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On January 14th members of ANSSA delivered their pre-budget submission to Nova Scotia Premier Darryl Dexter and Education Minister Marilyn More. Representatives from all ANSSA schools - Acadia, Saint Mary's, Dalhousie, St. Francis Xavier and Cape Breton Universities were in attendance.Read the pre-budget submission here. (PDF)

The following is a conversation during QP at province house between the Minister and her critic:

Question Period – 3:15 PM October 1st 2009

Taken from hansard.

MS. KELLY REGAN: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Education. During the recent election campaign your Party received a C grade for its post-secondary education promises from the Alliance of Nova Scotia Student Associations. The NDP promise of a graduate tax credit was evaluated by ANSSA. The organization said they did not see this as: A responsible use of money earmarked for post-secondary education.

My question for the minister is, will responsibility for the implementation of the graduate tax credit fall under the Minister of Education, thus being considered money for post-secondary education?

HON. MARILYN MORE: Mr. Speaker, that rebate is as much of a worker recruitment and retention tool as it is to keep graduate students in the province. There are other ways to increase accessibility and affordability for university and post-secondary education. I just want to clarify that we see that as providing the well-trained workers in this province, so it’s more on a Labour and Workforce Development strategy than it is an access – to improve access or affordability of post-secondary education in the province. Thank you.

MS. REGAN: Mr. Speaker, then might I respectfully suggest that that be considered under Labour and Workforce Development and not, in fact, post-secondary education. In fact, both ANSSA and the Canadian Federation of Students have made it clear that graduate tax credits do nothing to help students who cannot afford to attend one of our universities in the first place. A graduate tax credit will do little good if none of our students can afford to graduate. My question to the minister is, will the minister acknowledge that graduate tax credits are an ineffective tool for making our universities and colleges more accessible and affordable?

MS. MORE: I can only repeat what I said in answer to the first question, that this is a labour retention and recruitment strategy, and certainly the former government has done – and we support efforts that they have made to make university education more affordable, such as putting more of the student assistance up front as grants and providing additional funding to universities so that we can have a freeze on the tuition. I think there’s a little bit of confusion about the intent of the graduate rebate – retention rebate. Thank you.

MS. REGAN: Mr. Speaker, the problem is that not only do graduate tax credits not increase access to post-secondary education, but recent examples show they don’t even work as a retention tool. In an op-ed to the Chronicle Herald, the Executive Director of ANSSA stated that governments in Manitoba and in New Brunswick have invested $100 million in tax credits like this, but no changes in retention rates have been observed since the credits were implemented. These examples cause leading education expert Alex Usher to conclude that graduate tax credits provide, and I’m quoting here, “windfall gains to people doing exactly what they were going to do anyways”. My question to the minister is, will the minister acknowledge that graduate tax credits are not only ineffective as a tool to help gain access to post-secondary education, but they are also ineffective as a graduate retention tool.

MS. MORE: Well, as it turns out, we have considerable numbers of students from outside our province attending our post-secondary institutions. Currently about 20 per cent of them stay in the province. We feel that this graduate retention rebate will actually encourage those numbers to go up. Thank you.

September 21, 2009 Posted by markcoffin.

Budget day is Thursday in Nova Scotia. Four and a half months ago the previous Tory Government fell on their budget – creating a whirlwind of election excitement. Meanwhile, nobody noticed the roughly $ 1.5 Million discrepency between the funding allocated to universities and the funding that was promised. Nobody, except for ANSSA. The Memorandum of Understading between the Universities and the province (the holy grail of NS Student Leaders) had been renegotiated before the budget was released. At the time, we issued this press release.

$1.5 Million isn’t a huge sum of money considering the province is scheduled to spend about $318.7 Million in operating grants to universities this fall. But it is when you consider that almost $1 Million of that cut would come from Dalhousie. So now you might understand why the Dal Administration was so quick to wipe out credit card payment an an option to pay tuition to save the university almost … … … One … Million … Dollars (cue Mr. Bigglesworth).

So, when the new budget (which is sounding like it will look alot like the old PC budget) is released to a lockup of provincial stakeholders on Thursday, ANSSA representatives will be crunching numbers again to see how the funding promised compares to the funding recieved.

Written by Mark Coffin, Executive Director of ANSSA

Originally posted September 17 2009

Provincial politicians head back to the legislature today, at the same time as forty thousand students settle into university classrooms across Nova Scotia. Both groups are likely unprepared for the challenges that lie ahead. The recession has hit students and universities hard. Endowments are growing slower, meaning less operating revenue for institutions and fewer bursaries and scholarships for underprivileged students[1]. The unemployment rate for students aged 19 – 24 reached 21 per cent in July 2009, the highest rate on record since 1977[2], which happens to be when Statistics Canada started recording student unemployment. And since our new government has taken office, no changes have resulted to help students through this tough time.

Judging from the front page of their website, the governing NDP will claim that youth are their top priority. However, they have only one proposal to invest in youth: a hefty tax credit for university and college students who stay in the province after graduation. A credit that will reward students at the wrong end of a degree that too many cannot afford to begin with. A credit that government expects will make staying here more appealing than it currently is. A credit whose creators naively assume will be accompanied by an increase in the currently sparse job opportunities to accommodate the students who are so eager to stay in order to take advantage of it. And lastly, a credit that is likely drastically under-budgeted for if it were to ever come even close to working, which it won’t.

Governments in Manitoba and New Brunswick have invested 100 Million dollars in such tax credits. Yet, no changes in retention rates have been observed since the credits were implemented[3]. Rather than learning from their mistakes, our government wants to spend 6.5 Million dollars on, as Alex Usher says, “providing windfall gains to people doing exactly what they were going to do anyways”[4] while failing to retain graduates and failing to make education any more accessible.

Despite their campaign that promised “change”, this type of policy is simply an amplified archetype of the previous government’s own failed tax tactic. Why not invest these millions of dollars into something more useful? Why not improve access by directing this funding towards student grants or tuition reductions that will save students money now.

We’re asking government to change their approach, to lower tuition in order to keep youth from fleeing to Newfoundland for a more affordable education. We’re asking government to promise that no student is denied the right to a higher education for financial reasons alone. Students want the option to stay in Nova Scotia, but tax-credit or not, the opportunities for post-grad employment are scarce. If our government is serious about retaining graduates, they should focus on shaping and strengthening the knowledge economy that will both stimulate development and innovation within Nova Scotia, but also attract and retain young workers. For the success of our students, the sustainability of our institutions, and the prosperity of our province, our government should get to work.