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Toronto in mediation; good progress at Brescia and Nipissing

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The University of Toronto Faculty Association (UTFA) is heading to mediation with mediator-arbitrator William Kaplan.  Two days are scheduled, on June 2nd and 3rd.
 
Brescia reports that the parties continue to meet regularly and progress toward a first collective agreement. Their next bargaining session is June 14th.
 
At Nipissing, the parties have met in several full day meetings in April and report continued progress working through nonfinancial issues. The teams will begin dealing with more substantial proposals during an unprecedented run of seven meetings with the employer over three weeks in May.

This article originally appeared in the OCUFA Report. To receive stories like this every week in your inbox, please subscribe.

New survey: Ontario’s professors and academic librarians warn that university quality is on the decline

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Professors and academic librarians are concerned about the quality of education at Ontario’s universities, according to a new survey released today. Of those surveyed, 42 per cent believed that quality had declined at their institution.

“Ontario’s universities have welcomed thousands of new students over the past five years, but public funding has just not kept pace with the enrolment increase,” said Constance Adamson, President of the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations (OCUFA). “Universities are straining to accommodate the new students with inadequate resources, and the cracks are beginning to show.”

Other worrying survey findings include:

  • 63 per cent of faculty believe class sizes have increased over the past five years
  • 83 per cent of faculty report budget cuts in their department
  • 76 per cent of faculty report an increased use of part-time faculty at their institution
  • 73 per cent of faculty report an increase in workload, which for many (41 per cent) means less time to interact with students outside of class

 The survey also revealed that Ontario’s professors and academic librarians are deeply committed to the quality of university education and the essential link between teaching and research at the province’s universities. Surveyed faculty value teaching and research equally, although they believe their commitment to teaching is not always shared by their institution.

“Ontario’s professors and academic librarians believe that the connection between teaching and research –what we call ‘scholarship’—is at the heart of the university,” said Adamson. “When we separate teaching from research, we don’t give our students the education they expect.”

The OCUFA faculty survey was commissioned to assess Ontario university professors’ and academic librarians’ opinion on a variety of issues affecting university education. The online survey received over 2,300 responses between March 21 and April 16, 2012.

Read the full report

Data Check: University educated still have lower unemployment rate

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The latest Education Indicators in Canada report from Statistics Canada shows that the national unemployment rate for those with university education continues to be lower than the remainder of the working population. Although unemployment caused by the Great Recession peaked in 2009 for most Canadians, the highest level of unemployment amongst the university-educated was in 2010.
 
Other wrinkles show up in the data for Canadians 25 to 29 years of age – the age cohort most recently to have completed their choice of post-secondary education. Albeit with higher unemployment rates, the national-level patterns are similar for 25 to 29 year-olds to those for the workforce as a whole, except for to those with college and trades credentials. After dipping downwards in 2010, their unemployment rate rose in 2011.
 
A look at the provincial level figures indicates that Quebec and Ontario contributed the most to that reversal. These are also provinces that experienced no improvement in employment prospects for university-educated 25-29 year-olds. The worsening of their unemployment rate is not as steep as it was in 2010, but there can be little consolation that the deterioration is only creeping rather than leaping.
 
Source: Statistics Canada, Education Indicators in Canada: Report of the Pan-Canadian Education Indicators Program May 2012

This article originally appeared in the OCUFA Report. To receive stories like this every week in your inbox, please subscribe.

Data Check: Class sizes continue to grow

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As it goes with student-faculty ratios at Ontario universities, so it goes with class sizes.  As the number of students relative to the number of faculty increases, class sizes get bigger. This has serious implications for the quality of higher education in our province – larger classes mean less student interaction with faculty, a key determinant of student engagement.
 
There are no data which make a comparison of class size possible between the late-1990s/early 2000s and the ‘double cohort’ period – where enrolment swelled due to the elimination of the OAC year. However, it appears that there was a slight improvement in class size once the double cohort completed their studies. Unfortunately, it appears that class sizes are once again on the rise.
 
Published data do not indicate the actual average size of classes by undergraduate year, but they do provide information on the number of classes by size range. Assuming a particular average class size for each range is no substitute for the actual data, but it can provide an indication of developing trends.
 
According to OCUFA’s “medium” class-size projection, it is clear that growth in first- and second-year class sizes has continued almost unabated since 2005. It is less obvious for the third and fourth year classes, but larger class sizes appear to be rippling outwards from the first and second years.
 
