student caps

CILA wishes to use this opportunity to highlight other means to better protect international students and promote the integrity of our higher education and immigration systems:

  • Federal and provincial governments must work together to identify how to fund our higher education system in a more sustainable fashion so that colleges and universities are not so reliant on international students to fund their operations.
  • The federal government needs to set more realistic expectations to international students about the feasibility of obtaining permanent residence following graduation. The federal government, in concert with colleges, universities, and immigration consultants continue to tout Canada’s TR to PR pathways, when the reality is attaining PR is a very competitive process that is far from a foregone conclusion.
  • IRCC may wish to consider increasing the English- and French-language proficiency requirements so that approved international students are better equipped to succeed in Canadian classrooms, the economy, and society.
  • Re-introduce the Post-Graduation Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) to international graduates so that employers with genuine labour shortages can obtain work permits for international graduates with in-demand skills. This can also help such international graduates improve their odds of transitioning to PR.
  • Better regulate the conduct of immigration consultants in Canada and overseas to deter them from engaging in unethical behavior or with unauthorized agents that exploit international students.

CILA acknowledges the significant growth in Canada’s international student population has created significant integrity challenges and believes it is incumbent on governments across Canada to do more to provide both Canadian and international students with a better experience. CILA hopes such efforts will lead to a more sustainable path forward for Canada’s international student program. International students enrich Canada in many ways and are key to our global competitiveness. As such, it is imperative Canada get its international student program back on track so we can sustain the economic and social benefits that international students bring for many decades to come.

Source: Source: CILA’s statement on Canada’s international student caps

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , , ,

Keller: Thanks to Marc Miller, the immigration system is (slightly) less broken, Clark: Ottawa finally acts on international student visas, setting a challenge for Doug Ford

2024/01/24 Leave a comment

Two of the better assessments:

Every journey begins with a first step. The Trudeau government has finally taken a step toward fixing what it broke in Canada’s immigration system. This is not the end of the trip, not even close. But it’s a start.

Ottawa didn’t do the breaking on its own. The provinces helped. So did business.

…Mr. Miller has finally taken a first step to repairing the immigration system. All he has to do now is keep walking.

Source: Thanks to Marc Miller, the immigration system is (slightly) less broken

Still, Mr. Ford faces a challenge now. The days of unlimited student visas are numbered, so his government has to decide which schools will get them. Will they prioritize top-notch talent, or keep business going for a low-standard industry?

Of course, Ontario’s failing shouldn’t let the federal Liberals off the hook. They were asleep while the number of temporary residents ballooned. It took ages for the Liberals to even see that massive policy failure while the damaging consequences were piling up on so many ordinary folks.

Finally, albeit belatedly, Mr. Miller has acted. Over to you, Mr. Ford.

Source: Ottawa finally acts on international student visas, setting a challenge for Doug Ford

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , , ,

Immigration Minister urged to crack down on international student ‘no shows’ at colleges

2024/01/19 Leave a comment

All the negligence on the part of federal and provincial governments, education institutions and others for having enabled this degree of fraud and, in many cases, exploitation.

Likely worth looking into ownership of these private colleges to assess whether any degree of political complicity or corruption involved:

The International Student Compliance Regime, implemented in 2014, is designed to help identify bogus students and help provinces identify questionable schools.

Most of the colleges on IRCC’s top ten list of schools with the highest potential non-compliance rates are privately run and in Ontario, catering heavily to students from India.

The IRCC’s Student Integrity Analysis Report, dated November, 2021, found “no shows” to make up as much as 90 per cent of students at some private colleges. “No shows” are students with letters of acceptance, who should be enrolled but either did not confirm the acceptance, never attended class or suddenly stopped attending.

The Academy of Learning College in Toronto had a 95 per cent “overall potential student non compliance rate” among students, the report said. Ninety per cent of students were recorded as “no shows.”

The 2021 Student Integrity Analysis Report, obtained by immigration lawyer Richard Kurland through an access to information request, found that Flair College of Management and Technology in Vaughan, Ont., had a “no show” of 75 per cent of students.

Both colleges did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Mr. Kurland said the IRCC has known for years which colleges have large numbers of international students not attending classes but have so far failed to act on study permits.

