On September 7, 2016, Statistics Canada released its tuition fee data for 2016-17. You can read the StatCan highlights here. OCUFA researchers have taken a deeper dive into the datasets, and the results are concerning.
Ontario’s domestic undergraduate fees are 74 per cent higher than the average in the rest of Canada. Since 2010, they have increased by 10 per cent compared to four per cent in the rest of Canada. Graduate tuition is even worse: 96 per cent higher than the rest of Canada, having increased by 13 per cent since 2010, compared to six per cent in the RoC.
International fees tell a similar tale: undergraduate tuition fees are 54 per cent higher than the rest of Canada, and graduate fees are 66 per cent higher. But the rate of increase in international fees is the alarming bit: since 2010, international undergrad fees have increased by 31 per cent, while graduate fees have gone up by 20 per cent (compared to 13 per cent and one per cent in the RoC).
All of these numbers are based on weighted average tuition fees (weighted by enrolment in program of study) and are corrected for inflation. What they show is that Ontario continues to shift the cost of higher education onto students and their families. And if those students come from outside Canada, the shift is occurring at a very brisk pace indeed.