Introduction
Post-secondary education (PSE)—whether at a public college or university or through an apprenticeship program—is foundational to Canadian democracy and quality of life. While much of post-secondary education falls within provincial/territorial jurisdiction and significant investment is needed in their budgets, the federal government also plays a significant financial role. The federal government administers a national student financial assistance program, funding for research and innovation, and the Skilled Trades and Apprenticeship (Red Seal) Program. Per student public funding for PSE has been decreasing for decades. Funding shortfalls have been backfilled by international student tuition revenue. Sudden federal immigration policy changes have disrupted that revenue stream and thrown many colleges and universities into financial chaos.
In response, some institutions are scaling back operations: cutting and suspending programs, reducing course offerings, and, through various measures, including layoffs, shrinking the ranks of Canada’s academic staff. While tuition fees are capped in some provinces, affordability and accessibility of PSE remains a significant issue.
The new government’s mandate to bolster Canadian sovereignty through ‘nation building’ must include supporting all Canadians: our people, their skills and talents, are our greatest resource. Canadian sovereignty includes onshoring our talent pipeline. Investments in PSE, science research, and innovation are essential to shore up the foundation of Canada and to address longstanding public underfunding laid bare by significant losses to international student revenue.
Overview
The world is watching as the American president attacks higher education, creating a hole in global research and education capacity. Canada’s ability to fill this void is limited, considering our own scientific research and PSE funding already falls short of our domestic needs. The ideological attacks on education and science, driven by the extreme right, did not start in the U.S. and have not spared Canada.
The Conservative Party has recently attacked ‘woke’ research at universities1Conservative Party of Canada, Canada First Economic Action Plan, April 18, 2025, https://canada-first-for-a-change.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/20250418_CPCPlatform_8-5x11_EN_R1-pages.pdf. and claimed federal research funding decisions are driven by equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI) rather than merit. The Liberal government, for its part, has suggested aligning government research funding with national priorities. This diverges from the traditional—and important—model of funding research based on peer review and expert assessment. Although the Liberals committed in budget 2024 to create the Capstone agency to oversee research funding, it may ultimately enable a future government to target social science and humanities funding, as seen in New Zealand’s elimination of government research funding for these disciplines.2Veronika Meduna, “Amid cuts to basic research, New Zealand scraps all support for social sciences,” Science, December 6, 2024, https://www.science.org/content/article/amid-cuts-basic-research-new-zealand-scraps-all-support-social-sciences.
Canada’s federal research funding success rates need to be increased. Since 2013, the success rates for Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Insight grants have averaged 38.2 per cent. Canadian Institutes of Health Research’s (CIHR) Project Grant program funded less than 20 per cent of successful applications in the last year. Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada’s (NSERC) Discovery Grant program had a 58 per cent success rate in 2023, down from 67 per cent in 2019.3SSHRC, CIHR, NSERC Competition Dashboards. Projects that were evaluated to have met requirements and were of sufficient promise were not funded because there was not enough funding. Unfunded research means good ideas are left unexplored—ideas that would contribute to our collective knowledge and know-how. If Canada wants to become the world’s leading hub for science and innovation (including attracting top talent leaving the U.S.), new programs aren’t what we need. Canada’s research funding ecosystem is simply starved for more dollars.
Public funding for PSE has been stagnant for decades, lagging inflation and student growth. By 2022, tuition fees and private funding surpassed government contributions to operating revenue, crossing the 50 per cent threshold.4Canadian Association of University Teachers, “By the Numbers: Less provincial funding shifts more of the cost of post-secondary education to students,” CAUT Bulletin, January-February 2025, https://www.caut.ca/bulletin/2025/02/numbers-less-provincial-funding-shifts-more-cost-post-secondary-education-students. Canada’s public PSE sector used to be held up as another point of contrast between us and the U.S., but that is changing.
Rising tuition costs are exacerbating the affordability crisis; nearly half of students graduate with an average debt of $25,000.5Statistics Canada, Student Debt at Postsecondary Graduation, by Source of Debt, Level of Study and Province of Study, Table 37-10-0255-02, released May 2, 2025, https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=3710025502. Rising tuition adds stress to students and families, limits opportunities, and makes higher education less accessible. As more Canadians are excluded from higher education, public support will wane and could embolden anti-education attacks that will harm Canada’s productivity, prosperity, and quality of life.
