According to the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research (FGSR), the University of Alberta has about 8,000 graduate students, 37 percent of which are international [1]; that is 2,960 students. According to a 2016 research published by the Canadian Journal of Higher Education [2], international students, compared to the domestic, suffer from housing insecurity and extreme financial difficulties, have very limited access to adequate health and safety services, and are silent victims of food insecurity. To mitigate their hardship, international graduate students must choose between studying or earning an income. To strike a balance between the two, they tend to choose temporary positions among part-time jobs. Since the Coronavirus pandemic had the government of Canada and Alberta issue stay-at-home orders, many international students have been laid off and left with no off-campus source of income. Others have lost research assistantships that were dependent on conferences, colloquia, symposiums, and other academic activities that have been halted. More than ever, it is at this critical moment that international students face a precarious future with no housing and food security and no home and family to seek solace from. This campaign seeks your support to ask the University of Alberta to waive its Spring tuition for the international graduate students.
International graduate students very seldom take any classes during the Spring and Summer semesters, nor do they typically hold the teaching/research assistantship positions. Yet, they must pay tuition fees to maintain the conditions of their student visa. Unable to go back home, to seek financial assistance, or to work, they are unable to afford their tuition: they need a house and food on their tables first. Waiving the tuition is a small step towards helping people who contribute to this country through their research, works, taxes, and purchases.
Please sign this petition if you agree that University of Alberta ought to do more in protecting the rights and interests of its international students. May waiving spring tuition fees for them be that one step in the right direction.
NOTES
1.
https://cloudfront.ualberta.ca/-/media/gradstudies/about/facts-and-figures/graduate-enrolment-report/2018-2019-fgsr-graduate-annual-report.pdf2. Moira J. Calder, Solina Richter, and Yuping Mao, Katharina Kovacs Burns, Ramadimetja S. Mogale and Margaret Danko, “International Students Attending Canadian Universities: Their Experiences with Housing, Finances, and Other Issues,” Canadian Journal of Higher Education/Revue canadienne d’enseignement supérieur, vol. 46, no. 2, 2016, pp 92 – 110.
