Evidence of meeting #13 for Science and Research in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was graduate.
A recording is available from Parliament.
7 p.m.
Liberal
Ron McKinnon Liberal Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC
Thank you.
I will extend that same question to Dr. Blit, if he wouldn't mind.
7 p.m.
Associate Professor, University of Waterloo, As an Individual
My apologies that I don't know the number, so I can't give you hard data on this.
My sense is that at least when it comes to academia, I think what Dr. LaMontagne was mentioning earlier was that there are more lecturer positions instead of tenure-track positions doing research. Obviously, if there are fewer research tenure-track positions, more of our graduates or Ph.D.s are going abroad or having to find work outside their preferred field or outside their preferred area.
If we want to talk more generally about the brain drain—not just researchers and professors, but more generally—again I don't have the data. The World Intellectual Property Organization, or WIPO, looks at inventers around the world—people who have invented patents. They look at what country they're from and where they are living. Canada had the biggest number of Canadians living abroad who had patented, second only to China and India. Given that China and India have a billion people plus, it is quite shocking. Imagine how many people we're losing who could be contributing to innovation.
7:05 p.m.
Liberal
Ron McKinnon Liberal Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC
Let's build on that.
You certainly mentioned that we're losing a lot of our inventors. Much of the research that is done in Canada is not capitalized on here. The benefit goes somewhere else.
What can we do, as a government? What kinds of policies can we bring forward that will change that picture, so that we can encourage more private industry to take up some of these opportunities and advance them within our own country and for our own economy?
7:05 p.m.
Associate Professor, University of Waterloo, As an Individual
That's a million-dollar question. It's complicated. However, let me at least share a few ideas.
The biggest challenge is at the interface of research and invention, in universities and other places and industry. It's that interface between the two; there just isn't enough communication between those two parties. A lot of the research either sits in someone's drawer or gets picked up by foreign firms or something of the sort.
One thing I've been seeing that I'm quite encouraged by is this idea that instead of creating a Canadian...like an RPA or a CARPA, try to create some kind of a system similar to what they have in Israel or Finland. We've been talking about this.
Basically, it does a few things. One is that it convenes players, university researchers and industry, around big topics, ideas and problems. This is something the government can play an important role in doing, bringing people together.
Another thing it can do related to this is to connect people. If there's a firm or business that needs expertise in AI or something like that, they often don't know where to get it. They could connect that firm with university researchers in those areas.
Lastly, it's support for R and D. I mentioned in my testimony that our firms are doing almost no R and D—very little. We're last in the G7, and going down. We can reform the SR and ED system, but we can also do some direct support of R and D.
I'm encouraged by the latest things that I'm hearing. I think we need to move more in this direction.
If I can give a final plug to the University of Waterloo, I think the University of Waterloo is doing some very excellent things in terms of entrepreneurship and commercialization. We're right now trying to ramp that up by creating an office that's going to be devoted specifically to that.
7:05 p.m.
Liberal
Ron McKinnon Liberal Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC
Thank you, Doctor.
Thank you to everyone.
I had other questions, but I'm out of time.
Dr. LaMontagne, I think you'll have to wait. Thank you.
7:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Kirsty Duncan
Thank you, Mr. McKinnon.
Mr. Blanchette-Joncas, the floor is yours.
Maxime, we are glad you are able to join us tonight. Bienvenue.
7:05 p.m.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC
Madam Chair, greetings to you, my colleagues and the witnesses who are with us this evening.
My first questions are for Mr. Perreault.
Mr. Perreault, allow me to congratulate you and to applaud the outstanding work that Acfas does, including at the 89th annual conference held last week in Quebec City. I also want to acknowledge all the work that was done during that conference, where 3,500 scientific papers were presented exclusively in French. Congratulations! Lastly, I want to thank Acfas for all the work it has done for science in French both in Quebec and throughout the francophonie.
Turning to the subject of our study, which is the recruitment and retention of talent at our post-secondary institutions, you raised a concern that has also been mentioned by several other witnesses in recent meetings, the fact that the Canadian government's scholarships haven't been raised since 2003. You of course cited the example of inflation, which is quite striking.
I'd like to give you a chance to tell us more about the impact that situation has had on our universities.
Is it affecting the attraction and retention of talent at the postgraduate levels?
7:05 p.m.
Vice-President, Research and Graduate Studies, Université de Sherbrooke
The answer is relatively simple. We are betraying the next generation by offering very poor financial conditions to support students.