He said the data suggest that some schools may have a business model based on bringing students into Canada and getting their tuition, even if the student doesn’t attend.

“The integrity of our International Students Program is of the utmost importance,” she said in an e-mail.

Source: Immigration Minister urged to crack down on international student ‘no shows’ at colleges

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , , , ,

International students angered by failing grade say they feel exploited. Now the university is giving them a second chance

2024/01/12 Leave a comment

Emblemic of the failures of provincial higher education policies, institutional avarice and lack of federal guardrails for such abuse:

Failing marks for dozens of international students have led to a days-long sit-in at an Ontario university, with some frustrated students saying they’ve been left feeling as though the school is trying to milk them for more money.

In response to the controversy, Algoma University has re-evaluated the grades in one online course offered by its Brampton campus and, finding them “abnormally low,” has given dozens more students a passing grade. It’s also moved to offer the students a free makeup exam. 

The school says it deeply values academic integrity and fairness, and that for those students retaking the exam, it will be up to them to do the work and make the grade. It didn’t address the students’ suggestion that it was trying to extract more fees out of the affected students.

Source: International students angered by failing grade say they feel exploited. Now the university is giving them a second chance

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , ,

Canada’s Foreign Student Surge Prompts Changes, and Anxiety

2024/01/08 Leave a comment

Makes The New York Times but broader range of expert views missing:

The education consultant in India didn’t reveal to Maninderjit Kaur, a Canada-bound student, where exactly, relative to Toronto, the college she had enrolled in was.

Ms. Kaur told my colleague, Norimitsu Onishi, that after a never-ending Uber ride — eight hours and 800 Canadian dollars later — she had ended up in Timmins, Ontario, a place she had never heard of.

But, as Nori reported, finishing a degree in this remote city was perhaps less of an isolating experience given that 82 percent of students at Northern College in Timmins are foreign nationals, mostly from India.

Recruiting foreign students who pay higher tuition fees — roughly five times as much as Canadians to obtain an undergraduate degree, according to the census agency — has always been attractive to the country’s institutions. It has also become increasingly important for the federal government, which is vying to hit a lofty goal of attracting 1.45 million immigrants between 2023 and 2025.

By announcing this record-breaking target in November 2022, as part of a strategy to plug national labor shortages, Canada signaled that it was headed in the opposite direction from many Western governments that are curtailing migration, as I reported at the time. (As of this week, most foreign students in Britain will no longer be allowed to bring their families, a move that the country’s Home Office said delivered on its commitment to “a decisive cut in migration.”)

In Canada, the surge of overseas students has fanned concerns about the readiness of university and college communities to adequately host them, and about efforts to ensure that their labor and their finances are not exploited. The immigration minister, Marc Miller, recently announced a handful of measures taking effect this month for foreign students.

For the first time since the early 2000s, the government has increased the savings threshold that foreign students must have to qualify for a study permit to about 20,600 Canadian dollars, up from 10,000 dollars. And it will continue, until at least April, to allow international students to work more than 20 hours per week, a policy it had previously walked back.

Without providing details, Mr. Miller’s ministry said it was also looking into ways that it could ensure colleges and universities, which are provincially regulated, accept only as many students as they can assist in finding housing.

“Ahead of September 2024, we are prepared to take necessary measures, including significantly limiting visas, to ensure that designated learning institutions provide adequate and sufficient student supports,” Mr. Miller said last month at a news conference in which he announced the changes. He accused some institutions of operating the “diploma equivalent of puppy mills,” depriving those foreign students of a positive academic experience in the face of outsize hardships and a lack of intervention by provincial governments.Continue reading the main story

“Enough is enough,” Mr. Miller added. “If provinces and territories cannot do this, we will do it for them, and they will not like the bluntness of the instruments that we use.”

The number of international students in Canada has skyrocketed over the last three years, with a 60 percent increase in the number of study permits processed by the immigration ministry. It completed more than one million new study permit applications and extensions in 2023, a record, up from 838,000 in 2022 and 560,000 in 2021.

Study permits aren’t strictly capped, but permanent residencies do adhere to annual quotas. In 2022, Canada welcomed about 432,000 permanent residents, and of those, 95,000 were previously international students, according to a September 2023 report by four Canadian senators urging the government to address “program integrity issues.” Those include an increasing perception that aiming for a Canadian degree is a sure pathway to citizenship.

