Q&A: Fanshawe College president slams decision to cap international study permits
CBC
The federal government announced a temporary two-year cap on international study permits last week.
It means a 35 per cent reduction in the number of permits being issued compared to last year. Immigration Minister Marc Miller said the move will weed out "bad actors" in the college sector and help address housing issues across the country.
CBC London Morning host Andrew Brown spoke with Fanshawe College President Peter Devlin about how the college could be impacted by a decline in future international student enrollment.
The following has been edited for length and clarity.
Andrew Brown: What do you think of this cap?
Peter Devlin: I'm surprised and disappointed. Surprised as we were working collaboratively with IRCC on the development of their recognized institution framework that was expected to be rolled out later this year.
I think there's still a large bias in support of university schooling. University postgraduate students are not included in the cut. However, college postgraduate students are, and these are students with a credential who are studying at the postgraduate level at colleges like Fanshawe College and they fill critical labour market need.
I was just disappointed that the federal government chose not to include postgraduate students at universities but not at colleges.
AB: Colleges and universities in Ontario will be required to guarantee housing for incoming international students. Will Fanshawe be able to do that?
PD: We do offer first year students guaranteed residence provided they apply before the 15th of June for that coming academic year. So we already do that right now.
LISTEN | Fanshawe College President Peter Devlin on London Morning:
AB: Would you consider lowering the prices of those empty rooms?
PD: We work with campus living centres who operate a number of residents across the country and across the province. Some of those rooms will get filled over the course of the semester. So we start the year with our beds full and students do leave because residents' lives are not for them or they might have academic challenges.
So it's a moving vacancy rate and one that we pay particular attention to. It's all part of the support that we offer to our students.
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