Education For All is a joint campaign between the Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT), Canadian Federation of Students (CFS-FCEE), the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE SCFP), the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC – AFPC) and theNational Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE). Together, our combined memberships of more than one million students and workers are putting forward a vision of a more affordable, accessible, high quality, publicly-funded post-secondary education system in Canada; a system that is ready to take on the challenges of today and tomorrow.

Education For All in Manitoba

Today, public funding for post-secondary education is less than half of what it was 20 years ago, resulting in steadily increasing tuition fees and public student debt reaching a record $36 billion nationally. In 2017 the Manitoba government passed Bill 31, which both deregulated course-related fees and allows for up to 5% plus inflation tuition fee increases for domestic undergraduate students every year. International student fees – as well as college, graduate and professional programs – remain completely unregulated.

More recently, the 2019 provincial budget dealt another $6 million cut to the operational funding of our universities and contributed no new funds for the Manitoba Scholarship and Bursary Initiative (MSBI). While the government claims that they are concerned with improving upfront access to education, their relatively small contributions to the MSBI does not represent an effective lifting of barriers to post-secondary education for most students.  

It is imperative that students continue to push for affordable, accessible, publicly funded and high-quality post-secondary education. An educated population drives the economy, spurs innovation and creates stable, dynamic and just communities. By increasing tuition fees this government is ensuring that those opportunities are unavailable for those who need it most.

Goals :

• Advocate for protection and reduction of tuition fees for international, college, graduate and professional programs
• Conversion of student loans into provincial student grants
• Ensure adequate funding for post-secondary institutions to maintain quality of education.
• Work with our national student movement to advocate for the elimination of tuition fees for all students and for universal access to post-secondary education.
• Educate students on changes to course-related fees, and advocate for these fees to be refunded to students.