Most colleges and universities are under financial strain. In the past year, institutions have laid off staff and cut programs. McGill University plans to cut up to 500 positions, York University has suspended 18 programs, Carleton University has reduced contract teaching staff by over 50 per cent in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences and many other institutions, such as Camosun College, Mohawk College, and Fanshawe College, have announced significant job cuts or program suspensions. These trends may lead to campus closures, mergers, and a significant contraction in Canada’s PSE capacity, diminishing opportunities for Canadians to access education, which fosters prosperity.
Reversing this trend will require new money. Recent federal-provincial agreements on child care and mental health funding show that major new federal funding for social programs is possible. The federal government’s only commitment for PSE this past election was an apprenticeship grant covering up to $8,000. This was a welcome commitment—apprenticeship is an important element of post-secondary education—however, as the singular investment into the sector, it failed to acknowledge the value of comprehensive PSE and missed the opportunities of a broad investment across the spectrum of training and education opportunities in Canada. This commitment, on its own, is insufficient to spur the innovation the country needs.
While the promised apprenticeship grants are a great step forward in addressing affordability issues, it is important to note that currently only 46 per cent of apprentices complete their programs. To increase completion rates, beyond financial assistance, there is a need for more wraparound support for apprenticeships, balancing in-class training and work placement, and streamlining Employment Insurance (EI) to ensure portability between jobs while training. Additionally, increased support for the Canadian Apprenticeship Forum, efforts to increase participation of under-represented workers in the trades, and incentives for employers to retain apprentices through multiple training tiers should all be considered.
The 2025 federal budget will be tabled nearly a decade after the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s calls to action. The PSE educational gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students has widened in recent years. The federal government must significantly increase support for Indigenous learners, honouring an inherent and treaty right to education that is in accordance with First Nations, Inuit and Métis cultures, values, traditions and languages to support holistic lifelong learning.
Actions
Canada has a chronically underfunded PSE sector which now faces growing challenges in supporting scientific research and accessible education for all Canadians. Stagnant public funding, rising costs, lost international student revenue because of the student visa cap (which also had huge implications for international students—see Immigration chapter), and increasing privatization are limiting access to education and hindering national growth. Federal leadership and action are needed to reverse these trends, support underrepresented groups, and maintain the integrity of academic and research institutions.
The AFB will raise the maximum Canada Student Grant amount to $8,000 and lower the income thresholds for accessing grants. It is currently $4,200 and anticipated to fall to $3,000 in 2026—well below the average undergraduate tuition of $7,000 a year.6Statistics Canada, Canadian and International Tuition Fees by Level of Study (Current Dollars), Table 37-10-0045-01, released September 4, 2024, https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=3710004501.
The AFB will cancel federal student loans for graduates working in rural and remote communities. This will expand access to learners from these regions who are less likely than urban youth to attend PSE.
The AFB will provide $10 billion dollars to the provinces distributed through accountability agreements with the provinces on shared priorities. That amount would have an escalator of five per cent a year. Shared priorities must include reducing—with the aim of eventually eliminating—tuition, implementing an academic workforce strategy, addressing program closures, as well as making a commitment to academic freedom, ensuring that the PSE sector is free of political interference in research and teaching.
The AFB will increase research funding and prioritize fundamental science across all disciplines. At minimum, funding levels will be raised until a minimum success rate of 60 per cent is achieved across all federal funding competitions. Along with increasing the number of grants awarded, the value of grants will also be increased.
The AFB will provide $50 million the first year and $5 million per year afterwards to improve data collection on post-secondary education. The federal government has long promised to expand the University and College Academic Staff survey to include colleges, contract and part-time staff and demographic data beyond gender. A pilot was completed last year and requires funding for implementation to ensure an accurate picture of the academic workforce. Additionally, funding provided to the Canadian Education Statistics Council and the Canadian Apprenticeship Forum would also allow for more robust and harmonized data collection to close data gaps on student and apprenticeship data, including tracking college tuition, apprenticeship pathways, learning outcomes from work and apprenticeship placements.
The AFB will double funding in the Post-Secondary Student Support Program and the University and College Entrance Preparation Program to help close the gap on educational attainment between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students and to meet inherent and treaty rights obligations. It will also invest in equivalents for Métis and Inuit students.
The AFB will provide $200 million, per year, for five years in support of an apprenticeship strategy. It will increase funding and conditionality for employers, as well as enhance training portability and funding for wraparound supports for apprenticeships, possibly through an expansion of the role of ApprenticeSearch.
