Commission on Tuition Fees and Accessibility to Post-Secondary Education in Manitoba

The idea of a Commission on this subject was first announced in the spring of 2008, when the government indicated that it was ending the freeze on tuition fee increases in Manitoba. [...] In announcing the Commission, the Minister of Advanced Education and Literacy noted that this work was part of the government’s desire to “ensure post-secondary education in Manitoba is accessible and affordable”. [...] So, while the economic decline is reflected in some of the discussion and recommendations, the basic tenor of the report is grounded in the realities of the last several years. [...] In Manitoba the bursary program was eliminated in 1993, and there were further cuts to ACCESS programs during the decade, largely due to the withdrawal of the federal government from its shared funding. [...] While large fee shifts of this kind in other provinces have produced negative effects on equity of participation, data provided to the Commission from the Faculty of Law at the University of Manitoba indicate that the Faculty was able to maintain a good mix of students even with much higher fees because of their focused efforts on recruitment and financial support.