“It’s not a pathway — it’s a minefield,” said Syed Hussan, executive director of the Migrant Workers Alliance for Change, a migrant-led organization, similar to a union, based in Toronto.

He characterized the changes as minor “tweaks” to a system that was probably due for an overhaul.

“We’re constantly hearing issues around high tuition fees, difficulty being able to get permanent resident status, exploitation of work and exploitation by landlords,” Mr. Hussan said.Continue reading the main story

Placing firm caps on student permits is not the answer, said Anna Triandafyllidou, a migration researcher and professor at Toronto Metropolitan University, but she added that the government should do a better job of regulating migrant flow to avoid stoking “cutthroat” competition to stay in Canada.

“Otherwise you create this huge bottleneck where you admit 600,000 international students, but these have to compete with everyone else for 450,000 permanent residence permits,” she said.

It is becoming more common for migrants to spend some time living in the country before becoming permanent residents, a process known as two-step immigration, which is seen almost as a taboo in Canada, Professor Triandafyllidou told me.

Canada should recognize it has “a two-step system and just make sure that it works properly,” she said.

Source: Canada’s Foreign Student Surge Prompts Changes, and Anxiety

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , , , ,

Brett Fairbairn: New financial rules for international students signal need for change

2024/01/04 Leave a comment

From the President of Thompson Rivers University. Issue is broader than international student support systems…

New restrictions for international students recently announced by Canada’s federal government are intended to send a message to universities, colleges, and students who want to come here to study.

The changes addressing the cost-of-living financial requirements, work hours, and study permit processing for international students signal a shift in Canada’s approach to international education. Most plainly, the changes acknowledge that students are not commodities. They are valuable contributors to our communities and the Canadian economy, and they deserve better support from universities.

Some of these changes, such as new cost-of-living requirements (students must now show they have $20,635 available instead of $10,000), have been a long time coming, having not been adjusted since the early 2000s. While the increase in required funds may initially seem daunting, it underscores a vital truth for students — living in Canada is expensive, and they have sometimes been underprepared for the cost of living here.

Other changes are intended to make universities and colleges take more responsibility for students and their well-being, especially regarding housing and mental health support, which is in short supply everywhere.

Across Canadian higher education, there needs to be more consistency and accountability in how universities and colleges approach international students. There are too many institutions that “free ride” on the hard-won reputation of higher education in Canada. Some institutions, such as Thompson Rivers University (TRU) in Kamloops, offer extensive enhanced support to their international students. TRU’s approach goes beyond compliance with financial guidelines — we actively foster a nurturing and inclusive environment. This commitment is reflected in comprehensive services that address academic, cultural, and personal needs, ensuring that these students are enrolled and integrated into the campus and broader community. For example, each student is assigned a dedicated international student advisor for assistance with immigration, academics and well-being, along with access to 24/7 mental health support, assistance with living arrangements, and activities for engagement and integration with the local community.

However, some institutions seem to prioritize the financial benefits that international students bring, viewing the increased enrolment of international students primarily as a source of revenue. This approach inevitably leads to inadequate support, potentially leaving students to navigate the challenges of a new educational and cultural environment with minimal assistance.

The new requirements make clear the need for universities and colleges to develop robust support systems. By doing so, universities and colleges, whether public or private, can help international students handle the pressures of adapting to a new country while pursuing their academic goals. We must foster environments where international students feel valued and supported as learners and individuals embarking on a life-changing journey in a new country.

As mentioned before, Canada’s international education brand is hard won, and the result of strategies developed by this government and the last, and we must foster it. Canada risks developing a bad reputation not only because of a handful of “viral” poor experiences of a few students but also if the status quo continues, risking even more drastic and sudden changes in government policies.

Now is the time for governments and the post-secondary sector across Canada to work together to protect our brand, retain the massive positive economic impact international students bring, and ensure we are keeping the promise we made to students of the world of what education in Canada means. Value-added services, accessible housing and employment, and a warm welcome into communities should all be part of our offer.

