U of T’s Governing Council has approved the controversial proposal to charge incoming full-time undergraduate Arts and Science students with a flat program fee. At the May 20 meeting where the proposal was put to a vote, governors agreed to revisit the plan in two years. Unless GC overturns the plan at that time, incoming Arts and Science students to pay for five courses even if they take only three. In the interim, the Faculty of Arts and Science will introduce the flat fee “threshold” at four course equivalents for incoming students, starting this September.
The proposed threshold of three FCEs is the lowest in the province. Because students must take three FCEs to qualify for OSAP loans, the proposal will in effect force students seeking assistance through OSAP to pay for five full credits.
VP and provost Cheryl Misak denied that the proposal was a “radical” one, pointing to other Ontario universities that collect fees under the program fee model, but admitted that most of these universities had a threshold of 3.5 to four credits. Waterloo is the notable exception with a cutoff at five courses. Guelph, Ottawa, Brock, Lakehead, and Carleton all have a cutoff of four credits.
Alumni governor Tim Reid tabled the amendment requiring the Faculty of Arts and Science report to GC on the impacts of flat fees before implementing the three-course threshold in September 2011. The report will include a thorough profile of students taking three courses a year and those taking more than five, said Reid.
“Such an evaluation might reveal that students taking three courses on the whole have lower family incomes, commute to campus, and work part-time, compared to students taking more than five courses. We don’t know if this is an accurate or inaccurate profiling, which is why we need an in-depth, comprehensive evaluation before proceeding to phase two in two years’ time.”
Student governor Olivier Sorin said the administration has conducted no study to explain why U of T students take an average course load of 4.5 credits. The university has conducted no studies to investigate the relationship between students’ course loads, academic performance, and campus involvement.
Critics argue that the program was rushed through the university decision-making process.
Misak denied that the decision had been rushed, saying instead that administrators had been “agonizing” over the plan for 10 years. Over the past several years, the faculty has repeatedly faced budget deficits ranging from $5 million to $7 million.
Students protesting outside the meeting noted that the plan has only been known to the public since March. Student governor Jeff Peters said the first he heard of the proposal was in mid-April, when most students were busy with exams. He challenged the administration to debate the subject during another time of the year, when the students are less pre-occupied.
The flat fee proposal was circulated to Faculty of Arts and Science Council members for the first time on March 16. Prior to that, formal discussions of plans to bring in the flat fee were limited to the Program Fee Working Group and Implementation Committee, whose membership included only one student and one faculty member. No student was informed of the proposal until January 2009.
Satellite campus representatives on the PFIC decided against implementing the proposal, opting for more research.
The GC meeting took place at the Mississauga campus, though the program fee decision will not affect UTM students.
Student governors Sorin, Grant Gonzales, Ken Davy, and Jeff Peters, and staff representative PC Choo voted against the proposal. Four student governors were absent from the meeting.
