Tag: canada universities

International Student Heartland or Schitt’s Creek?

Aggregators, pathways, universities and Governments tend to be relentlessly upbeat in their promotional material for international students but its worth considering things from the other end of the telescope. A sceptic might include information suggesting which countries have a record of over-promising, whose ability to assimilate students is coming unravelled or where are the warning signs of exploitation. What you can bet is that this information is not concentrated in an aggregators top five list in their sales pitch or the “Why Choose….” website page of a college that has been investigated for “questionable recruitment practices”.

Canada has had a period of unrivalled growth and has consistently bucked the trend of most traditional international student destinations by having, at the end of 2021, more than twice as many students from India than from China (217k versus 105k).  At the end of 2020 commentators claimed it had become the third largest recruiter of international students in the world after a tripling of international students in a decade.  There were some obvious concentrations – Ontario had nearly 50% of the numbers with British Columbia and Quebec trailing at 23% and 14% respectively.

It’s popularity seems undeniable but there has been a drip feed of less palatable news which seems to be gathering pace.  The confluence of cash-strapped public universities and profit motivated private entities seems to be leading to students being poorly informed and having little recourse when their time, money or health is under threat.  There is no doubt that there are some fine institutions and well meaning authorities in Canada but the collection of news items suggests problems that need urgent attention.    

‘The Just Society’?

John Stuart Mills’ famous question was borrowed in 1968 by new Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau to outline his vision for the country.  But international students may be beginning to wonder ‘just what?’.  Are we just in a place where a route to a permanent visa is promised, just in a place that makes it easy to get work post study or just in a place where private money has taken advantage of a system which can’t cope? (note 2)

Getting a job while studying is not easy and there are suggestions that this is why in Windsor, Ontario 90% of food bank visitors are Indian students.  Getting a visa in the first place may be harder for students from certain countries as a Canadian Parliament Committee found evidence of “racism within the Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada.”  International student deaths were a cause for concern before the pandemic and more recent reports suggest the situation may have worsened.

Quebec has recently closed the immigration pathway provided by unsubsidized private colleges, New Brunswick has closed its express entry route for new immigrants with some arguing, “the number of applications, is just far more than can possibly be taken in” and a commentator in the Toronto Star accuses Canada of a “decades-old tradition of exploiting Punjab’s working class.”

Quebec’s latest efforts are not the first time they have taken action to restrict the activities of some of the colleges in question because back in 2020 the province suspended the ability of ten designated learning institutions (DLIs) to issue Quebec Acceptance Certificates (CAQ) enabling international students to study in Quebec.  A DLI is an institution approved by the Quebec government to welcome international students and such students are then eligible to obtain post-graduation work permits.  The suspension was for “questionable recruitment practices.”

Canada was also the starting point for one of the stars of the aggregator firmament, ApplyBoard, which became the poster child for private investment with $475mUSD raised and a post-money valuation of $3.2bn in 2021.  Lead investor in the latest round was Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board (Ontario Teachers’), through its Teachers’ Innovation Platform (TIP), who believe that the platform is “…creating greater opportunities for education globally.”  Several of the private colleges featured on ApplyBoard’s site are among those subject to the action in Quebec and it would be interesting to know if the Ontario Teachers’ are in favor of their approach to recruitment.   

This may be important because some commentators have argued that aggregators have reduced the accountability institutions feel they have for fully informing potential students as well as encouraging an unregulated sub-agent culture which is less committed to student service and support than longer standing agencies.  Another reasonable question may be whether coming from a relatively low and possibly inexperienced base has left Canada unprepared for some of the problems that can come with such rapid international student growth.  Overshadowing or perhaps underpinning this is the possibility that “the entire system in Canada is built around the false premise that education, not work and immigration, is the primary aim for most students.”              

Added to all this are the reported backlogs in processing visas with the inevitable stress this places on applicants.  Put together it seems reasonable to conclude that there is a lot of clearing up to do.  It will be interesting to see if more draconian action is required to root out the underlying causes and whether universities and their recruiting partners will take some responsibility for the issues. 

For now, Canada may be the country that should come with the biggest health warning to unwary students.(note 3)

Notes

  1. The title of this piece is a reference to the two Canadian TV series Heartland and Schitt’s Creek which outperformed the global behemoth Squid Game on American TVs in 2021.
  2. For the sharp eyed and politically aware this sentence does have a small pun relating to current Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau who is the eldest son of former prime minister Pierre Trudeau.
  3. It is reasonable to note that other countries have issues which rarely make it into the promotional material. If time permits a future blog will take a look at some of other contenders.
  4. This blog draws on publicly available information and provides links where this has been sourced. The author welcomes authoritative feedback if there are factual inaccuracies and will note these in amendments to this page.  

Image by Clker-Free-Vector-Images from Pixabay

Canadian Pathway Drive – Back to the Future?

Interesting times in Canada as Navitas and others try to muscle in on international student interest in the country’s lure of immigration and citizenship.  The latest to cross my desk is in Newfoundland and Labrador where Memorial University of Newfoundland (MUN) looks to be in discussions with Navitas.  A response to the proposition from the university’s alumni network is a little like being transported back to the union and faculty resistance to UK pathways in the early 2000s.

It’s also a good moment to look at the prospects for pathway growth in Canada over the coming years. This is about the likelihood of resistance by faculty being successful and the possibility that the private operators may get diverted. History has also shown that, for either side, short term gains and potential may not always convert into long term success.

