Blame for the federal government having to cap the number of international student permits to attend post-secondary schools now is causing a funding crisis for B.C. colleges and universities should land at the feet of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and former immigration minister Sean Fraser, says Conservative MP Dan Albas.

The government announced in November 2023 that an undergraduate study permit reduction of 360,000 for 2024, a 35 per cent reduction from 2023, which will remain in place for the next two years.  

Albas, the MP for Central Okanagan-Similkameen-Nicola, says the current Liberal government overwhelmed the system by allowing an increase of more than one million post-secondary student permits to be granted while ignoring the advice of immigration ministry bureaucrats warning about the negative impact of such a move. 

"Things had gotten so bad that current Immigration Minister Marc Miller has publicly accepted the reality the system is out of control, placing pressures on housing and infrastructure, all indications of a badly managed system," Albas said. 

Albas says the move was made to open a pathway to citizenship for these students under the guise that it would help address labour shortfalls across the country, which he says now at best was misguided thinking.  

The MP says he feels bad for students from other countries who have had their dream of working and gaining citizenship in Canada thwarted, for post-secondary institutions who were led to invite and count on that tuition revenue to expand course options and meet budget needs not otherwise met by provincial government funding. 

Miller explains earlier this year that the previous permit allotment created "the diploma equivalent of puppy mills" while the growing number of international students was also exacerbating the affordable housing market shortage. 

Asked if the federal government needs to step up funding to post-secondary institutions to offset the policy change impact, he pointed to the provincial government as responsible for funding education. 

"Unfortunately, the mismanaged immigration system has presented some real challenges for post-secondary schools," he said. 

"The system was broken going back nine years ago, and we need to get back to the common sense approach that previous Conservative and Liberal governments had towards immigration policy prior to then."

For Okanagan College, like all post-secondary institutions across B.C., the administration is scrambling to make adjustments to the drop in international student enrolment.

For the period of January to April, the college will already see a 70 per cent drop in enrolment compared to last year, confirmed Jenn Goodwin, OC vice-president of enrolment and college relations. 

That has already led to what she says will be 11 to 15 part-time instructor contracts being cancelled, and some realignment in administrative staff, beginning with changes to the international education recruitment department. 

"We realize going forward we have to change how and who we recruit under these new policies for international students," said Goodwin.

She says the new government student permit rule requirements have "put a chill" on international student recruitment for all post-secondary institutions. 

"The new federal policies limit colleges to what courses are eligible for students seeking post-graduate work permits so we have to ask ourselves what other ways we have to attract international students. We have sent out a message of less certainty here (in Canada) so students look elsewhere to meet their education needs."

Unlike some other schools, Goodwin says OC has not relied on international student recruitment as a cash cow, as that segment hovers around 13 to 14 per cent of current overall student enrolment of about 15,900+ annually.  

"For us, it has always been about offering a better education experience for all our students. Having those international students has enabled us to offer a broader offering of courses for all our students and the education experience they all receive with us," she said. 

It is a similar philosophy employed by Central Okanagan Public Schools, which offers an international student program to generate additional revenue which is directed back into school programs in the classroom where funding otherwise is not available. 

OC will continue to offer a diverse array of courses, with an eye to meeting employment labour market demands in the region.

The immediate impact, she says, might have been five sections of a particular course planned, which may be reduced to two or three. 

"So it would still be available, but there would be fewer section offerings," she said. 

And that will impact contracts offered for part-time instructors, with a union report initially indicating up to 80 jobs could be affected next fall. 

"At this point, it is too early to say where our enrolment will be come next fall. We will be watching that going forward and I would suspect by March or April of next year, we will have a better idea of where our enrolment is and what the picture will look like next September," she said.

"We will see how it all plays out over the next couple of months as the impacts could vary depending on different programs."

Sharon Mansiere, president of the Okanagan College Faculty Association, said in a statement to Black Press Media that the faculty wants the message out there that the college is "still open for business and that our faculty is a gifted team that wants to be involved in the solution of new programs that could even be enhancements to our current offerings."

She says the communities with OC campuses need to be connected with senior leadership and the board in the next while to make sure any changes made are transparent to the community and aligned with its needs. 

"We need municipalities to be letting the province know that the underfunding of colleges cannot continue," said Mansiere, who has taught biology at the Penticton campus of OC for 30 years. 

"Let Ottawa know that moving college students out of our often smaller communities into large university centres is not a housing solution."

But along with her faculty association, BCGEU union local members for vocational instructors and support staff are all concerned about the international student funding fallout.

She says for those instructors losing their teaching contracts, finding jobs elsewhere will be difficult as all post-secondary schools are struggling with the same financial impacts of losing international students. 

While Goodwin indicated recruiting more domestic students in the 18-23 age range won't make up the difference with the loss of international students, she said OC and other colleges are trying to make their course offering more accessible to older students looking to learn new job skills or embracing career changes to grow enrolment. 

"The opportunity to go back to school for people in their 30s and 40s who are looking to retrain and pivot to a career change," she said. 

Okanagan College enrolment

•The Bachelor of Business Administration continues to have stable domestic enrolment, as has our Office Administration program. Together both serve over 2,000 domestic students annually.

•Health programs have grown from fewer than 500 students to almost 700 students in the last 10 years, or 40 per cent increase.

•Trades foundation programs have gown 10 per cent in the last 4 years, while apprenticeship programs hold steady.

•Computer Science Degree has grown over 40 per cent in last 10 years, from 73 to 104, while the Computer Science Diploma has grown over 50 per cent, from 61 to 92.

•Early Childhood Education Diploma grads have doubled in last 10 years.

•Other areas have seen decreasing domestic enrolment over the past few years, including Associate of Arts, and Business Administration Diploma program.

•Over the past five years, the domestic student headcount (number of individual students) has held steady between 15,500 and 15,900 students. 

•The majority of domestic students are from in the Okanagan College region.