It is our mandate to advocate against unfair financial burdens being placed on students, while also finding ways to give back to students.

Recently, it was announced that almost all Fall 2020 classes will be provided online. Understandably, many of you have reached out to us to express frustration with paying for educational quality and services that have been forced to change, and how we intend to continue to advocate for having fees waived for inaccessible University services—especially when tuition costs are now confirmed to be rising for Fall 2020. To put it simply, we think the University was in a position to show greater flexibility on your tuition, and remove at least some of the burden that students will be tasked with facing. 

We are committed to holding both the University administration and the province accountable for increasing financial burdens on students. We understand that the University’s ability to provide relief for students has been severely limited by the provincial government’s devastating cuts, which includes a funding shortfall of $110 million. Even in the midst of the COVID-19 crisis, however, the province has not afforded any flexibility to the University.

There is a lot to say, and we expect to be saying a lot more in the coming weeks.
But for right now, we encourage you to:

• Talk to us about your concerns regarding tuition, fees, affordability, or any other barriers you are facing. That means you can send us an email directly, or even attend a Students’ Council meeting yourself.

• Talk to elected officials about how inflexible pressure from the provincial government is hurting your education.
  Contact the Premier's Office
  Contact the Advanced Education Minister's office
  Contact your MLA

—Your UASU Executive

We’ve done things in the past year to help with rising costs, and want you to know we’re here and available to you, but also that we’re committed to doing more:

• Earlier this year, the UASU was successful in advocating to have 15% of new tuition revenues redirected to new student financial aid. 

• We also advocated to increase accessibility to Access Fund financial aid—where approximately $750,000 will be redirected over the next five years to a series of student bursaries to ensure sufficient financial support is readily available for students on our campus who need it most.

• Fall 2020 will see the introduction of new coverage options for the health and dental plan, where a ‘basic’ plan can be chosen as an alternative to the existing comprehensive plan—an option that results in savings of at least $50 per year.

• We have successfully advocated to have the Athletics and Recreation, PAW Centre, and U-Pass fees waived for the Spring and Summer semesters—saving students hundreds of dollars.

• We have changed and pivoted many UASU businesses and services, such as providing Peer Support Centre and The Landing services by distance, and changing the Horowitz Event Centre to be North Campus’ main provider for contact-less grocery package pickup.