Stats Canada did their yearly University tuition fees, 2013/2014 report last week, and as usual I read it intently, their tuition fee study is always interesting.
The opening paragraph sums it all up very nicely for anyone wondering about the costs of sending their kids to University in the next little while:
Canadian full-time students in undergraduate programs paid 3.3% more on average in tuition fees for the 2013/2014 academic year this fall than they did a year earlier. This follows a 4.2% increase in 2012/2013.
Keep in mind that the last Inflation report from Stats Canada stated, that year over year inflation was at 1.3%. Simple math seems to say that tuition fees are growing approximately 200% of inflation, and that year over year is going to add up very quickly (as pointed out by Kyle Prevost on Preet’s Mostly Money, Mostly Canadian podcast (I am catching up on those in my spare time too)).
Glad to see that Stats Canada is also looking at the many extra fees that schools charge:
Services included in additional compulsory fees vary from institution to institution, and can change over time. Typically, they include fees for athletics, student health services, student associations, as well as other fees that apply to full-time Canadian students.
Students can opt out of a few of these fees (if your parents have a health and dental plan, you should opt out right away, since that fee is typically in the $300 range (combined)). I promise that some time this week I will publish a redacted set of the fees I now pay for both of my daughters at Trent University and Acadia University (need to make it publishable).
Tuition Fee Study
As with all the great info from Stats Canada there are 4 separate tables breaking down the tuition fee study, and the most interesting one for me is the following:
Average undergraduate tuition fees for Canadian full-time students, by field of study
| 2012/2013r | 2013/2014p | 2012/2013 to 2013/2014 | |
| current dollars | % change | ||
| Agriculture, natural resources and conservation | 5,119 | 5,297 | 2.9 |
| Architecture and related technologies | 5,340 | 5,586 | 4.6 |
| Humanities | 4,941 | 5,079 | 2.8 |
| Business, management and public administration | 6,097 | 6,326 | 3.8 |
| Education | 4,273 | 4,378 | 2.5 |
| Engineering | 6,560 | 6,864 | 4.6 |
| Law, legal professions and studies | 9,549 | 10,030 | 5.0 |
| Medicine | 12,012 | 12,438 | 3.5 |
| Visual and performing arts, and communications technologies | 5,002 | 5,151 | 0.0 |
| Physical and life sciences and technology | 5,335 | 5,484 | 2.8 |
| Mathematics, computer and information science | 6,051 | 6,319 | 4.4 |
| Social and behavioral science | 4,966 | 5,107 | 2.8 |
| Other health, parks, recreation and fitness | 5,232 | 5,399 | 3.2 |
| Dentistry | 16,678 | 17,324 | 3.9 |
| Nursing | 4,985 | 5,103 | 2.4 |
| Pharmacy | 10,463 | 10,942 | 4.6 |
| Veterinary medicine | 6,383 | 6,628 | 3.8 |
r revised
p preliminary
I have 3 kids and as early as now, even if they are not yet studying, I know I should start saving a whole lot for their studies. I don’t want them to get into college loans as much as possible.
That’s not bad. The tuition rates at the university where I’m getting my MBA rose almost 8% across the board this year… The basketball coach has a $10million salary….
Useful information. I have to go to uni at some point and this really helps and tells me how much I need to save.
Thanks for the publicity BCM. Along with Rob Carrick we’ve been trying for a couple years to explain that the idea of, “Why don’t young Canadians stop crying, we had it tough when we were in school too!” is mathematically insane. It just doesn’t compute no matter how bad people want to believe their own myths. The funny thing to me is, that Canadians don’t seem to be responding to the market changes very well when it comes to choosing their post-secondary options. One would think that with all of the incentives being thrown at skilled labour post-secondary paths, people would start to respond to those incentives fairly quickly.
Kyle, what I have seen is that a lot of “skilled” programs are getting overrun (i.e. too many applicants), so many kids are being fooled into the “any degree is better than no degree” post-secondary trickery (I have seen that simply having a degree is really not enough these days to get a job).
I hear you on the full programs part. On the other hand, if you exit high school at 17 or 18, and half to wait 18 months to get into an in-demand program such as electrical or pipefitting (just two random examples), this isn’t all bad. It let’s you get some labor experience, or “travel the world” if you feel the absolute need to jump on that bandwagon. The part about “any degree will do” is absolutely right, and we need to stop promoting that line of thinking at all costs.
We take a two pronged approach to our kids being in university. We try to minimize costs of course, but we also would want our kids graduate without debt. That means that we prefer that our kids live at home while going to school – even if it means the purchase of a car. And, we pay the greater portion of (but not all) costs. In fact, we have a sharing system for costs. We track all costs – tuition, books, gas, car repairs, etc and split it two thirds/one third.
My daughter may need to move out to continue her education after she gets her degree, but we’re hoping she goes to a city where we have family that has an extra bedroom :).
And that will help your RESP money last longer (if you child lives away from home, effectively DOUBLE your costs).
I doubt ours will be able to live at home. Pharmacy, optometry etc all are only offered at a few schools. So we’re saving lots and lots…..[I’m sure we can find something else to do with all that money if they change their minds. : ) ]
Ouch those are heavy hitters (both in Waterloo if I recollect) in terms of tuition costs.