Student groups continue to raise concerns over the rushed nature of the province’s recently announced post-secondary review, calling on the government to properly fund post-secondary institutions.
During a press conference Monday by representatives from the Alliance of BC Students and executives from UBC, SFU and Capilano’s student unions, student leaders decried the review as a performative measure.
The conference was held outside the Minister of Post-Secondary Education and Future Skills Jessie Sunner’s office in Surrey. Opening the conference, Kevin Root, chairperson of the alliance, described the review as “dangerous. It is designed to shut down the voices of students, staff and faculty as much as possible.”
The review, concluding in March, will provide recommendations on governance structures, reducing program duplication across institutions and finding ways to respond to revenue challenges, according to its terms of reference.
When announced in November, student unions immediately spoke out, saying the review’s timeline felt too quick and opaque.
“BC students are extremely concerned that this review [is not] a meaningful process and is being used to justify predetermined cuts at the expense of students,” the Alliance of BC Students said in a press release at the time.
AMS VP External Solomon Yi-Kieran said student unions had met with Don Avison, who is heading the review, for a 90-minute consultation session the previous week. Root noted the province said they wanted consultations completed in six weeks.
“[The province] told us the review would consider all options except one, and that is more public funding from the government,” said Root.
He added that universities have become dependent on international student tuition — the 2026 federal budget outlined a 49 per cent reduction in the target for new international student permits compared to 2025. The effects of decreased international enrolment have yet to be seen at UBC, but the university’s 2025-26 budget received 22 per cent of its operating revenue from international tuition.
This review also comes after a provincial post-secondary funding review was quietly shelved, which was originally meant to create a fairer model that met the evolving educational needs in B.C.
“The provincial government is facing a clear choice: commit public funding for the public post-secondary education system or make devastating cuts and unaffordable tuition increases,” said Root.
Yi-Kieran said they had two demands for Sunner: that she publicly commit to protecting the Tuition Limit Policy and to “properly” funding the post-secondary sector.
They cited Sunner not indicating any protection for the tuition cap when speaking to the media or in meetings with student unions.
Yi-Kieran referenced when the provincial government under Gordon Campbell lifted the tuition freeze on universities in 2002, which led to domestic tuition nearly doubling in three years, student protests and the eventual creation of the Tuition Limit Policy in 2005.
In a statement to The Ubyssey, Sunner wrote “education is the foundation of opportunity, and our post-secondary institutions are facing tremendous financial challenges, including federal reductions to international student permits, global inflation, and declining domestic enrolment.”
“That is why we have launched an independent review to provide a clear path for stabilizing institutions in the short term and ensuring the entire sector is financially sustainable and resilient over the long term.”
Sunner also noted that the government has increased operating grants to the 25 public post-secondary institutions by $1.2 billion, from $1.83 billion in 2016-17 to nearly $3.1 billion in 2024-25. For much of the past decade, UBC has consistently accounted for a third of those funds.
Root also raised concern about the provincial government considering merging post-secondary institutions. The terms of reference leave open the possibility for mergers as the review may pinpoint opportunities for “consolidation of institutions.”
Every university has a student union and student representative on governing bodies like the institution’s Senate and Board of Governors; SFU’s VP External and Community Affairs Jessica Lamb questioned how the potential merging of schools could negatively affect student advocacy.
They questioned if student unions would also have to merge and whether the sudden expansion of the student population would also mean expanding the number of student representatives on governing bodies to be proportional.
“The prospect of bureaucrats and politicians in Victoria making decisions about student representation across the province is something that the student movement will not accept,” said Lamb.
When asked whether Yi-Kieran had spoken to UBC administration, they said they have and work closely with offices.
“We are quite on the same page. We do not want to see the two per cent tuition cap going. We know that it's harmful for the province, it's harmful for universities and it's harmful for students.”
Root felt the process was “performative” and “pre-determined,” specifically referencing the fact that the review, due in March, would be completed after the provincial budget is announced in February. Yi-Kieran added the province did not feel receptive to the student union’s feedback.
“This is not a very transparent process. It's a very opaque one … I think the ministry has a lot of work to do to build back the trust of students,” said Yi-Kieran.
