Federal intervention on provincial mismanagement
Over the past two months, the federal government has made several major changes to international student policy across Canada. International students are now required to have access to over $20,000 in funding before they are permitted a student visa, and international student visas will now be capped for the next two years. The changes include modifications to post-grad work permits (PGWP) as well.
As of January 1st, international students will now need to prove they have $20,635 in accessible funding to cover the costs of studying in Canada. In addition, the federal government has capped the acceptance of international students to 360,000 international students, a 35 per cent reduction compared to 2023, for the next two years.
Starting this September, students starting a program part at an institution part of a curriculum licensing agreement (when one private college is allowed to teach the curriculum of a public college) will not be eligible for a post-grad work permit, while graduates of “short graduate-level programs” will be able to apply for a three-year work permit “soon”.
“The main intent of this change [to the financial requirements] is to protect students who arrive in Canada without enough money to support themselves,” Sofica Lukianenko, communications advisor for Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), commented before the cap was announced.
“International students choosing to come to this country need to be aware of the costs associated with life in Canada. A student who arrives without adequate funds is more vulnerable to being exploited by an employer or might feel forced to accept a poor housing situation.”
The last time the financial requirements were changed was in the early 2000s. The recent changes come within two months of each other.
“I think that change [to the financial requirement] has now been overshadowed a bit by the new cap and the changes to the PGWP rules, particularly for students attending Public-Private Partnership campuses,” Iain Wilson, manager for Higher Education Strategy Associates commented.
In a press release for the changes to the acceptance numbers and PGWPs, Marc Miller insisted the federal government would have liked provincial governments to take action before they had to.
Regarding financial requirements, Lukianenko continued, “IRCC is undertaking a review of the International Student Program to strengthen program integrity and enhance protections to address student vulnerability, unethical recruitment and non-genuine actors in the program.
“The goal is to ultimately protect international students and Canada’s interests, and to help modernize the program to better select and retain students that meet Canada’s economic and social-cultural goals, including francophone and regional immigration objectives. It is important to note that provinces and territories are responsible for the designation and de-designation of institutions.
“At the moment, we are in a stage of considerable uncertainty, which is probably not entirely desirable, simply because the federal government has effectively pushed a lot of the detailed decision-making down to the province by costing the ability to bring in international students but not setting the detailed rules, which of course, constitutionally is not really their position.”
Wilson additionally commented, “Both of those [recent changes] will have a big impact, especially in Ontario, but there is uncertainty at the moment while we wait to find out how the provinces are going to manage their allocations.”
