Education Project

A new report from the CCPA’s Education Project tracks the affordability of university education across Canadian provinces. The study looks at trends in tuition and compulsory fees in Canada since 1990, projects fees for each province for the next four years, and examines the impact on affordability for median- and low-income families using a Cost of Learning Index.

Since 1990, with very few exceptions, the tuition fee burden across the country has been increasing faster than incomes, and the average tuition and compulsory fees for Canadian undergraduate students will continue to rise by an estimated 17.7% by 2015-2016.

Read the full report, Eduflation and the High Cost of Learning, to find out which provincial governments are ensuring university education is more affordable for median and low-income families, and which governments are telling students to take a hike.

Check out our Take a Hike! infographic (click to enlarge):

Quebec's striking students have raised arguments and concerns that get to the root of the debate about the kind of society we want to build—or the kind of society we areallowing to be dismantled in our name. However, the response to this action has raised another issue. The stereotype of the lazy student (or alternatively, “the hostile protestor” or “entitled generation”) has been an effective weapon of the mainstream media. Nuanced, thoughtful arguments about the strike are routinely dismissed, and demonstrations of solidarity have done little to blunt these recurrent negative student stereotypes, or to broaden the terms of the debate.

The summer 2012 issue of Our Schools / Our Selves, Smashing the Stereotypes: Challenging race and gender in the classroom, examines the ways in which stereotypes (such as racial and gender-based stereotypes) and unfounded negative perceptions limit debate and foster contempt, and how educators and academics are challenging these constraints.

Click here to preview and order Smashing the Stereotypes: Challenging race and gender in the classroom.

The CCPA Education Project is pleased to present a remarkable education and cultural resource: Pluralism in the Arts in Canada: A Change is Gonna Come, edited by CCPA Research Associate charles c. smith. With narratives coming out of theatre, dance, music and other forms of artistic expression from some of the most renowned Aboriginal and racialized artists, this book gets to the heart of a very needed discussion about Canadian identity, what it is not and is, how this is seen in the public space performance occupies, and how this is lived each day across diverse communities.

Click here to preview and order Pluralism in the Arts in Canada: A Change is Gonna Come.

In spite of system and systemic failure, young people are—with creativity, passion and determination—fighting for change across sectors and within communities. They are pushing the progress envelope. And we need to celebrate their victories and support them with knowledge, with numbers, and with resources. 

The spring 2012 issue of Our Schools / Our Selves, Power of Youth: Youth and community-led activism in Canada, looks at the personal stories of young activists and organizers in Canada and how they are using activism and organizing to bring about change in whatever issue they are working on.

The book, edited by Brigette DePape, explores grassroots activism across a variety of themes, and it shows the concrete work young people are doing, as well as highlighting challenges they face, lessons learned, ways forward, and bold visions for the future.

Click here to preview and order Power of Youth: Youth and community-led activism in Canada.