U of C law dean defends tuition hikes
Increase will ‘enhance student experience’
The dean at the University of Calgary’s faculty of law defended a draft proposal to increase tuition by way of a market modification, saying the benefits to students would outweigh the costs.
“The proposition to the students is that for a relatively modest increase we’re able to do a whole bunch of things that in a real and tangible way will make the program better,” Ian Holloway said.
“But they are things we couldn’t do without this, and it’s still going to be cheaper than the average of our comparator schools,” Holloway added.
Under the draft proposal, tuition for law students would increase $250 from $1,026 to $1,276 per half course — a 22 per cent hike. Media reports of a 46 per cent jump earlier this week were incorrect.
The U of C’s engineering and business schools are proposing hikes of 31.6 and 9.2 per cent, respectively.
Holloway said a recent review found the U of C’s tuition fell “significantly below” 10 comparator law schools across Canada.
“The average tuition and mandatory fees … is $16,900 a year,” Holloway. “We’re currently at $13,850.”
Under the proposal, first-year stu- dents would pay, on average, $16,100 in tuition and mandatory fees. Second- and third-year students, who take fewer courses than first-year, would pay about $14,000.
If approved, the proposed hike would increase revenue by $700,000 — most of which would be used to “enhance the student experience,” Holloway said.
“All of this is going to increase the quality of the program,” he said, noting $300,000 of the additional revenue would be used for bursaries, scholarships and to create summer jobs for students.
Critics have blasted the province for allowing Alberta post-secondary institutions to submit up to three proposals each for market modification tuition increases — a tool the government promised to abandon in 2010.
Tuition in Alberta is typically tied to inflation, but market modifiers allow schools to increase rates to be more in line with comparable schools. Recently, Liberal education critic Kent Hehr said market modifiers were “regressive” and “counter-intuitive to us expanding educational opportunities for Alberta’s youth.
“By going to market modifiers, this would be a disincentive,” Hehr told the Herald last month.
Post-secondary institutions have until Oct. 15 to submit up to three proposals each for the provincial government to review.
The province could announce a decision as early as Nov. 17, but a spokeswoman for Advanced Education said that date could be pushed back because of the recent cabinet shuffle.