Last week’s provincial announcement on reducing post-secondary tuition fees by 10% is the first shoe to drop. That’s the assessment of Northern College president Fred Gibbons.
He says he sympathizes with the government doing a line-by-line budget review, and figures the second shoe to drop will affect his and other colleges’ annual general purpose and specialty funding.
“Collectively, what the ministry has withdrawn from the colleges is about $350,000,000 towards their provincial budget challenge,” notes Gibbons. “It is a lot of money, but in the big scheme of things, it’s still a very large challenge that the province is.”
“So I think they’re going to be looking a little more deeply (and) I don’t think the exercise in fiscal restraint for us is quite over yet.”
