The UTM Academic Affairs Committee approves a new co-op internship program, in which students from six departments can participate starting in fall 2024. The program will include asynchronous work preparedness modules and a 12- or 16-month paid internship for students that they take part in after having completed their third year.

The UTSC Academic Affairs Committee votes to create an expedited schedule for deferred exams, in line with what UTM offers. Instead of writing their deferred exam at the end of the following semester, students can now write it within a month of its original date. The committee package notes that the UTSG Faculty of Arts and Science is “also exploring this process.”

The federal government announces that it will stop providing funding to any research projects in key areas — such as artificial technology and quantum science — undertaken in partnership with entities from a list of dozens of Russian, Chinese, and Iranian institutions.

The federal government argues that the new rules are necessary to maintain the security of sensitive research and intellectual property. In a statement to CTV, the executive director of the Canadian Association of University Teachers — which represents 72,000 academic professions across 125 Canadian post-secondary institutions — cited concerns about the regulations “limiting the global exchange of scientific research, [and having] negative impacts on academic freedom and an overall chilling effect on certain research areas of import to Canadians.”

With the Scarborough Campus Students’ Union (SCSU) Vice President  Equity Denise Nmashie having vacated her role in December, the union’s Board of Directors (BOD) elects Vyshnavi Kanagarajamuthaly to the role for the remainder of the academic year.

Ottawa announced a two-year cap on the number of international undergraduate study permits the federal government will issue, halving the number of permits it allots to Ontario postsecondary institutions. The Ontario government is expected to release a plan by the end of March for how it will distribute the remaining permits to colleges and universities. U of T administrators claim this legislation is targeting “abuses in the system,” and that they’re not worried about it affecting the number of international students U of T will accept this coming year.

The UTM Campus Council votes to increase the price of residence for UTM students by 6.5 per cent and meal plan rates by three per cent for the 2024–2025 school year.

The University of Toronto Students’ Union (UTSU) approves a policy manual for the union’s senate — a step toward the senate’s long-awaited implementation. UTSU members first approved the senate at the 2022 Annual General Meeting (AGM) to account for the BOD’s concurrent downsizing. At the 2023 AGM, members rejected the executives’ plan to replace the senate with a different advisory group.

The policy manual lays out concrete procedures for the senate, which will consist of up to 75 members from various colleges, faculties, and constituencies such as first-generation students and mature students. Those present at the group’s inaugural mass meeting, which the union plans to hold in September, will elect the inaugural senate’s members. The group will then establish procedures for future elections. The senate will advise the BOD when making decisions and conducting advocacy.

Three of the campus’ five representative student bodies — the UTSU, the SCSU, and the University of Toronto Mississauga Students’ Union (UTMSU) — have held elections determining who will hold executive positions in the 2024–2025 school year. 
For the UTSU, voters elect Shehab Mansour as president, with a 13.2 per cent voter turnout. With an election turnout of approximately 12 per cent, UTSC undergraduates elect members of the IMPACT UTSC slate to all executive positions. The EmpowerUTM slate sweeps the executive position elections, with 16.3 per cent of eligible students turning out to vote.

Voting for the University of Toronto Graduate Students’ Union’s spring elections are scheduled to occur from March 26–29. Members of the Association of Part-time University Students can vote for BOD members — whom the BOD appoints to executive positions at its first meeting of each year — during the union’s winter general meeting, which it has not yet announced the date for.