We also need to hear from international students about what makes their time in Canada more fulfilling. Students have an active voice, and international students, to their credit, are claiming it. We must listen and learn from them to devise better systems.

It is time for institutions and policymakers to move decisively beyond viewing international students through a financial lens and see them as integral, valued community members. This shift will enrich the Canadian landscape, strengthening Canada’s communities and our position as a leader in global education.

Brett Fairbairn is the president and vice-chancellor at Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops. This year, TRU World celebrated 40 years of international education.

Source: Brett Fairbairn: New financial rules for international students signal need for change

Filed under Immigration Tagged with ,

Ottawa’s delayed strategy on foreign students

2023/12/16 Leave a comment

Even the Star is critical:

Foreign students didn’t create the country’s current housing shortage. Blame should also not fall on the shoulders of temporary foreign workers, refugee claimants or new immigrants to this country.

Blame rightly falls to governments that failed to see the flashing warning signs of a housing shortage for years and a federal government that has put out the welcome mat to new arrivals and essentially had them sleep on the floor.

But the mushrooming number of international students pouring into this country has been a contributing factor to our housing woes and from a political perspective, they had become a problem for the federal Liberals. If potential voters saw them as a problem, the Liberal had to act. But they had to act carefully so as not to appear to be scapegoating others for their policy failures.

So first steps to curb their numbers are welcome. If the Liberals can sell the changes as a way to protect the well-being of future students, so much the better from a political standpoint. Still, it falls into the category of a move that was long overdue, a tiny fix to a problem long ignored.

Immigration Minister Marc Miller is vowing to crack down on the exploitative practice of luring students here with promises of backdoor permanent resident status. But he cannot move too aggressively, mindful of the fact that international students are a rich vein of revenue for Canadian universities. Here, there must be pressure on universities and colleges to properly support the students who contribute so much to their bottom line.

International students contribute $22 billion annually to this country’s economy and supporting an estimated 200,000 Canadian jobs. He also cannot price a post-secondary education out of reach of students of limited means and make a Canadian degree attainable only to the elite.

Under his revised measures, students will need to show they have at least $20,635 to cover living expenses in this country, in addition to what they need to cover a year’s tuition and travel costs. That’s a significant hike from the current threshold of $10,000, a figure untethered to reality which has not been revised upward for two decades. Miller also plans to reduce the number of hours international students can spend doing paid work, allowing the 40-hour limit to continue only until the end of April, 2024 at which time it is likely to be cut to 30 hours or less. The minister quite rightly argues that working 40 hours per week while studying here is “untenable.”

He also says he will crack down on a system which he likened to the diploma equivalent of “puppy mills” in which diplomas are churned out without providing a legitimate student experience and profit is made on selling “backdoor” entry points to permanent Canadian residence. He’s right. But it must be noted that this has been allowed to fester under the Liberal watch.

Immigration levels hit record highs under the Liberals. Miller has recently announced a freeze on that level beginning in 2026, but his government will welcome 485,000 permanent residents in 2024 and 500,000 in 2025. When the Liberals were elected in 2015, the immigration intake was set at 265,000 per year. Canada’s population hit 40 million last summer, part of the largest year-over-year percentage increase in population in 66 years, with the country on a path to double its population in 25 years. The 2.2 million non-permanent residents living in this country on July 1, 2023, comprised largely of temporary workers and international students, was up 46 per cent over the previous year.

According to documents cited by the Globe and Mail, the government anticipated 949,000 foreign student applicants this year, a number expected to rise to about 1.4 million by 2027.

Freezing immigration levels and limiting the number of international students will help ease the pressure on housing, although those who are struggling with soaring rents or are unable to buy a home are unlikely to see the benefits before the next election. The only solution is to expedite the construction of housing and the Liberals have – again belatedly – begun to act on that. Other measures, while welcome, are really just tinkering on the edges.

Source: Ottawa’s delayed strategy on foreign students

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , ,

Mahboubi and Skuterud: Canada must stem the surge in temporary foreign workers and international students

2023/12/15 Leave a comment

More needed analysis and commentary:

Recent years have seen an unprecedented increase in Canada’s non-permanent resident population, far surpassing increases in annual admissions of new permanent residents. The unbalanced growth in Canada’s temporary and permanent migration inflows will inevitably result in a growing undocumented population and forced deportations. Both developments risk inflaming Canada’s immigration politics and undermining public confidence in the immigration system.

