Improvement costs money

Investing in higher education will ensure brighter future for Ontario’s citizens

Global competition for jobs, ideas and highly skilled employees is no longer an academic theory—it’s our reality.

The path to prosperity in our world has been confirmed: the better educated your workforce, the more prosperous your city, province, or country.

Without a doubt, post-secondary education is an investment that pays tremendous dividends for the individual and society as a whole. It not only results in greater personal earnings potential and government tax revenue, but also a healthier, more engaged citizenry. Simply put, it’s the first step on the journey out of poverty.

In this time of economic uncertainty, it’s critical the government continue to invest heavily in higher education, for the present and for the future.

In the short-term, investment in higher education stimulates Ontario’s economy. Universities and colleges employ thousands of Ontarians, placing them among the largest employers in Ontario’s communities. Through millions in local expenditures on goods and services, these institutions are also some of the largest consumers in their communities, thus driving local business.

When the total economic impact from all sources is calculated, the University of Waterloo, for instance, estimates that it infuses approximately $1.1 billion a year into the region. In addition to providing immediate stimulus for local economies, our universities and colleges are a critical investment in the people of Ontario and in our province’s future.

According to the Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation, for more than a 40-year period, a bachelor’s degree holder in Ontario will earn $769,720 more than someone with only a high school education.

Moreover, those with a university degree comprise only 22 per cent of the population but contribute 41 per cent of income tax paid and only receive 14 per cent of government transfers.

Finally, Ontarians with a post-secondary degree are likely to live longer, commit fewer crimes, vote in larger numbers, donate more to charity and volunteer more often in their communities.

Having post-secondary educated parents leads to lower levels of poverty, teenage pregnancy, child abuse and neglect and reduced crime rates in children.

But the question remains, is Ontario producing the volume and quality of graduates needed to compete in the global economy and ensure a prosperous society?

We know that up to 70 per cent of future jobs created in Canada will require some post secondary education. With only 40 per cent of 18 to 24-year-olds participating in 2007, we have much work to do. Even after significant investments by the McGuinty government, Ontario is still producing far fewer university graduates than peer jurisdictions in the United States.

Some have argued that as participation in higher education increases, the value of a degree lessens. The Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation has dismissed this delusion, showing the value of a post-secondary degree is increasing faster than the share of population with a degree.

Indeed, as stated in OUSA’s Dec. 2009 report, Ontario’s Knowledge Economy: The Economic Impact of Post-Secondary Education, “degrees have grown more valuable even as they have become less scarce.”

If we hope to increase the number of people attending university, we must encourage students who are traditionally underrepresented.

Aboriginal students, students with disabilities, low-income students and rural and northern students must be as integral to our post-secondary institutions as they are to the future of our province. We must tear down barriers—not

just financial—but social, physical and cultural as well.

There’s no easy answer. Outreach to these students requires government investment, but if we don’t demonstrate that higher education holds value for everyone, we risk leaving these individuals out of future prosperity.

But it’s not enough to simply increase the number of graduates—we must also ensure Ontario students receive the highest possible quality of education. With countries such as China and India producing millions of graduates each year, our advantage lies in the ability to produce an education of the highest quality. Unfortunately, Ontario’s universities receive a level of funding that puts us near the bottom in Canada as well as internationally.

As a result, our universities score poorly in enriching educational experiences, active and collaborative learning and student-faculty interaction compared to our competitors south of the boarder.

To bring Ontario’s student-faculty ratio up to the level of our U.S. peers would require hiring 9,000 new professors. Given Ontario already has the highest tuition in Canada and that increasing participation is also of vital importance, raising tuition fees isn’t the answer. The Ontario government must step up and properly fund our universities.

The reality is that improvement will cost money. But investments today will pay enormous dividends in the future. In the current economic climate we cannot afford to sell off Ontario’s future for a quick fix to current problems.

And it isn’t just students sounding the alarm bells. Organizations like the Institute for Competitiveness and Prosperity, the Ontario Chamber of Commerce, the Ontario Association of Food Banks and the Toronto Board of Trade have all called for increased investment in higher education in recent months.

There’s consensus—investing in higher education will ensure a bright future for the people of Ontario. It’s time to take bold steps.

Alexi White is the Executive Director of the Ontario Undergraduate Student Alliance. He was the Journal’s opinions and letters editor in 2008-09. He was the AMS academics affairs commissioner in 2007-08.

All final editorial decisions are made by the Editor(s)-in-Chief and/or the Managing Editor. Authors should not be contacted, targeted, or harassed under any circumstances. If you have any grievances with this article, please direct your comments to journal_editors@ams.queensu.ca.

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