While worrying, these data are only estimates. Currently, accurate class size data is not available in Ontario. In order for students and their families to understand what is happening to learning quality, universities must be compelled to release accurate class size figures.

Note: The “medium” scenario assumes 29 students per class in the under 30 range; 45 in the 30-60 range; 80 in the 61-100 range; 150 in the 101-250 range; and 251 in the 250-plus range. The maximum for the smallest range offsets the minimum for the largest range, for which there can be no fixed median or mean by definition. The product of the assumed average number of students per class and the number of classes can be divided by the number of classes to yield an estimated average class size for each year of study.

This article originally appeared in the OCUFA Report. To receive stories like this every week in your inbox, please subscribe.

Data Check: On student-to-faculty ratios, Ontario goes from worst to even worse

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Since the mid-1990s, Ontario has had the worst student-to-faculty ratio in Canada. While the number of students per full-time faculty member in other provinces hovered around 20-1, the Ontario ratio rose from 22-1 in the fall of 2000 to 27-1 by 2005-06 as the “double cohort” entered the university system.
 
A slight improvement occurred as the bulk of the double cohort completed their undergraduate studies, but the ratio looks to be worsening again. Even if universities hired as many full-time faculty as they planned in their Multi-Year Accountability Agreements (and the evidence to date suggests they have not), the ratio is now approaching 28 students for each full-time faculty member.
 
Higher student-to-faculty ratios mean larger classes, less student interaction with faculty, and reduced course choices. In order to preserve the quality of higher education in Ontario, we need to hire new full-time faculty – and we need to start doing it now.

This article originally appeared in the OCUFA Report. To receive stories like this every week in your inbox, please subscribe.

OCUFA Statement on allegations of research misconduct at Queen’s University and HEQCO

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In recent weeks, the research practices of the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario (HEQCO) have come under scrutiny by the media and members of Ontario’s higher education stakeholder community. On April 10, 2012, Jennifer Massey and Sean Field, both PhD candidates at Queen’s University, wrote a letter to Harvey Weingarten, President and CEO of HEQCO.  In it, they allege that staff at Queen’s University made significant changes to a HEQCO-funded report they co-authored (Student Services at Queen’s University: An Evaluation of the Supported Learning Groups Pilot Program), without their knowledge or consent. HEQCO subsequently published the changed research, constituting what Massey and Field describe as a “serious breach of academic and intellectual integrity.”  This allegation was subsequently reported in the Canadian Press and appeared in several Ontario newspapers.

On behalf of our members, the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations (OCUFA) has investigated these allegations carefully. As the representative of Ontario’s professors and academic librarians, we believe research ethics and academic freedom are of fundamental importance. This holds true no matter where the research is being conducted – a university, a think tank, or a government agency.

As a result of our investigation, we believe the following facts to be correct:

  1. The research contract in question was between HEQCO and Queen’s University. Massey was the principal investigator, and Sean Field and Jeff Burrow were also engaged as authors on the project.
  2. Significant changes were made to the “Conclusions and Implications” section of the final report submitted by Massey, Field, and Burrow by Chris Conway, Director of Institutional Research and Planning at Queen’s University.
  3. None of the principal authors were aware of, or had consented to, the changes.
  4. In a letter dated April 10, 2012, HEQCO claims that the project was overdue and the principal authors had become uncommunicative, and that Conway’s edits were needed to complete the project. The authors disputed this account in a letter dated April 11, 2012.[1]
  5. As the original contract was with Queen’s University, and not the authors, the changes made to the document did not constitute a contractual breach on the part of HEQCO or Queen’s University.

While we do not believe that HEQCO or Queen’s University violated the terms of the HEQCO research contract, this situation has revealed several issues of concern with HEQCO’s research process. Researchers should be aware of these issues before deciding to conduct research for HEQCO.

 1.      The importance of understanding the HEQCO Research Contract

HEQCO is an agency of the Government of Ontario. As specified in the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario Act (2005), the function of HEQCO is to develop and make recommendations to the Minister of Training, Colleges, and Universities on “all aspects of the postsecondary education sector, including improving the quality of education provided in the sector, access to post-secondary education, and accountability of post-secondary educational institutions.” While HEQCO describes itself as an ‘arm’s-length’ agency, it is important to recognize that the Council is directly accountable to the Government of Ontario and has an explicit mandate to provide policy advice to the Minister of Training, Colleges, and Universities. As such, it is not a think tank or an independent research institute – it is a crown agency. The term ‘arm’s-length’ appears nowhere in HEQCO’s authorizing Act, and the Government of Ontario can alter the composition and mandate of the Council at any time.

