Substantial increases in tuition fees in Canadian universities have sparked aggressive student demonstrations across Canada. Canadian students in Lund vent frustration about the peaking student demonstrations.
Canada has seen a stepping increase in tuition fees for local university students since 2009, but a stark rise of 4.3 percent for tuition fees last term was responded by great protests.
“Students live under the roof of their parents’ even after university due to the burdens of repaying tuition fee debt,” says exchange student Jinsol Kim from The University of Waterloo in Ontario.
Jinsol continues: “Canadian university education has become inaccessible and it shouldn’t be that way.”
In Québec, the home of Canada’s lowest tuition fees and where tuition fees have been frozen for most of the last 40 years, the situation has turned aggressive when the tuition fee rose last term.
Demonstrators have prevented other students from entering classes, as well as blocked access to educational institutions in Montreal. Police intervention also became necessary when people tossed projectiles, such as fireworks.
Joseé-Anne Otis of Université du Québec á Rimouski, a current exchange student in Lund, disagrees with most of the protests as “most of the people are there for no cause, simply like sheep following the shepherd. When a day of school was cancelled for me, I saw it as a way to lose out on what we have paid for.”
In agreement to this, Nicole Harper from Ontario, a current master student here in Lund, adds that “I think the protests are absolutely necessary and more students should get informed and active; more drastic action including walk-outs and direct engagement with MPPs is definitely needed. Suppose we simply refused to pay?”
In response to the student demonstrations, the government of Ontario implemented a system for students to ease the burden of repaying tuition fees. But the system has been criticised for favouring the “elite”.
Text: Suzanna Törnroth
