Education
Over the past two decades, Ontario's system of financing higher education has become more regressive, exploiting already over-stretched families who want to help their children pursue their educational aspirations. In 1990, a middle-income family in Ontario could earn the equivalent of four years of tuition fees in 87 days; it will take 195 days in 2011. The situation is even more dire for low-income families who are looking at the equivalent of two years of income for four years of tuition fees in 2011.
OTTAWA—Ontario’s system of financing higher education is becoming less equitable and more regressive for families, says a study released today by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA).
According to the study, if a middle-income Ontario family dedicated every cent of their after-tax earnings towards the cost of their child’s university tuition fees starting on September 1, 2011, they would have to work until March 14, 2012 (195 days) before they paid for a four-year degree.
Halifax – The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives-Nova Scotia (CCPA-NS) released a new report today which shows that Nova Scotia students and their families are paying almost three times as much as the provincial government.
The report, entitled Fairness, Funding and our Collective Future: a way forward for post-secondary education in Nova Scotia, shows that the largest part of the cost of a university education is not tuition fees; it is the cost of the income students forgo while they attend university.
What do progressive people do when they realize that there are victories we can no longer take for granted, particularly when we see some of those hard-fought victories being eroded? What do we do when we realize that what we’re doing now — what we did in the past — to secure victories and move a progressive agenda forward may no longer be enough (if it ever was)?
After three days of hearings on the health impacts of Wi-Fi and wireless technologies, Canada’s Parliamentary Standing Committee on Health released a remarkably timid report -- An Examination of the Potential Health Impacts of Radiofrequency Electromagnetic Radiation – last December. Judging from the fact that there were three “supplementary reports” (from the NDP, the Bloc Quebecois, and the Conservative Party) accompanying the document, disagreement among Committee members must have been rampant.
Tonight, the Toronto District School Board is debating a motion over whether or not to extend a pilot project that currently sees flat screens being installed in four high schools across the city. If accepted, screens would be installed in 70 schools and 20 more schools in January.
"Petrol's Paid Pipers," from the Winter 2011 Our Schools / Our Selves,examines industry-funded lessons on bitumen mining that have been developedand currently promoted to teachers in Alberta as a strategy to promote apositive corporate image while maintaining an uncritical business-as-usualapproach to development.