College students can get tuition refund if they withdraw from school, say officials
A St. Clair College official apologized to students for the five-week faculty strike Monday as the Ontario government announced students will receive a full tuition refund if they withdraw from college because of the work stoppage.
The move comes after the Liberals passed back-to-work legislation over the weekend, ending the college strike after five weeks.
The Ministry of Advanced Education stated in a press release that colleges will be required to offer support funds to students "who have experienced financial hardship as a result of the strike," using the net savings the institutions incurred over the last five weeks.
Students stressed over remaining semester
Full-time students will be eligible to receive up to $500 for costs including child care fees, rebooking transportation tickets, or rent, according to the release. Student will have to apply to their college for the financial aid.
Ahmed El-Kadri is studying civil engineering technology at St. Clair and said those funds will only "help a little bit."
The third-year-student had plans to fly to Lebanon to visit his family over the holiday break, but now expects he won't be able to use that expensive ticket.
"I can't cancel what I've already done, just to see my family," he said, adding the remnants of the semester are sure to be stressful.
"Five weeks isn't a small amount of weeks," said El-Kadri. "A lot of people were depending on this and a lot of people are trying to graduate. This is probably going to be really difficult for all of us."
The province will also refund tuition for students if they decide to withdraw from their college because of the strike. Students who withdraw from their studies have two weeks from the re-start of classes to receive a full tuition refund.
St. Clair apologizes for strike
John Fairley, Vice President of College and Community Relations at St. Clair College, said to get the full refund for this semester, students would have to leave the college — 10 students have already withdrawn from the college according to the registrar.
If they want to return next semester, they would have to go through the application process again.
Fairley said St. Clair College students have until December 11 to withdraw from this semester without any penalties to their transcripts, but if they plan on staying enrolled they will not receive a tuition refund.
He added he feels as though students are looking for someone to say sorry for the strike and he was willing to step up.
"We apologize. We never saw this, we had a plan for a three-week work stoppage, four weeks, five weeks, so that's where we're at," he said. "We certainly didn't expect this. I don't think our faculty union expected it."
OSAP
The province said any strike-related support would not count against OSAP assessments.
OSAP will also be extended for students whose winter semesters have been prolonged due to the strike.
All outstanding issues related to the labour dispute are now heading to arbitration.
