When English Canada is talking about Québec, you know there has to be something big happening in la belle province. The current strike in Québec’s universities, affecting some 135, 000 students, has many Ontarians wondering what is wrong with students facing the lowest tuition fees in the country. What are they complaining about? Noaman Ali (Vive l’éducation (plus) libre, The Varsity, March 22) suggests that this massive mobilization is aimed at a “fairer power distribution.” Although he raises some good points, the Québec picture is slightly more complex.
Central to the students’ grudge is the provincial Liberal government’s decision to cut $103 million in grants and bursaries-a measure initially intended to save expenses for Québec’s universities. While no student disagrees with the rectors’ claim that as much as $700 million needs to be invested in the Québec university network, most recognize that cutting grants that were given to students from low-income families is a terrible way to provide universities with additional funding. Student unions and groups across the province have therefore reacted accordingly, and have launching a widespread protest campaign on every campus. Guess what, it worked. Medical school students from Laval University and future engineers from Montréal’s École Polytechnique can hardly be described as left-wing activists; yet they joined most other faculties in a strike of unprecedented magnitude.
Moreover, another reason for the success of the students’ mobilization campaign is the current tense political and social climate in the province. Jean Charest’s Liberals came to power promising a change from the Parti Québécois’ previous years of social-democratic government and unabashed sovereignism. However, the change revealed greater than what Quebeckers had expected and came into contradiction with the province’s usual left-of-centre politics. That citizens were already angry at the government prior to its controversial decision to cut bursaries explains the huge support students now enjoy within the population.
Québec post-secondary students acknowledge their privilege: at $1800 on average per year, their tuition fees compare very favourably with those of other Canadian provinces and, needless to say, the United States. This situation indeed emerges from the willingness of Québec, an ever-distinct society, to maintain a social model whereby the state assumes an important role in subsidizing education. To address the pressing issue of better funding, Québec students would have accepted a measured rise in their already low tuition fees, provided it includes bursaries for those unable to afford it. Yet the government, tied by its electoral promise not to raise those tuition fees, decided to implement a measure specifically targeting students who were eligible for financial aid-those who were poorer in the first place.
Free education for all is not what the students of Québec are demanding. Countries with very low or no tuition fees-notably France-often witness unpleasant results. Such schemes sometimes give rise to a two-tier education system: France, for instance, has its overcrowded and underfunded public universities as well as its elitist and expensive Ivy League, the grandes écoles. This is hardly a model to follow, and Québec students recognize it.
What they are essentially demanding is more social justice: that well-off students assume the true cost of their education while needy students be given a helping hand through appropriate bursaries and grants. Ontario students, some of whom are far in debt, should take note.
Alex Bellefleur is an exchange student at U of T from Québec City’s Laval University.