Varying Degrees 2009 – Issue #9
by Robert Clift
May 5, 2009

Reality Check - Post-Secondary Enrollment Growth

"Your government believes that any student with a 75 per cent average in secondary school deserves to have access to university. This year it will act to accomplish that goal by 2010. Your government will add 25,000 new student spaces to B.C.'s colleges, universities and institutes by 2010." - Throne Speech – February 10, 2004

"Fortunately, we have prepared, with the largest post-secondary expansion in 40 years. That has created nearly 32,000 new student spaces since 2001." - Throne Speech – February 16, 2009

"This has added nearly 36,700 new student spaces since 2001, including 2,500 new graduate spaces by the end of the year, such that anyone graduating high school with a B-average can get into university." - BC Liberals Platform – April 15, 2009

"Coell says the Liberals have increased opportunities and degree choices. He also notes that they've created 36,000 new spaces and new universities to bring education closer to home and therefore cheaper for more students." - Times Colonist – May 3, 2009

There have been a lot of numbers thrown around during the election campaign about the growth in the number of student spaces during the past two terms of the Liberal government. The figures didn’t seem quite right to me at a gut level and I’ve been unhappy with how they keep shifting around. So I sat down and crunched the numbers in an attempt to uncover the real story on growth in post-secondary enrollment.

Let’s start with the 25,000 seat promise made in the 2004 Speech from the Throne. Between 2004/05 and 2010/11, full-time equivalent (FTE) enrollment at BC public post-secondary institutions will have increased by 20,816. Still somewhat shy of the promised 25,000 spaces, but pretty close.

Moving on to the claim in this February’s Throne Speech that the Liberal government has created 32,000 student spaces since it took office in 2001 -- this is also pretty close to the truth. Between 2000/01 and 2009/10, FTE enrollment at BC public post-secondary institutions increased by 30,752.

What about the claim that the Liberals added 36,000 since 2001? I can’t find the numbers to support this.

At first I thought this might be based on headcount rather than on FTE count. Unfortunately, I don’t have good headcount data available to me, but my gut tells me that the headcount growth would be higher than this.

It could be that the 36,000 number adds the new apprenticeship spaces created to the new spaces created at public post-secondary institutions. This doesn’t seem quite right to me either because I was under the impression from government reports that the number of apprenticeship spaces has increased by more than 5,000 since 2001. In fact, the Liberals make the claim in their platform that they "will have funded an additional 7,000 new apprenticeship spaces since 2007/08." So, the 36,000 number being bandied about doesn’t appear to have a factual basis.

What about the claim that the Liberals have been responsible for the largest post-secondary expansion in 40 years? I assume that by largest expansion, the Liberals mean expansion in enrollment.

In order to provide a comparison with the record of the previous NDP government, I have to use two different data sets. One data set is for the period 1991/92 to 2000/01 and the other is for the period 2000/01 to 2009/10. Both data sets originated in the Ministry of Advanced Education, but were generated for slightly different purposes using slightly different assumptions. Although there are variations between the two data sets, I'm confident they are about 90% comparable. So, for the sake of argument, let's say that the enrollment numbers between the two periods have a margin of error of plus or minus 10%.

Keeping this in mind, between 1991/92 and 2000/01, FTE enrollment at public post-secondary institutions in British Columbia increased by 37,019. This compares with an increase of 30,752 FTE spaces between 2000/01 and 2009/10. So, on the face of it, it looks like the NDP created more FTE student spaces during their two terms in government than have the Liberals.

If we factor in the 10% margin of error, the lowest number for the NDP government would be 33,317 and the highest number for the Liberal government would be 33,827. So, at best, the Liberals can claim that they have done as well as the NDP in increasing the number of student spaces. Hardly "the largest post-secondary expansion in 40 years."

This isn't to say that Liberals haven't done good things for the post-secondary system, but they have also made significant mistakes, like last year's $50 million surprise funding cut. The NDP also did good things for the system, but they too made mistakes, like forcing post-secondary institutions to create additional student spaces without the required funding for several years.

There are certainly differences between the parties on post-secondary education issues, but on the question of which party created the most new student spaces while in government, it looks to me like a dead heat.

Graduates' burden $27,000 average debt load of B.C. students

There was good story in the May 3rd edition of the Times Colonist on the costs of higher education for students. I think the following excerpt from the story sets up the issue pretty well:

Students in B.C. graduate with some of the biggest debt loads in the country. They average about $27,000 -- the highest in Canada except for the Maritimes and thousands more than the national average of $24,000. That's a dramatic increase from the average of $18,500 in 2001, when B.C. had the lowest student debt in the country, the Canadian Federation of Students says.

"The average student debt is a big student debt," says Shamus Reid, chairman of the student federation's B.C. branch.

"In the last couple of budgets, student loan disbursements and loan applications have dropped," Reid says. "Low- and medium-income students are simply not applying."

Students from traditionally disadvantaged backgrounds -- women, aboriginals, working class people and recent immigrants -- are especially affected. Current debt is "up from $17,000 in 1999-2000," says NDP critic Rob Fleming.

But Advanced Education Minister Murray Coell points to the $78 million in debt relief provided to post-secondary students. Fleming counters that $40 million of that total will disappear in 2010 when funding from the federal Millennium scholarship program ends.

"In terms of what was offered in 2001, there's been a $35-million reduction of what the grant program used to have," Fleming says.

The NDP is campaigning to re-instate the grants eliminated by the Liberal government and top-up the shortfall when the Millennium contribution ends.

Coell says the Liberals have increased opportunities and degree choices. He also notes that they've created 36,000 new spaces and new universities to bring education closer to home and therefore cheaper for more students.

For the full story go to: http://www.timescolonist.com/Business/Graduates+burden+average+debt+load+students/1559244/story.html

NDP Promise Funding to Save UBC Farm

NDP leader Carole James and Vancouver-Point candidate Mel Lehan announced on May 4th that an NDP government would provide up to $200,000 a year to keep the UBC Farm operating. The farm, on UBC's Point Grey campus, has been under threat of being shut down or relocated. The full NDP news release can be read at: http://mellehan.bcndp.ca/news/mel-lehan-and-ndp-announce-funding-ubc-farm

The UBC Alma Mater Society has applauded the NDP promise. The full response can be read at: http://www.amsubc.ca/index.php/ams/news/

Disclaimer

Unless indicated otherwise, the opinions expressed in this blog are Robert Clift's personal opinions and not necessarily those of the Confederation of University Faculty Associations of British Columbia, its member faculty associations or any other person or organization.