Human Resources Committee on May 26th, 2009

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Sure.

Ms. Boyles, if you have something to forward to us, just send it to the clerk and it will get distributed that way.

I have Calvin Fraser for a quick response. We're over time here, but just a quick response.

[Calvin Fraser]

I'll try to keep it very quick.

I think in terms of looking at strategies and federal-provincial cooperation, I'll make a quick analogy. Are we looking at the beach or are we looking at the sand? From a federal level we need to look at the beach, and our goal, of course, is to clean that beach. We need to work with all kinds of different groups because the problems in that sand may be different in each and every province, so we need to take it from a much higher level.

Obviously we do need to have clear objectives, and those objectives have to be stated and meetable, reachable. But one of the things the federal government can do is provide two-way communication about where the problems are, how to reach the problems, and reach out to them, because they can do a sharing job that simply isn't being done anywhere else.

Graduates, especially overseas graduates, are not a significant problem in education, though it really is a problem in other sectors of our economy. We have mobility for teachers all over Canada, including those who come from other countries. In fact, there are not many of those, since we have too many teachers in Canada at the moment. That is rare. Canada may even be the only country in the world with a surplus of teachers.

We have started to look at this problem and at the question of mobility across the country. The federal government and the provinces are studying the issue. The effort has already borne fruit in some fields. I have raised the matter not only with parliamentarians but also with people working in provincial governments. This is one of the aspects that is improving.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you very much.

We're now going to move over to Mr. Vellacott for five minutes, please.

[Maurice Vellacott, Conservative, Saskatoon—Wanuskewin, SK]

Thank you very much.

I appreciate the presentations we've had today.

I'm going to centre most of my remarks around post-secondary education. I think it's a given. I think we pretty much all agree that getting that good start from young on up is the early building block there. But I think we're also aware that the distinctions and the gaps, if you will, in terms of wage-earning capacity comes as there's the additional post-secondary education. I'm told that it's no different in many other countries in the world than in Canada. Actually, there's always room for improvement, but with respect to participation, we're one of the highest in terms of participation for post-secondary education among all of the OECD countries. So this is an encouraging thing. But as we say, we can always work on that and we can always bump the percentages up from there.

Our government has increased post-secondary education funding, as you know, by about 40%. If we don't know, it's good to be reminded of that. That's fairly huge. We're investing about $2.4 billion in post-secondary education through the Canada social transfer, rising to $3.2 billion in the 2008-09 year.

I also want to ask about the new budget infrastructure, the $2 billion. I want to ask Terry in respect to her further reflection or comments on that. I'm reading from a press release from the Association of Canadian Community Colleges from January 26, right after that $2 billion fund for infrastructure was announced. The president, James Knight, said, “The announcement today by Transport, Infrastructure and Communities Minister John Baird of a $2 billion fund for construction, repair and upgrade of colleges and universities is good news for students, for colleges and for Canada.”

He cites some thousand rural and urban communities where there are campuses, and also this very positive...I didn't realize it was that high, but he said that more than 90% of college graduates obtain employment in their field within six months of graduating, even in today's slowing economy. So that's very commendable in terms of our Canadian community colleges.

He goes on to say that his college badly needed an infusion of new capital to help them expand and upgrade their infrastructure and acquire leading-edge technology. The announcement did that.

I guess in terms of that announcement being made in January, I know that in my neck of the woods, in western Canada, some of that is beginning to get under way. What's your sense, Terry, as you connect across the country, of what the dollars are getting at? There are some renovations, maintenance; there's some of that stuff beginning to occur already. It takes a while for dollars to get out sometimes, but is this beginning to happen now? Have you talked with people across the country?

[Terry Anne Boyles]

Yes. In advance of the announcements, we had done an analysis of ready-to-go projects in the country, so we knew that a number of the institutions had the plans in place, had the permits in place to move readily because of this capacity shortfall.

The application deadline was the end of March. The very first announcements were actually made, for B.C., in the first week in April. Ontario announcements were made yesterday. So money is starting to flow at different stages across the country on most projects. Of course, they're ready-to-go projects, and the colleges are working with their partners in the construction and engineering industries to bring those forward.

At this point in time, we're still awaiting announcements for Quebec, Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick, and Nunavut and the NWT. So there are some other challenges as we move forward. Also, of course, in the north you have those barriers in terms of the construction season.

