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Editor: Alec Salloum news@carillonregina.com the carillon | March 27 - May 14, 2014
Expect a tuition hike!
The provincial budget will hit U of R students hard alec salloum news editor
The provincial budget, released March 19, has detailed what the future holds for education in the coming year. In terms of the U of R, a future of belt tightening and penny pinching is being faced. Despite the budget being balanced, in fact a $71 million surplus was declared, the university was again snubbed in its proposed increase to operating funds. The budget stated that “a $12 million increase in operating funds” would be implemented, translating to “an average two percent increase” for the university. The problem arises in that university asked for a four percent increase to their operating funds. This has been a consistent trend, as the university has not received its desired funding in recent memory. Outgoing URSU President Nathan Sgrazzutti expressed such sentiment stating, “the U of R has done three years of three percent across the board cuts, those are horizontal cuts, and some of our faculties are at their limits.” Sgrazzutti went on to say the two per cent is not what the U of R needed. “[We] needed a four per-
Emily Wright An increase looms for U of R students
cent increase to their operating budget in order to continue offering the same classes, programs, and functionalities that it did this year.” Considering that the arts and culture program was cut this year, this shouldn’t be hard to replicate. U of R President Vianne Timmons has emphasized austerity in the coming year. “The
two percent is going to be a challenge; we’re going to have to find efficiencies,” said Timmons. Unfortunately, these efficiencies manifest as fewer professors and increased tuition. In a Global News interview, Timmons stated, “I’ve taken the opportunity over the last four years to take every position freed up when someone leaves or retires as an opportunity to
look at efficiencies.” She goes on to say, “We have not filled a lot of positions and we’ll continue to do that.” However, in response to these vacancies and the recent budget, Timmons said, “what we’ll do is look at every single position, and some of those have been filled. What we do is scrutinize carefully the impact of
not filling it … and also look at it in terms of how much money we have in the administration.” It remains to be seen what actually happens, but if the administration is bracing for austerity in response to not receiving their proposed budget, it seems likely these vacancies will remain as ‘efficiencies.’ With a nearly 20 per cent increase in the student population, fewer programs are to be met with an increase to tuitions this coming year. “One of my goals is to keep tuition low but that is a real challenge,” said Timmons in response to this, emphasizing that university costs in Saskatchewan are among the lowest in Canada. Despite this, an increase is still looming for U of R students. Recently elected URSU president Devon Peters will have only a week from being elected until he is put in front of the University Board of Governors to argue for lower tuitions. Pragmatically speaking, the U of R is moving towards another year of paying more for less. Tuition continues to rise, vacancies remain, and programs have been cut.
English as an additional language How the budget will affect this and other programs eman bare news writer
This years provincial budget includes an almost $600,000 addition in funding to the EAL program in Saskatchewan. English as an Additional Language is offered at many Saskatchewan schools, including the University of Regina. According to statistics from 2013, Saskatchewan has over 3,000 students that are enrolled in EAL support programs in schools. It is also believed that in Regina and Saskatoon alone, there is an expected 8,000 students who need additional help with the English language. “We will look around the province. The ministry officials will work and determine where the number of new students are, and allocate it on that basis,” said Minister of Education Don Morgan, when asked where the funding would be used. “We are not going to allocate it just on the basis of what the per capita is.” In the 2011 census, statistics show that there are 68,780 Saskatchewan residents who were born in other countries. The consensus of 2006 in com-
parison shows that there were a total of 48,160 Saskatchewan residents who were born in a foreign country. “We want to make sure that we have everything that we can do to try and encourage immigration. We work with the federal government and we work with the employers,” said Morgan. “The people who come to this province, we need their skills, we need them in our work force and the last thing that we want to do is have a lack of English language support being an impediment to them coming.” In addition to increasing funding to EAL programs, the government has also increased funding to the Adult Basic Education program. The budget invested an additional $2.1 million in funding, and this translated into an additional 700 seats in the program. Jennifer Burton, an EAL teacher at the University of Regina, said that the government needs to start paying more attention to skilled workers in the province, and this budget was a good first step. “There seems to be a lack of EAL programs directed to the skilled workers that are in
Saskatchewan,” said Burton. “While they (skilled workers) have to pass a certain level of English proficiency to apply for the visa, they could still benefit from a class with an emphasize on technical English.” Others are critical of the funding the Saskatchewan Government provided. “Unfortunately the dollars that we see on that front are insufficient. It’s really exciting that we have a growing population, and a big part of that population is a new Canadian population and many of those individuals are learning English, “ said Trent Wotherspoon, an MLA for the NDP. “It adds a complexity to classrooms and it certainly is a challenge for the students. Government needs to do a better job of supporting the growth in that population, the needs of those students, and making sure they have the resources required to have the best quality education to fulfill their full potential here in Saskatchewan.” Statistics show that 20,620 people have immigrated to Saskatchewan between 2006-2011. Those numbers translate into 39 per cent of the immigrant population in the province arriving
Eman Bare Jennifer Burton working with an EAL student
within those four years. “We’ve seen a lot of problems with this government’s track record when it comes to the immigrant nominee program, so we’re continuing to listen to the immigrant community to ensure that needs are being met,” said Cam Broten, leader of the NDP. “It comes down to education as well. We need to make sure the right resources
are in the classroom so that we have enough ELA teachers and the right supports are there.” Although it has yet to be determined just how the nearly $600,000 in funding will be used for EAL programs in this province, the need to support the growing immigrant population is evident both in statistics and in schools.