Students eligible for the new regional mobility program learned only after the start of the school year that they would not receive the $7,500 scholarship announced by the government. The Quebec Collegiate Student Federation is calling for “more clarity and transparency” in the future in the allocation of scholarships, left to the discretion of CEGEPs.
“When we saw the stock market, we thought wow! It’s really a chance. It was an incentive for my daughter,” says Estelle Lagueux to The Press.
This mother refers to the new Parcours regional mobility program announced in May, the objective of which is to attract 5,000 college students to the region within 5 years.
Since this fall, students who enroll in one of the 18 regional CEGEPs are eligible to receive an annual bursary of $7,500, for all programs combined.
Only conditions: the student must be registered in a CEGEP that is more than 60 km from his residence and the program must not be offered in an establishment within this radius.
M’s daughterme Lagueux, who enrolled in film and television techniques at Cégep de Jonquière, met all of these conditions. It was even the announcement of the Parcours program that convinced her to migrate to the region (her daughter had also applied for admission to a Montreal university). Except that in mid-September, surprise: she learned that she was ultimately not eligible for the scholarship.
She was disappointed. It forces me to compensate for her, and she has less leeway [financièrement].
Estelle Lagueux, mother of a student
“It was laborious to know what the selection criteria were. I didn’t think it was really transparent,” she adds.
Her daughter is probably not the only one in her situation. At Cégep de Jonquière, “a few hundred students” were theoretically eligible for the Parcours program, indicates the establishment. However, only 24 scholarships were awarded.
The Quebec Collegiate Student Federation deplores “the lack of clarity and transparency” in the selection criteria, left to the discretion of CEGEPs.
“There are lessons to be learned” for the next few years, believes its president, Maya Labrosse.
“We had to give ourselves a little time”
Eligible establishments are granted a budget from Quebec, which corresponds to a limited number of Parcours scholarships.
If the number of scholarships offered is not sufficient, it is up to the establishment to “give priority to certain applications for admission”, specifies the Ministry of Higher Education by email. It’s also listed on their site.
According to Quebec, CEGEPs have been informed of the amounts that would be granted to them in the 2022-2023 CEGEP Budget and Financial Regime, adopted in May.
However, “we had to give ourselves a little time to put everything in place and determine the terms and conditions for administering the scholarship in our CEGEP,” explains Sabrina Potvin, communications coordinator for the Cégep de Jonquière.
She says that in June, students were notified by email that the number of scholarships offered would be limited. The selection criteria were not announced until after the start of the school year: the CEGEP gave priority to six study programs, including building engineering technology and industrial process technology, “because of their weak effective “. The film and television techniques program is not one of them.
A number of scholarships were also awarded to students who were already involved in the old version of the interregional mobility programme.
Consequence: “there were very few scholarships available for new students,” says Ms.me Potwine.
Even the CEGEP dipped into its own budget to make sure to grant a scholarship to all students enrolled in the targeted programs, instead of doing “a draw”.
Insufficient scholarships
The Cégep de la Gaspésie et des Îles also had more eligible students than available scholarships. “We would have needed 148 scholarships and we had 66,” says Marie Nowak, communications advisor.
The establishment has prioritized programs with recruitment difficulties and students admitted to the first and second rounds of admission. The other scholarships offered were also taken into account in the selection.
Most scholarship recipients were notified in June, but other students received a scholarship in the fall, following withdrawals during the summer.
For its part, the Ministry of Higher Education argues that 6.3 million dollars are planned for the first year of the program, which corresponds to 1,000 scholarships. For the moment, it seems that “all the scholarships should be allocated”, says one by email.
Learning lessons for the future
The Quebec Collegiate Student Federation considers the situation reported by The Press. “It’s a great program, but the establishments really haven’t had a lot of time to prepare,” notes Maya Labrosse.
However, she asks that in the future, the selection criteria of each institution be clearly indicated when applying for admission, as these may vary from one CEGEP to another.
“We also hope that the number of scholarships will be sufficient for the number of eligible students,” she adds.
Next year, Quebec’s budget for the program will rise to $19.1 million, then increase to $37 million in 2026-2027.