Most international students at Laurentian University to pay 5% more in tuition fees

Laurentian University will increase its tuition fees for most international students by five per cent in the next academic year.

Laurentian's board of governors approved the tuition fee hike for all of its programs except its MBA program and its master of social work.

Serge Demers, the university's registrar, said they increased the fees to remain competitive with other Ontario universities.

"Part of my job is to make sure that when we speak with agents, when we speak with students and when we look around the province, that our tuition fees don't stick out as being either way above the norm or well below the norm," he said.

Currently, undergraduate international students pay about $30,000 per year to attend Laurentian, The increase will bring that closer to $31,500.

The province has frozen tuition fees for Ontario students, but students from other provinces will also see a one per cent increase to their tuition fees in the next academic year.

In a document Laurentian shared with its board of governors, it said Laurentian's undergraduate tuition fees for international students were between 15 and 32 per cent lower than the provincial average.

But Laurentian was more in line with smaller Ontario universities, and had slightly higher fees for many programs, compared with institutions of a similar size.

Demers said one area where Laurentian has much higher fees than other universities is for international students in French-language programs.

At Laurentian those students also pay about $30,000 per year, but at the University of Ottawa and the University of Hearst, international students studying in French pay closer to $10,000 per year.

Demers said he has suggested some scholarships for those students to bring Laurentian in line with its competitors. 

"I'm waiting to see what the outcome of that will be," he said.