What's behind the problems with Canada's international student program?

Colleges and universities in Canada are making billions from international students, but many of those students have spoken out about living under precarious conditions. 

Jovial Orlachi Osundu, president of the international students association at the University of Moncton, says international students are being wrongfully blamed for housing and job shortages. 

"It is pretty unfair to use them as scapegoats to explain the wrong decisions that our political actors took in the past," Osundu said. 

Schools are now facing major reductions in the number of study permits for international students that they'll be allocated after the federal immigration minister announced a temporary cap on Monday, with the goal of targeting institutional "bad actors" and addressing the impact on the housing market.

But how did we get to this point in Canada's international student program in the first place?

There are more than one million international students in Canada, according to figures from Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. 

Economist Mike Moffatt, an assistant professor at the Ivey Business School at Western University in London, Ont., says post-secondary institutions boosted international enrolment in response to provincial governments cutting back on funding "over the last decade or more." 

In Ontario, data from the provincial government shows operating grants for universities were lower in 2021 — $8,350 per student — than in 2008, when they were $8,514 per student, not accounting for inflation. 

"At least a handful of schools have kind of gone above and beyond what was necessary to fill in the financial blanks and have massively increased their enrolment," Moffatt said.

Moffatt notes that colleges, in particular, are relying heavily on international students and it's most pronounced in Ontario.

About 76 per cent of all tuition fees for colleges in that province come from international students, according to a report by consulting firm Higher Education Strategy Associates.

The report estimates that students from India alone will provide Ontario colleges with $2 billion in operating revenue for the 2023-2024 school year. That's slightly more than those colleges receive from the provincial government.

The surge in international students has coincided with reports of some recruiters misleading those students about the education they'll receive and the real cost of living in Canada. 

Both federal and provincial officials have referenced these "bad actors" in the post-secondary sector, who they say have preyed upon international students.