A Canadian Problem or Opportunity?

The scant MUN’s Minutes of Vice President’s Council from October 2020 confirm that a Pathway Proposal feasibility with Navitas has been ‘endorsed’ by the Council.  A response by the MUN Faculty Association Executive (MUNFA) at the end of March 2021 highlights seven ‘concerns’ as a sighting shot.  To borrow from a son of Canada one side of the discussion might be “rockin’ in the free world” but the other are suggesting “there’s a warnin’ sign on the road ahead”1.

Drivers behind MUN’s interest may be varied but the economic case for international recruitment is likely to be high on the list.  From 2012/13 to 2019/20 it saw operating budget cuts of $39.5m along with further capital budgets being lost.  Since 1999 the provincial government has had a tuition fee freeze for students from the province but out of province and international students can be charged more.

Reports suggest this is a scenario that is also being played out in Ontario, Alberta and Manitoba as provincial government’s reduce funding for higher education.  The conditions are ripe for pathway operators to find partnerships from hard-pressed institutions.  Magnifying this attraction is the benevolent visa, work rights and immigration policies that has driven international student interest in Canada over recent years.   

The Past In A Different Country

The MUNFA arguments are all very familiar to anyone who followed the progress of INTO University Partnerships (IUP) in the UK as it took its new 50/50 partnership model into discussions with potential partners in the early days.  Much of the debate is played out in the media but another good source is the website of the University and College Union (UCU).  There may be something for all sides to consider in the arguments made and what eventually happened.

The campaign against IUP at the University of Essex is well documented and laid out in a triumphant Fighting Privatisation Toolkit summary.  It charts the story (from the UCU point of view) from first skirmishes in December 2007 to a university announcement in October that the teaching would be kept in-house.  But as American baseball legend Yogi Berra told us, “It ain’t over till it’s over” and in 2017 the University announced a partnership for a ‘pathway college for international students’ with Kaplan.

Defences were also mounted at other institutions and some university management, for example at De Montfort, even expressed trenchant views about the potential dangers of private providers becoming partners.  It was, however, only two years later (in 2013) that De Montfort, under ex-Vice Chancellor Dominic Shellard, teamed up with Oxford International Education Group for an international pathway college on campus.

It may be that INTO’s 50/50 partnership model with its associated terms was the real problem and later deals were modified to make them more acceptable to universities.  But it is also true that some institutions in the UK have successfully developed alternative approaches to providing pathways for international students.  Institutions that have moved so rapidly to deliver universal online education in the past year might care to consider how they apply that agility to accepting international students who are short of requisite language skills.          

Lessons from the US and UK for Canada

UK universities have, to a greater extent, fully embraced the pathway model with long established groups Kaplan, Study Group, Navitas and Cambridge Education Group having around 50 universities in their portfolio.  Newer players such as QA Higher Education, GUS and Oxford International are growing and well ranked universities continue to gravitate towards private partners with Aberdeen, Cardiff, Aston, Southampton and Queen Mary all finding pathway partners in the past two years.

In the US, however, the story is quite different with many pathway closures in recent years from Navitas (5), Study Group (6), Cambridge Education Group (4) and INTO (3) more than counter-balancing Shorelight’s slowing growth in new partnerships.  It’s always difficult to be certain from the outside what is driving a closure but it’s reasonable to assume that the decline in international students going to the US has made it less viable for the commercial partner to continue.  At its worst that exit leaves a university with no infrastructure, no foothold in the market for international students and potentially a poor reputation overseas that will be difficult to overcome.

There are material differences in the number of institutions and the private/public make up of the university sectors in the two countries.  It’s arguable that Canada is more like the UK in terms of numbers of institutions, it has a degree system that offers flexibility, and it is relatively inexpensive.  But the progress for the pathway providers has been very slow and success may not come quickly enough to ensure rewards.

Riding the Roller Coaster

As the world emerges from the pandemic there is almost certainly going to be a renewed appetite for student mobility but it is a quite different higher education landscape to just two years ago.  The US administration has changed, the UK has seen growth from India outpacing that from China, and Australia, while wounded, is looking for ways to recover.  Past performance is no guarantee of future results should be a watchword for pathways looking to Canada as much as caveat emptor should be a guide for Canadian universities talking to private providers.

Colleagues have speculated on Canada as being in the ‘squeezed middle’ as the US and UK open their doors more widely to students.  It may also be of interest that while the numbers of scholars in the US from China were lower in 2015/16 than 2019/20 the number from India was slightly higher.  There is also every reason to believe that the attractiveness of the US has already increased amongst potential students and this could pay big dividends as the country’s vaccination program increases pace.         

The historical evidence from the UK, and to a lesser extent from the dash for growth of pathways in the US, is that resistance from faculty and friends of MUN may succeed in the short term but is futile over the longer term.   It could, however, be enough for them to delay the seemingly inevitable because the private providers will turn their attention to other opportunities if the attraction of Canada begins to fade.  Universities that have already signed on the dotted line may find that, as happened in the US, pathways are as willing to walk away as they were to sign up in the first place.

Notes

1. Frank Sampedro/Neil Young, Rockin’ in the Free World lyrics © Wixen Music Publishing, Silver Fiddle.

2. Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay