The worst of the pandemic storm seems to have passed in the universities. The number of students enrolled in higher education institutions is relatively stable, up slightly by 0.6% compared to fall 2020, with the exception of the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM), where the number of students fell by 8% at the baccalaureate.
According to figures obtained by The duty, UQAM appears to be an anomaly in the rather encouraging picture of enrollments in the 18 Quebec universities. Only the University of Quebec in Outaouais (UQO) reports a comparable decline in its student body, in full return of face-to-face on campuses after a year and a half of distance learning.
Across Quebec, the minimal increase in enrollments is attributable to the second and third cycles (5.4% and 4.2%). Undergraduate student numbers fell 1%. A total of 317,000 students are enrolled this fall at the university, two-thirds of them full-time.
The number of registrations at UQAM fell by 5% compared to last fall. The 8% drop in undergraduate programs is partially offset by increases in master’s (5.7%) and doctorate (8%).
The Uqamian community wonders about the decline considered “worrying” in registrations. The management of the establishment declined the interview request of the To have to, but our sources indicate that a reflection on this subject has started within the university authorities.
“How can we explain this drop? The boring answer is that we don’t know it yet, even if we can think that the pandemic had collateral effects, ”says Geneviève Hervieux, president of the Union des professors et professeures de l’Université du Québec à Montréal (SPUQ).
She mentions the hypothesis of students who have put their studies on hiatus because of pandemic fatigue. Some have found employment. Others might fear going back to school because of their state of health or the state of infrastructure (ventilation, narrow rooms, etc.).
One thing is certain, distance education as well as the social and health crisis have put the students to the test, underlines this professor specializing in work psychology. She recalls that UQAM was created half a century ago to promote access to higher education for young people from the French-speaking working classes, whose parents have little education. Is this population more likely to drop out in times of social and economic turmoil?
Towards a way out of the crisis
Despite this upsurge in registrations, Geneviève Hervieux is confident in the future of UQAM. She believes that the establishment is in a good position despite a deficit of $ 9.2 million for the 2020-2021 fiscal year, authorized by Quebec due to the pandemic. Without taking into account the costs attributable to COVID-19, UQAM balanced its budget, indicates an internal message that The duty obtained.
The 2020-2021 budget was adopted “in a health context of great unpredictability and uncertainty”, explains in this message Sylvia Thompson, vice-rector of administration and finance.
However, the worst of the crisis has passed for the universities, hopes Pierre Cossette, rector of the University of Sherbrooke and president of the Interuniversity Cooperation Bureau (BCI). He recalls that the Ministry of Higher Education has authorized establishments to make deficits corresponding to the additional costs linked to the pandemic.
The COVID-19 bill was estimated at $ 100 million last May for universities. “The preliminary data received seems to indicate that most universities are in surplus in 2020-2021, and that the costs related to COVID are therefore absorbed”, indicates the office of the Minister of Higher Education, Danielle McCann.
“We are awaiting the final portrait before determining whether it is necessary to put in place measures to support universities that will be in deficit, if there are any, and if this deficit is attributable to COVID-19. In 2020-2021, we injected more than 175 million into the university network to support institutions in the face of COVID. “