We at the Ontario Veterinary College are writing today to express our deep concern over the University's proposal to increase international student fees in the coming school year. For many students, this increase represents an amount that is more than their loans will permit over a one year period, and will impose great hardship for those same students. Our international colleagues at the OVC are already pay $72,000 CAD per year- seven times what their Canadian counterparts are charged. In addition, these fees do not go into improving the OVC curriculum, but largely into Canadian student graduate studies and other departments. 

In short, international students are being shamelessly exploited. They come here to learn, not for cheaper fees (the OVC costs as much or more than domestic education!), or just for the OVC name, but because they hear we are a caring, supportive community that will help them become exemplary veterinarians. These students leave their homes and come here, having budgeted for living and food and approximately the tuition advertised by the OVC, with room for a small increase for inflation as advised by the website. They do not come planning to live in luxury, or have large sums in reserve in case the University arbitrarily decides to target them by raising their fees by $3,000 CAD per year. If this trend continues, the students who entered in 2019 will have paid $30,000 more than they were told to plan for by the time they graduate. 

Your plan to increase tuition once again for international students shows disregard for their mental and academic wellbeing. The fact that you have decided to target only international students, and not domestic, shows that you understand that this will have a strong negative impact on student lives, and are choosing to take an 'us vs them' approach.

We urge you to reconsider your approach, and to realize that funding can come from other areas or that it is, in fact, not important enough to extort your students for.