The HEQCO research contract further clarifies the relationship between HEQCO and the Government of Ontario. Given the provisions contained within the contract, HEQCO operates as a research and policy contractor for the provincial government, soliciting research from experts and practitioners in the higher education field. The research contract is thus very different from those used by granting councils, independent think tanks, or academic publishers.  Rather, the HEQCO contract is properly seen as a consulting contract. This is clear from the intellectual property provisions, notably:

(11:3) The Council shall be the sole owner of the Deliverables. The Contractor irrevocably assigns to and in favour of the Council and the Council accepts every right, title, and interest in and to the Deliverables, immediately following the creation thereof, for all time and, subject to sub-section 11.10 the Contractor irrevocably waives in favor of the Council all rights of integrity and other moral rights to the Deliverables, immediately following the creation thereof, for all time. All Deliverables and copyrights therein remain the exclusive property of the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario.

(11:10) For the purposes of the Copyright Act, the Contractor acknowledges that the Deliverables produced by the Contractor in connection with this Agreement have been or will be prepared by or under the direction and control of the Council and moral rights are waived in favour of the Council.

We believe these provisions, and the entire contract, contain fairly standard Government of Ontario consulting language. The complete waiver of moral rights to the completed work required in the HEQCO contract is unusual in academic research, but common in consulting contracts.

This is not to denigrate consultancy research, or to suggest that the work completed for HEQCO is necessarily inferior due to the nature of the contracts under which the research is conducted. Rather, we wish to warn our members that working with HEQCO requires the researcher to surrender all ownership of, and moral rights to, the final product. Many researchers may be comfortable with these provisions, and wish to proceed.  However, it is vital that every researcher is aware the intellectual property requirements before signing the HEQCO contract.

2.      The confusing disclaimer

The HEQCO contract also requires researchers to allow the following disclaimer to appear on the completed project:

Funding for this research was provided by the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario. The opinions, findings, conclusions, and recommendations expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario.

In the case of Massey, Field, and Burrow, the conclusions were manifestly not those of the authors, at least not those listed on the publication. As such, it was a false statement and should have been removed prior to publication.

More generally, the disclaimer suggests that HEQCO has little control over the final product, and that the authors are responsible for the completed research. As noted above, this is flatly contradicted by the terms of the contract which assigns ownership, copyright, and moral rights for all research deliverables to HEQCO. Given the language in the contract, the disclaimer is misleading as to the nature of HEQCO research. It creates the impression that the research commissioned by HEQCO is disinterested academic research, rather than research conducted by a contractor hired by a government agency.

OCUFA believes that this ambiguity is harmful, and mischaracterizes the relationship between HEQCO, its contract researchers, and completed research. We recommend that the disclaimer be substantially revised or removed entirely from future HEQCO research publications.

 3.      Protecting academic freedom at institutions that work with HEQCO

The terms of the HEQCO research contract puts serious constraints on the academic freedom of those who undertake HEQCO-funded research. If these constraints are accepted by the researcher with full knowledge of their implications, then this is a question of personal choice. However, if a university signs a research contract with HEQCO, and then sub-contracts the work to researchers within their institution, then care must be taken to ensure that these researchers understand the terms and conditions of the HEQCO contract. This is particularly true for students and early-career academics.

With this in mind, OCUFA believes Queen’s University did not sufficiently protect the academic freedom of Jennifer Massey, Sean Field, and Jeff Burrow. As graduate students, they were less experienced in dealing with contracts, and from subsequent it events it appears they misunderstood their rights and responsibilities as sub-contractors, and may have been unaware of the provision requiring them to waive moral rights to their work.

 4.      Violation of research ethics

While we do not believe that HEQCO or Queen’s University violated its contractual obligations, it does appear that a serious breach of research ethics occurred in the case of Massey, Field, and Burrow. OCUFA believes that changing the conclusions of a research paper without the knowledge or consent of its authors, and then publishing that work under the authors’ names, is unethical practice, and steps should be taken to ensure it does not happen again.