It is imperative that the government take immediate steps to stem the continuing growth in foreign student and temporary foreign worker entries.

Several factors have contributed to the non-permanent resident (NPR) population surge, including ad-hoc programs aimed at expanding eligibility for permanent resident (PR) status, increasing postsecondary reliance on international student tuition revenue and eased employer access to temporary foreign workers, most notably those in low-wage occupations.

Statistics Canada estimates that by the third quarter of 2023 Canada’s NPR population had reached 2.2 million, while entries of new permanent residents remained below 500,000 and which the government has announced will stabilize in 2025. The tightening bottleneck in temporary-to-permanent residency flows is, in fact, worse, because most PR slots continue to be filled by applicants residing abroad, not from Canada’s NPR population.

A key factor driving the growth in NPR inflows is the government’s repeated announcements of ad-hoc programs aimed at easing the pathway to PR status for lower-skilled migrants who would otherwise struggle to clear the hurdle of the Express Entry skills-based points system. Allocation of PR slots has increasingly become a lottery incentivizing large numbers of migrants to try their luck at obtaining Canadian PR status.

But given the limited number of PR admissions, large numbers of justifiably hopeful NPRs will be unable to realize their dreams. As their study and work permits expire, many will be unable or unwilling to return to their home countries. These migrants will become increasingly vulnerable to workplace exploitation, distorting wage outcomes in lower-skilled labour markets, and poverty, which government supports are unable to address because of their ineligibility.

Canada urgently requires a multipronged strategy to stem the continuing growth of the NPR population and restore the stability and integrity of the immigration system. In our view, policies should be aimed at augmenting migrants’ own incentives to seek NPR status in Canada.

On the international student front, we recommend reintroducing the cap on foreign students’ off-campus work hours at 20 a week; it was waived in October, 2022, and recently extended to April 30, 2024. The punting of this issue down the road is unhelpful in restoring predictability for prospective foreign students. Study permits have become de facto work permits incentivizing migrants whose primary objective is accessing Canadian jobs, not human capital investments.

We also recommend restricting study permits to institutions of a certain standard. Too many private colleges are essentially used as stepping stones to residency. Designated learning institutionswhose students are currently ineligible for postgraduation work permits should also be ineligible for study permits. The government should also seek to undesignate institutions based on the measured immigration and labour market outcomes of their graduates. Moreover, these metrics should be regularly published by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) to help prospective migrants make informed decisions and to combat false dreams pushed by education recruiters.

On the temporary foreign worker front, the government must reconsider extended measures allowing, for example, 30 per cent of the work forces of employers in specific industries to be composed of low-wage temporary foreign workers. Stemming the growth in the low-wage stream of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program and restoring the pre-2020 hiring regulations would recognize recent evidence of the adverse effects of this program on wages and local unemployment rates.

Most important, the government needs to bring back predictability in its system for allocating PR admissions in the economic-class applicant pool. Though well-intentioned, ad-hoc programs aimed at easing the pathway to PR status are contributing to growth in TR inflow. IRCC needs to return to relying on the Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS) for allocating PR admissions, as it did before 2020. Given the transparency of the CRS “points system” and a stable CRS cutoff over time, unsuccessful applicants can see what human capital investments they need to be successful, thereby advancing the objectives of our skilled immigration program.

If these policy levers are collectively applied, they can stem growth in Canada’s NPR population, restore fairness and transparency in the PR system and secure the immigration system’s integrity and sustainability. In doing so, we can ensure that Canada continues to be a welcoming and prosperous country for all.

Parisa Mahboubi is a senior policy analyst at the C.D. Howe Institute. Mikal Skuterud is a professor of economics at the University of Waterloo, director of the Canadian Labour Economics Forum and a fellow-in-residence of the C.D. Howe Institute.

