Manitoba’s post-secondary System in need of review

‘Can we do better? We can always do better.’ —Diane McGifford

Chelse McKee, staff

Saskatchewan, Alberta, and New Brunswick, among many other provinces, have released reviews of their post-secondary education systems within the last two years, but no such large-scale reviews Manitoba’s universities can be expected, education leaders say.

In 1993, the University Education Review Commision released an examination of Manitoba’s post-secondary education, entitled the “Roblin Report.” In it, they stated that they found “that the provincial structure of post-secondary education governance now in place is inadequate for the formulation and implementation of post-secondary education policy. Substantial changes are called for.”

Fourteen years later, Devin King, a faculty of education student from the University of Winnipeg and the host of the radio program The Fishbowl, said that the lack of a Manitoban review is most likely due to the different priorities of the government.

“I think, right now, the mentality is that if it isn’t broke, don’t fix it,” he said. “It’s not as if we don’t have COPSE, but certainly, I think, reviews are important for everyone to get a better understanding of what’s going on.”

COPSE is the Council for Post-Secondary Education for the province of Manitoba, which was created in 1997.

Each year, post-secondary institutions and post-secondary students can make presentations and voice concerns about the system to COPSE.

Although there was not an overall post-secondary review in progress or being planned, Dianne McGifford, minister for Advanced Education and Literacy in Manitoba, said there are some factors that are under examination. The items being reviewed are the COPSE act, implemented in 1995, University College of the North, and Campus Manitoba.

Garry Sran, president of UMSU, said that the lack of review could be considered a good thing. “Reviews are always political,” Sran said. “If you look at some of the reviews that have happened across Canada, most notably [the] Ontario Rae Review and just recently the New Brunswick review, it’s a way for the governments to announce a new policy and justify a new policy.

“Basically what the review allows them to say is, ‘We’ve consulted and this is what people wanted,’ whether they did or not. The [Ontario Rae] review only served to justify a policy of higher tuition fess. The outcome was known way before the consultations started.”

In the Alberta post-secondary review, released by the Steering Committee, it was stated that Alberta needs an “enhanced learning system that supports all of our aspirations. We need a learning system that covers the full range of advanced learning opportunities including literacy development, community programs, apprenticeship and industry training, colleges, universities and technical institutes.”

They listed six goals of their post-secondary education. One goal was for Alberta to have the highest participation rate in post-secondary studies and having the best support programs for graduate students. They included a deadline of 20 years as well as a plan to achieve these goals.

Meanwhile, Saskatchewan’s post-secondary review focused on the financial situation of their post-secondary education and the students attending the institutions. In terms of post-secondary funding and support, McGifford believes there is no reason for a review.

“I don’t know why we should have one,” she said. “Our situations are very different. The concern in Saskatchewan was really with student aid. That concern appears not to exist in Manitoba because students haven’t asked us to review student aid and also, we appear to be amongst the best of the provinces in supporting our students.”

She continued on to cite lower tuition fees and the new tuition fee income rebate program as benefits of the Manitoban post-secondary system.

“Can we do better? We can always do better,” she said.

Sran disagreed with McGifford’s claims of the lack of interest in a review of the province’s financial situation in the matter.

“I do strongly feel that more funding is required for institutions,” he said. “There’s a lot of areas of post-secondary education that need to be improved on.”

“Reviews are necessary for everything, not just education and certainly one of the big criticisms, right now, of universities, is that they way that money’s being spent is inadequate,” King said. “That’s coming from the student unions primarily.”

Richard Lobdell, vice president (academic) pro-vost for the University of Manitoba, left the decision of a review up to the government.

“[The university’s] quite happy to participate in a review if the government decides that’s what they’d like to do,” he said. “I can’t, myself, think of any particularly strong issues that I would like the government to investigate but [the university is] happy to participate if we’re asked to.”