The Regina Public Interest Research Group (RPIRG) acknowledges the Government of Saskatchewan’s announcement of a new four-year funding agreement with post-secondary institutions. Although the agreement represents a positive shift toward stability in post-secondary institution funding, the commitment is not enough to address the current affordability issue faced by students. With the reduction in international students’ enrollment and increase in cost of goods and services, post-secondary institutions, in our case University of Regina, face significant budgetary challenges, and provincial government’s adaquete funding commitment has become a necessity more than ever.

There are, without question, some positive aspects to the announcement:

• A four-year funding model provides a degree of financial stability and allows universities to plan and budget with greater certainty — but only if operating expenses do not continue to rise significantly due to inflation amid economic uncertainty.

• A tuition cap of 3% (down from 4%) is a step toward the right direction.

While this announcement is a clear win for the provincial government, it may not be one for students. In a time of provincial and federal economic uncertainty, this agreement effectively locks in a modest 3% annual funding increase for four years, regardless of how inflation, the cost of living, or broader economic conditions evolve. This fixed model benefits the government by limiting its financial exposure, but it risks leaving institutions underfunded if costs rise faster than expected. We have seen that happening in the past years.

For students, the benefits are even less tangible. The agreement’s tuition cap may be lowered to 3% from 4%, it barely makes any difference, given non-tuition related costs are increasing in a rapid rate. The bar for provincial contribution to post-secondary institution funding has been set so low that we understand why the University of Regina is considering this accouchement as “big news”, but the real big news could have been adaquete funding and tuition freeze at least for next 2 years while Canada works on its affordability crisis.

pAs a student-led and student-funded resource centre, our goal is to advocate for measures that make students’ lives easier and make higher education accessible; therefore, we ask the following:

• We call for annual provincial funding increases to be at least 4% or matched to inflation, whichever is greater, to ensure universities can maintain quality education and services without transferring costs onto students.

• We also call for tuition fees to be limited to 0% increases for the first two years of the agreement, and no more than 1% in the third and fourth years — giving students real and measurable relief as the cost of living continues to rise.

RPIRG will continue to advocate for these amendments in the weeks and months leading up to the provincial budget and the signing of the MOU. We look forward to speaking with Advanced Education Minister Ken Cheveldayoff on these issues. If you’re interested in joining our advocacy efforts, please reach out to us at info@rpirg.org.