Source: Canada must stem the surge in temporary foreign workers and international students

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , , ,

Globe editorial: When it comes to international students, ‘show me the money’ is only half a policy

2023/12/13 Leave a comment

Valid critique that politicians (and stakeholders IMO) are to blame:

The Liberals, as well as the opposition parties, have been loathe to blame immigrants, temporary foreign workers, international students and refugees for a housing crisis that has been fuelled by rapidly growing demand combined with a stagnant supply. They should be loathe to, because it is the politicians who are to blame.

Until the housing crisis emerged, Ottawa and the provinces turned a blind eye to shady “diploma mills” in Canada that sell dodgy educations as a back door to permanent residency. They also let the temporary foreign workers program turn into a massive cheap labour boondoggle that brings hundreds of thousands into the country.

Ottawa made a shocking error this year when it secretly waived rules for temporary visitors that required them to prove they would leave the country when their visas expired, leading to a huge surge in refugee claims at airports. The Trudeau government has also refused to alter its plan to increase annual immigration targets.

Source: When it comes to international students, ‘show me the money’ is only half a policy

Filed under Immigration Tagged with ,

Expect fewer international students in wake of raised income requirements, advocate says

2023/12/11 Leave a comment

Expected and desired, particularly with respect to the “puppy mill” colleges and exploitation. Will see if major education and provincial push back emerges:

An international student at Memorial University in St. John’s says federal changes to the amount of required income for international students will provide transparency on what is needed to live in Canada but will also likely reduce the number of students who choose to study in the country.

Immigration Minister Marc Miller announced new rules Thursday that will increase the amount of money that prospective international students will need to study in Canada.

As a way to cut down on fraudulent applications, Miller said, students will need to show they have access to $20,635 instead of $10,000.

Jawad Chowdhury, executive director of campaigns for Memorial University’s student union, said the move is a big step toward being open and transparent with students looking to study in Canada, but cautioned that many cannot afford the more than $80,000 that a four-year program would require.

“We’re no longer promising students something that they can afford [when they actually] can’t afford housing and, you know, groceries and all the necessities that you need,” Chowdhury said.

“But on the flip side, I also think it’s going to significantly reduce the amount of international students coming into Canada.”

Chowdhury said he has seen rental charges for some properties in the St. John’s area nearly triple since he came to the city around 2018. Tuition has also increased in recent years, fuelled by a $68.4-million budget cut to Memorial by the Newfoundland and Labrador government. As a consequence, fees for international students have increased.

Ottawa also announced it is winding down a policy that lengthened the time that graduating international students could work in Canada without an employment visa.

A cap of 20 work hours per week for studying international students is set to come back into effect in the new year.

Miller said the federal government is reviewing the 20-hour figure but suggested that keeping the cap at 40 hours may keep students from focusing on their studies.

Chowdhury said he’d like to see international students retain the ability to work full-time hours, as it is often required to keep students in Canada.

“A lot of international students over the past year have gotten managerial positions, have gotten supervisor positions that require them to stay … permanent and full time,” he said.

“We don’t want international students losing those positions because there’s a reduction in their work hours.”

‘Canada needs students,’ says job recruiter

Meanwhile, a recruiter based in N.L. who often works with international students says Miller’s announcement cannot be the only action taken to address Canada’s labour needs.

Wanda Cuff-Young, vice-president of operations at the international recruiting agency Work Global Canada, said the announcement of additional funds needed is a good step forward to combat fraud but she wonders if doubling the amount of money needed all at once is too much to handle right away.

“Maybe it could have been phased in,” Cuff-Young said. “Canada needs students.”

A key focus of Miller’s announcement was Canada wanting to crack down on what he called “puppy mills” — institutions that accept and bring in international students to Canada without providing a legitimate educational experience.

Cuff-Young said these kinds of institutions are more common in larger provinces like Ontario, Quebec and British Columbia but added they also don’t teach programs that would provide stable work for students.

“In my 15 years of doing this work in Atlantic Canada, I’ve never been asked to supply anyone with a supply chain manager,” she said.

“They’re teaching programs and giving false hopes to students that there’s a future in this sort of course. And I think this is where some of these adjustments need to be reviewed. The programming needs to be adjusted.”

Cuff-Young said many employers are searching for tradespeople and early-childhood educators. She hopes more will be done to ensure people coming to Canada can be trained in positions the country will need moving forward.

Filed under Immigration Tagged with ,

← Older posts

Newer posts →