Between them, around twenty CEGEPs in Quebec have accumulated a deficit in maintaining their aging buildings of more than half a billion dollars. A situation that concerns the directors of several establishments, who fear the repercussions that the deterioration of their premises could have on the student community.
The Collège de Bois-de-Boulogne, in Montreal, moved this year from fourth to first position among the province’s CEGEPs accumulating the largest deficit in maintaining their assets. This is thus estimated by Quebec at $52.9 million, compared to $30.4 million last year.
All of this CEGEP’s buildings are currently considered to be in poor or very poor condition, following inspections ordered by the Quebec government. However, major renovations are underway and upcoming in one of the college’s two pavilions, where all of the windows in a curtain wall must be replaced, while the roof and stairwells must be renovated. In the meantime, students are suffering the repercussions of the poor condition of this building.
“Currently, the Ignace-Bourget pavilion is a pavilion that is not at all comfortable. It is not ventilated. In winter, we take the temperature near a window and it is 12 degrees, while in summer, the heat is suffocating, depending on Duty the general director of the Montreal college, Pascale Sirard.
“It’s an environment that is very uncomfortable, so when we talk about academic success, it’s not an environment that is very suitable for our clientele,” adds the establishment’s director of administrative services, Hélène Gingras. However, the two women believe that the future work in this pavilion will ultimately improve the daily lives of the students. The bill is currently estimated at $42 million.
Difficult to reach targets
In Sainte-Thérèse, the Lionel-Groulx College is faced, like several other establishments in the network, with a double challenge, since in addition to accumulating a deficit in maintaining its buildings of $17.5 million, the College must also manage the rapid growth of its student population.
“We are currently full at 125% of our capacity,” says the general director, Philippe Nasr, who must juggle a project to expand his CEGEP and that of repairing a “heritage wing” built at the end of the 19th century.e century.
“There are upgrades to be made for which, unfortunately, the budgets are not there,” specifies Mr. Nasr.
The Cégep de l’Abitibi-Témiscamingue estimates, for its part, at more than $17 million the sum it would have to invest to carry out numerous works in its “science pavilion”, where the roof, doors and windows of the building must be renovated. “At the science pavilion, when you walk near the windows at -30, in winter, well it’s cold because the thermostats are all broken, they are at the end of their life, therefore the calorific quality that it is supposed to generate , we no longer have it. You put your hand on the window and it’s as cold as outside,” says the general manager, Sylvain Blais.
However, the establishment is struggling to obtain sufficient funds from Quebec to carry out this work, to the point where Sylvain Blais fears a possible breakdown in service if this pavilion becomes, within a few years, unusable.