We believe Queen’s University to be primarily responsible for this lapse. When communication became difficult between the principal authors and HEQCO, HEQCO President Harvey Weingarten presented Vice-Provost Ann Tierney with the choice of abandoning the project or assigning it to other Queen’s staff for completion. Chris Conway was given the project, and made the changes required by HEQCO to ensure a ‘publication-ready’ report. Queen’s administration should have made every effort to inform Massey, Field, and Burrow of the changes, and seek their consent. At the time of this writing, Massey and Field have alleged that this did not occur, and neither Queen’s nor HEQCO have provided any evidence to the contrary.

Absent authorial consent to the proposed changes, and in a situation where communication between the authors and Queen’s/HEQCO had apparently ceased, there were at least five options available to senior staff at Queen’s, presented here in descending order of desirability:

  • Draw upon mediation services available at Queen’s University in order to re-establish contact and develop some form of agreement on the proposed changes;
  • Re-write the report in such a way as to make clear the sections that had been written by Massey, Field, and Burrow, and which sections had been changed;
  • Cancel the project;
  • Remove the author’s names from the project and proceed with publication; or
  • Publish the altered paper under the authors’ names without their consent.

Regrettably, it appears that the least desirable option for all parties was chosen. There has been some suggestion that HEQCO has offered, post-publication, to remove the authors’ names from the report. This is an unsatisfactory remedy, as the paper has been live on the HEQCO website for some time. More to the point, the majority of the published paper remains the work of Massey and Field, and they should receive fair recognition for their contributions.

Given that a variety of more desirable options were available, and without any evidence that efforts were made to pursue these options, OCUFA has no choice but to conclude that a serious breach of research ethics occurred at Queen’s University. The severity of the case requires that the breach be fully investigated by the institution. As a university, Queen’s is obliged to observe certain standards of research practice. These standards should not be overridden due to the requirements of a particular kind of contract, and senior staff should be expected to adhere to them fully. 

HEQCO is not blameless in this situation. Ethical propriety requires that the Council be sure that authors listed on its research publications have been treated fairly and that they endorse they work that bears their names. In his April 10, 2012 letter, Harvey Weingarten seems fully aware that the final report was delivered by Chris Conway, not the original authors of the paper. This should have been taken as an indication that the listed authors did not approve of the submitted document. If HEQCO could not independently verify that the authors endorsed the final paper, then they should not have published it under their names. Expedience should not be allowed to trump ethical research practices, as appears to be the case here.  

5.       Uncertainty about HEQCO research practices

The revelation that HEQCO published research that contained unapproved changes damages the research credibility of the Council. Arguing that no wrongdoing occurred because there was no contractual breach misses the point. It is wrong to change someone’s work without his or her permission, and even more wrong to publish that changed work under his or her name. We are now left with a series of unsettling questions: has this occurred to other HEQCO research reports? What is the motivation behind the changes? How sure are we about the reliability of research published by HEQCO?

No agency that purports to conduct research can operate effectively with these questions unanswered, particularly if they are charged with providing advice on urgent questions of public policy. As such, OCUFA recommends that the Government of Ontario conduct an independent review of HEQCO’s research procedures. Again, this is not to suggest that HEQCO necessarily has improper or flawed procedures. The Massey and Field issue may well prove an isolated incident, and that HEQCO otherwise adheres to high standards of research quality and ethical integrity. But until the review is complete, OCUFA and its members will struggle with lingering questions over the reliability of HEQCO’s research conclusions. Transparency and accountability are the best ways to ensure confidence in HEQCO’s research program.

Until such time that a research review is completed, OCUFA advises its members to exercise caution when working with HEQCO, particularly if they are working as sub-contractors within an institutional project.


[1] All correspondence related to this case can be found at http://cfsontario.ca/en/section/192

Negotiations underway at Carleton, Nipissing and Brescia; Complex bargaining at RMC

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Bargaining is heating up around the province in May, with multiple days of bargaining scheduled at Carleton, Nipissing and Brescia. York anticipates having days scheduled by mid-May.  Complex negotiations are also underway at the Canadian Military Colleges Faculty Association (CMCFA), which represents faculty at the Royal Military College, to deal with Federal Budget’s demand that a substantial number of academic positions be cut from the military college system.
 
During the April 20, 2012 OCUFA Collective Bargaining Committee meeting, faculty association chief negotiators met and discussed current bargaining issues. Chief negotiators were pleased to hear that Minister of Labour Linda Jeffrey confirmed, in a meeting with OCUFA President Constance Adamson, that bargaining will occur “as usual” in 2012-13. Faculty associations across Ontario intend to proceed with responsible local bargaining sensitive to the current provincial fiscal situation, as demonstrated by the settlement pattern for faculty over the past two years. At the meeting, negotiators also participated in skill building workshops on how to utilize university financial statements in bargaining, and how to properly cost faculty career progress.