[Maurice Vellacott, Conservative, Saskatoon—Wanuskewin, SK]

At a time like this, in the economic downturn, there's a lot of retraining required, and so on. I think there is hope and optimism here, certainly in terms of the community colleges operating at capacity and wait lists being very long. The anticipation, I assume, in this is to reduce those wait lists, to be able to expand the capacity of those places so those students can get in and fill the spots.

[Terry Anne Boyles]

Yes, and as we mentioned in our brief, the infrastructure money is making a dent in the critical shortage of infrastructure for colleges in the country. It needs to move forward. It certainly will be a big step. It also helps to provide the training venues that are so critical for the productivity of the future.

[Maurice Vellacott, Conservative, Saskatoon—Wanuskewin, SK]

Exactly. Thanks very much.

There are a couple of other things in addition to that. In the last budget, the change from these various non-repayable programs, which are now going to come about in the newly created Canada student grant program, will provide, we think and hope, more predictable financial support to students from low- and middle-income families.

I'm virtually out of time here, but maybe Terry Anne can respond quickly. Is this a good thing, from your perspective?

[Terry Anne Boyles]

We know that if there are grants for the first two years of post-secondary institutions, low-income people tend to stay in post-secondary education, but the amount of the grant currently is insufficient.

[Maurice Vellacott, Conservative, Saskatoon—Wanuskewin, SK]

Okay. It has to be increased.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you very much.

We're now going to move to the Bloc.

Madame Beaudin, you have five minutes.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Good morning and welcome. Everything you have said is very interesting, moving, and even a little disconcerting, especially when Ms. Russell spoke to us about a specific case. I am particularly interested in preschoolers. I have worked in this area in Quebec. I feel that our practices are exemplary in our partnership work with all the decision-makers in all areas of community activity to help children and to prepare them for school. I am particularly concerned by the fact that many preschoolers arrive at school without the skills they need in order to learn.

I would first like to know if our involvement should be the same everywhere. For example, the Agence de la santé et des services sociaux de Montréal is presently conducting a study on school readiness in various parts of Montreal to see if the same response is needed everywhere or if it should be different. Politically, should we adopt the same kinds of responses for all provinces and territories? How important to you is citizen involvement through community organizations? I understood that it was very important. Should we continue to fund productive local initiatives? How important to you is the relationship between school, family and community? There are pilot projects along those lines too in Quebec. Should we expand them and work with parents, children and educators?

There, I am afraid that we do not have much time. I would like this to last two hours, but it is not possible.

[Calvin Fraser]

As I said just now, we have to look at the forest, not the trees. The problems are very different from province to province. In Quebec, 67% of children, especially boys, do not complete the secondary level. So the problems there are different from those in Alberta. Different solutions are necessary and we must work with provincial governments to establish what those solutions are. It is always possible to measure not only the number of people who finish school but also what happens when we work with those children. The process is just as important as the result.

[Dr. Paul Cappon]

There are certainly differences between provinces. But the problem of readiness is more or less the same everywhere. I mentioned that one child in four has problems when entering school.

We need one system to analyze and evaluate readiness. At the moment, we have four different systems across Canada. The response will be different in each province, even in each region of a province, because the situation is quite different in each region.

As to the question of the involvement of community organizations, it is critical. That is why we have the composite learning index at the CCL, the Canadian Council on Learning. It is really at neighbourhood level, community level; it is not even provincial level because there are so many differences and so many critical responses at community level.

Lastly, the school-family-community interaction is, once again, critical. Think of the school drop-out problem. The solution does not just lie with the school; it lies with the community as a whole. It really is everyone's problem.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you very much.

From everything you have said, it is clear that there are a lot of problems with eligibility for employment insurance, with accessibility to training and learning, and to funding as well.

We have to do something. This is a priority. We have to get involved with the parents as well as with the children. I always come back to my pre-schoolers. I tell myself that I want to break the cycle of poverty in society by getting involved with the pre-schoolers so that they are prepared when they get to school. We know that the real power lies in information and knowledge.

What kind of involvement do you propose in order to have the greatest and most immediate impact on families and parents?

[Dr. Paul Cappon]

I can think of two things.

