Post-secondary students in Ontario may have to deal with the highest tuition fees in the country, but Alberta’s 125,000 students have their own heap of problems that are leaving them in the red years after graduation – if they graduate, that is.
The province has the third highest average tuition in Canada, at $5,520 for undergraduate students in 2009-2010, the lowest participation rate in its post-secondary school system, and the highest college and university dropout rate.
According to student representatives and advanced education critics, the Alberta government is to blame for these appalling statistics.
Liberal Advanced Education critic Harry Chase has spoken out against the recent cut to student grants, scholarships, and bursaries in the Alberta budget announced early last month as an example of the Progressive Conservative government “having their cake and eating it too.”