This article originally appeared in the OCUFA Report. To receive stories like this every week in your inbox, please subscribe.

Reality Check: Different key, same commercialization tune

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The 2012 Ontario Budget essentially took a ‘wait and see’ approach on funding for research and development. After abruptly cancelling three rounds of funding under the Ontario Research Fund (ORF) Research Excellence program late last year, there is no immediate prospect of further cuts. But there will be no new funding to keep pace with either inflation or economic growth.
 
Some funding for research and development (R&D) will be phased out, but there is no indication that there is any intention to change the tune on research commercialization and business innovation. Provincial expenditure estimates indicate that funding for ORF has declined by 6 per cent in real terms over a five year span. In contrast, support for commercialization rose by more than 71 per cent.
 
The proposed Ontario budget only postpones decisions on how best to fund research and development. A Jobs and Prosperity Council is set to review tax credits and direct subsidies for business expenditures on R&D in the context of prospective changes to the federal government’s own programs.
 
We now know that the federal government plans to transfer some support for businesses from the Scientific Research and Experimental Development (SR&ED) tax credit to direct subsidies. Including $67 million to “refocus” the National Research Council and “concentrate on active business-driven, industry-relevant applied research,” over $250 million will be directed to business research and development.
 
Meanwhile, federal support for the three main granting agencies for academic research and graduate education continues to stagnate. According to the federal main estimates, funding is set to decline in real terms for the second consecutive year and will be the same as it was in 2008-09. To keep up with economic growth, Tri-council funding should have instead grown by 5 per cent over the past three years. Clearly, commercialization continues to be Ontario and Canada’s favourite research funding song, leaving basic research with a dwindling pool of resources.

This article originally appeared in the OCUFA Report. To receive stories like this every week in your inbox, please subscribe.

OCUFA meets with Ontario Minister of Labour

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On April 16, 2012, OCUFA President Constance Adamson, Executive Director Mark Rosenfeld, Research Director Donna Gray, and Government and Community Relations Analyst Erica Rayment met with Minister of Labour Linda Jeffrey. This was OCUFA’s first meeting with the Minister.
 
In addition to introducing Minister Jeffrey to the organization, OCUFA sought clarification on some of the labour proposals contained in the 2012 Ontario Budget. The Minister confirmed that while circumstances have indeed changed in light of the province’s constrained fiscal situation, faculty associations will continue to bargain as usual. She also indicated that she was open to hearing from OCUFA further about empowering the OLRB to merge bargaining units if requested by the union, or to combine newly certified workers into an existing unit.
 
OCUFA will continue to meet with Ministry of Labour staff over the coming months and monitor new developments in the labour portfolio.

This article originally appeared in the OCUFA Report. To receive stories like this every week in your inbox, please subscribe.

Reality check: Calling a cut an ‘increase’

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The average annual increase of 1.9 per cent in postsecondary and training announced in the recently tabled provincial budget may bring a sigh of relief in some corners. At first pass, it does seem better than the 1.5 per cent average recommended by the Drummond Commission.

A closer look is far more disturbing.

The projected 1.9 per cent increase is based on “all-in” expenditures by the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities (MTCU), including operating and capital funding for universities and colleges, student support, and employment and training programs. Plans for the next three years of operating funding for universities actually limit increases to an average of 1.1 per cent per year.

Operating funding per funding-eligible student will decline once enrolment growth and the budget’s own assumptions for GDP inflation are taken into account. Per student funding has in fact been in decline since the financial crisis hit in 2008-09. The budget does nothing to help. By 2014-15, OCUFA projects that public operating funding for universities will drop by 16 per cent. This is a huge loss in revenue that, if left unfilled, will damage the quality of higher education in Ontario. History tells us that institutions will attempt to fill the gap with higher tuition fees, continuing the unsustainable shift of costs onto students.

This article originally appeared in the OCUFA Report. To receive stories like this every week in your inbox, please subscribe.

Reality Check: It gets expensive when you don’t have revenue

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Writing in the Toronto Star, Michael Mendelsohn of the Caledon Institute for Social Policy observes that the relative size of Ontario’s deficit is not because of spending. In 2009-10, the Ontario government spent the lowest amount of any province per capita – $9,030, seven per cent less than ninth place British Columbia.
 
