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Category: Student Aid

More Provincial Expenditure Comparisons

I got a lot of feedback on last week’s blog about provincial PSE spending comparisons.  So much so that a few of you asked for a bunch of other comparisons.  This blog does nothing but aim to please, so let’s get to it. One question I received a couple of times was “what happens if you throw student assistance expenditures into the mix”?  This is a good question.  In particular, Ontario – which as you will recall came dead last in

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October 30, 2018 No Comments

Student Debt Not Increasing Whatsoever (Shocker)

Hi all.  How’s the summer working out so far? I promised I would be back with a blog just as soon as the folks at the Canadian Undergraduate Survey Consortium (CUSC) published their triennial survey of graduating students, which is the most regular and arguably the best source of information we have on student debt.  Which they did on June 27, so here I am. (Why is CUSC the best source?  Well, the feds can’t publish such data because CSLP

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June 28, 2018 4 Comments

Savings Plans

[the_ad id=”12755″] One of the unique aspects of Canada’s higher education funding system is its regime of Registered Education Savings Plans (RESPs) and various kinds of public subsidies to these plans – the Canada Education Savings Grant (CESG), the Alternative Canada Education Savings Grants (A-CESG) and the Canada Learning Bond.  What are all these things, and do they work as intended? Let’s start with RESPs, which are simply accounts in which interest and capital gains are allowed to accumulate tax-free. 

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June 20, 2018 No Comments

Why Student Debt Won’t Fall

[the_ad id=”12740″] Since 2011, the amount of grant aid available to students has increased enormously in Canada.  Partly that’s due to the 2016 Federal, Ontario and New Brunswick budgets, which shifted a whole whack of tax credits to grants, as well a more long-term shift towards grants and away from loans in both Ontario and Quebec as well as, more recently, Prince Edward Island as well.  The shift isn’t universal of course – in the other 7 provincial programs loan/grant

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June 19, 2018 No Comments

Two Ways of Thinking About Student Aid and Equity

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Take two students.  One of them comes from a poor family and needs student aid, the other, by dint of having wealthier parents, is either ineligible for aid, or can manage somehow to get through school without it.  One therefore finishes school with debt and the other does not.  Because the debt carries interest, the poor student pays “more” than the better-off student.  And because the poorer student will start their career

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June 11, 2018 2 Comments
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One Thought to Start Your Day is our founder and CEO Alex Usher’s popular daily blog, brimming with up-to-the-minute insights and informed opinions on today’s higher education industry.

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