First, adult workplace training. Sixteen percent of workers in Canada take no training at work and do not want to take any. This can have a significant intergenerational impact on the children. That is why we cannot put all our resources in early childhood. The impact parents have is so important.

Then there is the question of literacy. Forty-two percent of adult Canadians are below the international literacy standard. This has an impact on the next generation.

So we need direct involvement with early childhood, with schools, with families, but also with the adults who have such a formative effect on the children.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you. That's all the time we have.

We'll now go to Mr. Lobb. Sir, you have five minutes.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Thank you very much.

Thank you to the witnesses for taking the time to provide us with information on this very important study.

I'd like to note to the Teachers' Federation that my brother is a full-fledged teacher in the province of Saskatchewan, so I can appreciate where you're coming from.

I have a question. One of the aspects of poverty that I've tried to focus on is financial literacy amongst all Canadians, definitely our most vulnerable but also our working poor. As we know, many people don't go to college and university, so high school is really the last stop for them. Could you update the committee on what programs you have added, are going to add, or are planning to add, that would really provide some financial literacy and education for our high school students? Many of our young Canadians have no idea about savings, writing cheques, RRSP accounts, GICs, the stock market, even something as simple as on-line banking, Microsoft money, or even Microsoft itself.

Please update the committee on some ideas you're working on.

[Emily Noble]

Calvin and I will do a bit of a Frick and Frack here.

Certainly in my experience at the elementary level, I'd give credit to some of the banks and credit unions. They have some excellent programs with which you can supplement your math programs, some of those kinds of things. I know at the high school level a lot of the banks have programs and will have speakers in.

Part of the challenge with kids is that while you're teaching the hormones are racing, so they're not necessarily focused on what you'd like them to do. But I do know there are some tremendous programs out there. A lot of the programs that ministries of education are looking at are whether these are actually practical programs and skill-based programs. There's more of a look from the ministries of education across the country to get skill-based things. Certainly we don't have enough of those skills. When you talk about the debt load that some of the kids have, even out of secondary school, it's absolutely incredible what they're doing with money and their whole understanding of it. We need to do a lot more.

Calvin, I know you have some experience in Alberta.

[Calvin Fraser]

Yes, and I'm afraid I have to agree with my president there, that's it's in fact all hit and miss curriculum-wise across the country. There are some required programs for every high school student, but the students see these programs as something they have to get through, because of the old adage, “What's counted, counts”. Ultimately those are not the pieces that show up on the big tests; they're not the pieces that determine whether or not they pass.

Frankly, the students don't approach these courses, in the places where they are compulsory, with the type of attitude we'd all like to see, because we know the need is there. So it's really a matter of societal adjustment in terms of the attitude, if we're going to introduce these courses with any success.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Thank you.

I do find it is a bit of a shame that we don't do more for our young people on that front, because that's really one pillar of the piece that's lacking. I think we've seen that in the U.S., where it has been really magnified.

I'd like to ask my last question of Madam Russell—and it is along the lines of student debt as well. In my past, I worked in the finance department of a software company, and one of the things my colleagues and I ended up doing was providing financial counseling to some of our new graduates, because they could not manage their money. It was not necessarily their debt load, but that they had no idea of actually how to manage their money.

I wonder if your group has any ideas beyond looking at ways of repaying debt, but of actually educating young students on what it looks like from the time they enter the first year of university and exactly how many years it will take them to pay off their student debts if they aren't proactive at it.

[Susan Russell]

We have done some work on student debt, and I could probably get some material sent to you.

What we have found is that student debt repayment depends on student employment after graduation. We've also found that women take approximately five years longer to pay their student debt because they often end up in lower-paying jobs after graduation. So all of this is linked to how much you earn after you come out of graduation, as much as it is to poor management.

I'm not aware that students are particularly poor managers of money, but I am aware that at the time they graduate they have substantial debt; and not only do they have to pay their debt, but they also have to live on whatever income they have. They will obviously be at the lowest earning peak in their careers, simply because they're just starting out.

So it's a sort of two-way thing, but I can certainly send you my recommendations.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Well, I appreciate that. I can assure you there are people graduating from our universities today who don't even know how to write a cheque. So I'm not knocking the system; I'm just stating a fact.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you, Mr. Lobb.

We're now going to continue with Ms. Minna, for five minutes, please.