He cites the Drummond report and points out that 39 per cent of revenues flowing into federal coffers in 2009-10 were from Ontarians. The proportion is in keeping with Ontario’s share of the population.
 
But the share of federal expenditures going to Ontario and its citizens was only 34 per cent. The resulting revenue gap is $12.3 billion, or 77 per cent of the current deficit. For Mendelsohn, the consequences for Ontarians are clear: “Higher university tuitions, less infrastructure spending, more user fees.”

This article originally appeared in the OCUFA Report. To receive stories like this every week in your inbox, please subscribe.

Some progress at Brescia; A slow pace for St. Michael’s

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Some progress was made recently in the first collective agreement negotiations at Brescia with the parties signing off on three articles. The same cannot be said for St. Michael’s College at the University of Toronto; the pace of first contract negotiations there is best described as glacial. The parties have met eight times over four months and have yet to sign off on a single article.  According to Chief Negotiator Colleen Shantz “The foot dragging on the other side of the table is inexplicable given the reasonableness of the union’s positions.  All we are asking for is standard industry language and categories”.

This article originally appeared in the OCUFA Report. To receive stories like this every week in your inbox, please subscribe.

Ontario Budget adds up to less funding and more intervention

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OCUFA is disappointed that today’s provincial budget effectively cuts university resources while signaling increased government intervention in labour relations.

“If you look behind the numbers in the budget, the government is providing less money to universities than recommended by Don Drummond,” said Constance Adamson, President of the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations (OCUFA). “University education is one of the best investments a government can make to promote economic growth. It is too bad that the government has missed this important fact in their deficit reduction strategy.”

In his report on public sector reform, Don Drummond recommended that university funding increase by 1.5 per cent per year. In the face of rising enrolment and inflation, this would mean an effective cut to university operating funding. Surprisingly, the 2012 Budget goes even further than Drummond, limiting yearly increases to an average of one per cent. This leaves universities with $46 million less funding than Drummond recommended, and far less money than they need to provide high quality education for every student.

Professors and librarians are also concerned about the apparent willingness of the Government of Ontario to consider intervention in collective bargaining at Ontario universities. The budget signals the government’s interest in sector-wide bargaining, top-down pension reform, and steering compensation settlements. Ontario’s universities and faculty have a long history of responsible local bargaining sensitive to local needs, the sector’s bottom line, and the interests of Ontario’s citizens. Many of the government’s proposals could seriously harm this record of success.

“We will hold the government to their promise that they will consult meaningfully on pensions, compensation, and bargaining,” said Adamson. “If the outcome is predetermined, then there is no point consulting. But if they really want to work with the sector, professors and academic librarians are ready as always with ideas and insights that promote fair and responsible collective bargaining.”

Data Check: Government funding for universities continues to decline

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By almost any measure, provincial public funding for Ontario universities has lagged behind every other province for nearly two decades. Reckoned in terms of inflation-adjusted per student funding, provincial support bottomed out in 2002-03, rose again for a few years, and has been falling again since 2008-09. Operating expenditures follow a similar pattern.
 
Over the two years following 2008-09, operating grants from the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities (MTCU) – which is primarily allocated to universities according to funding-eligible student enrolments – have fallen by five per cent. When all enrolment and all provincial funding are taken into consideration, the drop has been three per cent.
 
With the exception of a one year drop in 2008-09, net student fees (fees, minus scholarships paid from operating funds) and other sources of income have made up enough of the difference that Ontario universities’ operating revenue from all sources has continued to increase on a per student basis.
 
Operating expenditure began to rise after 2003-04, a year after government income rose. It then fell in tandem with government sources after 2008-09. In the two years since, operating expenses have fallen by one and a half per cent. Controlling for pension expenses, the per-student cost of salary fell by two and a half per cent. Contrary to what some observers now claim, students are paying less for faculty salaries than they did in 2008.

Sources: MTCU – operating allocations exclude: Ontario/Queen Elizabeth II Graduate Scholarship in Science and Technology; Ontario Research Chairs; $210 million in 2006-07 year-end federal Post-Secondary Education Infrastructure Trust funding.
Council of Finance Officers – Universities of Ontario, Financial Report of Ontario Universities;
Ontario Ministry of Finance (GDP implicit price index)

This article originally appeared in the OCUFA Report. To receive stories like this every week in your inbox, please subscribe.