Edmonton post-secondary schools report record-high admissions for international students
CBC
Post-secondary schools in Edmonton are seeing record-high enrolment rates for international students.
The University of Alberta will welcome 44,036 students total this upcoming school year across their undergraduate and master's programs. About 8,457 of them are international students, accounting for 20 per cent of this year's total enrolments. For comparison, in fall 2021, there were 8,216 international students at the U of A.
MacEwan University made 756 admissions offers to international students for undergraduate programs for the upcoming fall 2023 term. Of the 361 students confirmed to arrive, the majority are coming from India, Nigeria, and the Philippines.
International students represent four per cent of MacEwan's student population.
Edmonton's Northern Alberta Institute of Technology (NAIT) is welcoming 873 international students from 56 different countries for the fall term. However, the number could change slightly over the next two weeks, according to a statement from the school.
Meanwhile, student groups are working to ensure that the growing community of international students are getting the proper mental health, financial, and community support they need.
Amirali Bigleri, co-president of the international student association at the University of Alberta, says they're working with the student union to offer scholarships to ease financial obligations for international students so they can divert more focus to their studies.
"It can be a little bit challenging at first to feel a sense of belonging, feeling that you are understood as a part of the community. So that's what we're trying to achieve this year with this union," said Bigleri, an international student from Iran.
Statistics Canada data on the 2019/2020 school year indicate that international students represented 11.5 per cent of university enrolments in Alberta.
On Monday, just before the first session of the three-day Liberal cabinet retreat, Housing, Infrastructure and Communities Minister Sean Fraser said implementing a cap on the number of international students permitted to study in Canada is one option the federal government is considering to address the current housing crunch felt across the country.
But national post-secondary groups are pushing back.
In a statement responding to Fraser's comments, Universities Canada and Colleges and Institutes Canada (CICan) said a cap may provide temporary relief, but it will create long-lasting and adverse effects on these students, and exacerbate current labour shortages.
The organization has asked for expanded eligibility in funding programs through the National Housing Strategy to help get more housing projects off the ground.
Richard Mueller, an economics professor at the University of Lethbridge, says that international students are just one piece of the housing crisis puzzle. And, a cap is going to have ripple effects throughout the economy.
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