up

Letter to the Fulcrum Editor
The University of Ottawa

Tuesday, September 28th 2004



To whom it may concern:

I am responding to Jeff MacCharles' article, "Defrosting tuition",
in the September issue of the Fulcrum - in particular - the comment
made by Jesse Greener of the Canadian Federation of Students
(CFS), "the fact that we are the lowest funded province per 
capita in post-secondary education in the country points to 
the need for increased funding ... .", and the allegation that 
Ontario universities face a $1.74 billion infrastructure debt.

In the latter case of the $1.74 billion infrastructure debt, where is the 
"supporting" evidence? 

And in the former case regarding Ontario being the lowest funded
post-secondary education province per capita, maybe there is an 
economy of scale effect at work from having such a huge student 
population that makes post-secondary education cheaper, here, in 
Ontario than in the other provinces.

THE PROBLEM! is this: students attending colleges+universites in
Canada canNOT! figure out for themselves if what they pay in terms
of tuition if fair or if they are being SCAMMED by the System. 

There was a time when college tuition in Ontario was have that of any
university. NOW! they are both on par. College+university students
pretty much pay the SAME TUITION FEES.

What's worse is that students in the "professional programs" like
law, nursing, engineering+medicine are being made to PAY FULL
TUITION FEES. Yet, they have NO WAY of knowing it what they
pay in the way of tuition if FAIR+REASONABLE.

To make matters worse, there are COMPULSORY! STUDENT
FEES that are ADDED! to the tuition fees for use of the sports
facility, for student union activities, the student rag (newspaper),
etc.

There was also a time when "international students" paid REGULAR! 
tuition fees. TODAY, foreign students whose tuition fees are NOW! 
UNREGULATED can pay $25,000 per semester fees or MORE! 

(I've even heard of foreign business students paying $35,000 per
semester in an MBA program.)

ADDING TO THE CONFUSION, NO ONE seems to know who 
owns the colleges+universities as they are private entities.

ADDING TO THE CONFUSION, Government funding of colleges+
universities is based on several factors: there's the PER CAPITAL
amount they receive, BUT! they can receive MUCH MORE EXTRA!
$$$ for diverse reasons like if it's a bilingual institution or NOT! 
Whether it's involved in research and technology or NOT! If it has
business partnerships or NOT! etc.

The terms+conditions attached to the EXTRA money ALWAYS!
is CONFIDENTIAL.

Such SECRECY! makes it IMPOSSIBLE! for students to figure 
out if the tuition they're paying is FAIR+REASONABLE. 

PLUS! colleges+universities will use a policy of PAY SECRECY 
to COMPLICATE! MATTERS.

One thing is for sure, the students are PROBABLY paying TOO! 
TOO! MUCH: in other words, they're being fleeced BLIND!

Given the OFTEN! MINIMAL QUALIFICATIONS of the professors 
being foisted on them, is this FAIR?



Kenneth Selin (say'leen)
~~~
Ottawa U. grad
~~~
B.A.(Psychology), B.A.(Spanish), B.Admin.,
B.Comm. (Honours), B.A.(Italian) magna cum laude
~~~
President/Party Leader 
of the Égalité Party of Canada
~~~
Let's DEcriminalize Government: at ALL levels!
http://www.eh-ok.ca