Province’s student support program ‘weakest in the country’

FREDERICTON (CUP) — The Nova Scotia government says its own support system for university students is broken, and is holding consultation sessions later this month hear from students about ways to fix it.

Students are invited to participate in an online review or they can attend one of six public hearings scheduled around the province to share their thoughts about ways the province can improve its financial assistance programs for students.

The public hearings are set to begin on Nov. 16 at Cape Breton University in Sydney, N.S. and wrap up on Nov. 30 with a francophone video-conference at Université Sainte-Anne.

Calling it the worst student support system in the country, Carol Lowers, the government’s director of student assistance, said Nova Scotia students are graduating with unacceptably high debt levels, at about $30,000 for a four-year program.

“It’s a well known fact that Nova Scotia students attending post-secondary institutions in Nova Scotia are graduating with the highest levels of debt of any province in the country,” she said.

The goal of the sessions, she said, is to find ways to reduce that debt.

But the discussion won’t include tuition or a conversation about whether or not the government will extend the freeze on tuition, which expires at the end of the school year.

This is a concern, says Alliance of Nova Scotia Student Associations president Mark Coffin, who expects tuition to rise this year after the O’Neill report recommended tuition be deregulate completely. The report, released in September, was commissioned by the government to assess the state of post-secondary education in the province

“All signs are pointing towards the government is likely to increase tuition,” he said.

Just because the government isn’t including tuition talks in their consultation about debt does not mean student aren’t going to bring it up, he said.

“You can’t separate one and not talk about the other,” he said.

Tuition in Nova Scotia is on average the third highest in country at just under $5,500 — only New Brunswick and Ontario are higher — according to figures released by Statistics Canada earlier this year.

Lowers says decisions about tuition are being made by another part of her department, and stressed that student debt comes from more than just tuition fees.

“At this point in time, I think the important piece of information is that we don’t have a direction on tuition,” she said. “I think the other part is that it’s important to note is that students don’t only borrow for their tuition. It’s part of the student experience buy only one of a number of variables”

Zach Daylor, national director of the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations, said debt loads are a huge problem for students across the country, but he knows first-hand the cost of university in Nova Scotia.

“I went to school out East,” said Daylor, who did his undergraduate degree at Acadia University in Wolfville, N.S. and a master’s at Dalhousie University in Halifax.

“It’s a very expensive endeavor, and a tough thing for that province is that students get educated and then leave. So for the money [the government] is putting into it and the money they’re investing, they’re not seeing much of a return,” he said. “

Nova Scotia has a number of problems, but it’s a great place to go to school and hopefully they don’t do anything to damage that reputation.”