Tuition fees for domestic students in the upcoming year are projected to remain the same, according to a series of town halls hosted by Ryerson to discuss the operating budget for 2022-23.
In the 2019-20 academic year, there was a 10 per cent decrease in domestic tuition fees compared to the previous year, and the domestic tuition fees remained frozen in the 2021-22 academic year.
“While the current announcement expires at the end of this year, we don’t know what the new targets are going to be. We’re going to make a prudent assumption that tuition fees remain frozen,” said Glenn Craney, deputy provost and vice-provost, university planning.
Although domestic tuition fees are predicted to remain the same (pending the upcoming release of the provincial government’s budget), international student tuition is not regulated by the province, and is up to the discretion of the university. One of the 2022-23 budget model predictions presented during the town hall shows a five per cent increase in international tuition.
“We are looking to increase the total number of international students, and we have made an assumption that we’ll continue to increase international tuition fees at the rate that we have been increasing historically,” said Craney.
At the virtual town hall on Wednesday, Craney also said that some of the investments that Ryerson is making going forward will be in international student support. “We’ll be making investments in international student recruitment, we also have been making investments in international student support. So that both includes financial and non-financial support to move forward,” said Craney.
The town hall meetings were held from Tuesday to Thursday this week. The first town hall, which was hosted in-person, had 13 people show up. The second and third town halls were both hosted virtually via Zoom.
During the in-person town hall on Tuesday, one of the participants in the audience asked about the costs associated with the university name change. Lachemi didn’t provide a figure, but said his team is working to determine the costs, and will be sharing this with the Ryerson community.
Although changing the university’s name will cost money in the short term, the benefits are long term, according to Lachemi. He said not changing the university name would negatively affect the finances of the university going forward.
“We have been under pressure by many of our partners, saying that, ‘I’m not comfortable giving money to a university that has the name Ryerson,’” said Lachemi.
After a similar question during the Wednesday town hall consultation, no concrete numbers were given in terms of the cost of the renaming process. “This immediate fiscal and budget year we’ll see the majority of those costs, and the benefits will accrue over several years,” said Jennifer S. Simpson, provost and vice-president, academic. Simpson is also the chair of the University Renaming Advisory Committee.
During each of the town halls, one of the questions audience members asked of participants was what initiatives or activities should Ryerson begin or expand, if feasible. The responses to this question focused on mental health supports, international student support, Black student support, faculty needs and accessibility.
Emma Moore was a Social Media Producer and General Assignments Reporter for On the Record News in the Winter 2022 semester.