Fewer and fewer Canadians are choosing to study at the master's and doctoral levels. All Canadian universities are recruiting increasing numbers of students internationally, many of whom then return to their countries of origin. Since Canadians are generous, we therefore contribute to the development of research and innovation around the world.
We should begin by establishing an excellent scholarship system to ensure that study at the master's and doctoral levels is an attractive proposition. As I mentioned in my statement, all these individuals will then contribute to the Canadian economy by holding a series of positions. It's a well-known fact that the more people study at university, the less unemployment they encounter in their careers. They regenerate the economy throughout their careers, even if only as a result of their training. The talent pool is thus the starting point.
The second point to consider is that more students are being forced to take jobs because they can't make ends meet on their university scholarships alone. This takes up time that they should be spending on their studies. Students across the country now tend to take longer to complete post-secondary studies. Here too, we're doing ourselves a disservice. We should instead be encouraging them to finish their education sooner by providing proper support, as was done for our generation, so they can focus entirely on their studies while at university.
7:10 p.m.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Thériault
The Bureau de coopération interuniversitaire recommends that scholarships be raised to $25,000 at the master's level and $35,000 at the doctoral level.
What's your opinion of the Australian model, which advocates annual indexing based on inflation?
7:10 p.m.
Vice-President, Research and Graduate Studies, Université de Sherbrooke
It's one thing to increase scholarships, but they'll have to be indexed annually based on the rate of inflation or else we'll be doing ourselves the same disservice. If scholarships had been indexed to the rate of inflation since 2003, they'd be worth $25,000 today. We just forgot that students, like us, also had to buy butter at the grocery store and that costs had increased. That's the problem.
A system also has to be put in place to catch up and increase the number of scholarships to cover all sectors because I think all disciplines are equally important. Then scholarships will have to be indexed to the cost of living.
7:10 p.m.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC
Thank you.
You've presented a point of view that we haven't really heard so far in this committee. You said that students coming to the end of their undergraduate degree had to choose between continuing their studies at the master's level while living below the poverty line or entering the labour force, where, given the labour shortage, they can find a new job on attractive terms.
Please tell us more about this new dynamic.
7:10 p.m.
Vice-President, Research and Graduate Studies, Université de Sherbrooke
I can do better than that. The labour market is so hot right now that universities are having trouble helping students finish their undergraduate degrees and actually graduate. That's definitely the case in the information technology field. In IT, students often leave university after a year and a half because they're offered jobs at salaries of $80,000. Consequently, when they decide to do a master's degree, they're asked, “Do you want to work 40 hours a week for $80,000 a year or to work 60 hours a week as a graduate student living below the country's poverty line?” Those are the options they're offered.
7:10 p.m.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC
Thank you, Mr. Perreault.
Can you think of any other measures the government could take to establish positive conditions and thus attract and retain talent at educational institutions?
7:10 p.m.
Vice-President, Research and Graduate Studies, Université de Sherbrooke
I can talk about two or three elements. First of all, student support programs are essential, especially federal programs, because they are the best in Canada. They set the standard for all future organizations and foundations.
Graduate student pathways and support also need to be much more effective to help them obtain their degree quickly and they may need further guidance if they have entrepreneurial aspirations. I think that universities are beginning to do this, but there's still a lot more to be done. It would be a way of promoting innovation, which in itself would pay back any investments in scholarships.
7:15 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Kirsty Duncan
I'll have to interrupt you, Mr. Perreault.
Monsieur Blanchette-Joncas, I'm sorry. It's the worst part of this job.
We're delighted, Mr. Bachrach, that you can join us tonight. We thank you for joining us.
You have six minutes, please.
7:15 p.m.
Taylor Bachrach Skeena—Bulkley Valley, NDP
Thank you so much, Madam Chair.
I'm delighted to be here on behalf of my wonderful colleague, Mr. Cannings, who's an actual scientist and would probably be much better suited to this discussion than I am, but I'm going to do my very best.
It is an interesting conversation. I've appreciated all of the insights that our witnesses have shared with us so far.
I'd like to start with Dr. LaMontagne and pick up on some of these questions around support for graduate students. This was brought to my attention in an article in The Globe and Mail from May 12, regarding scholarship amounts in Canada for science graduates. I'll read the first sentence. Some of the witnesses are probably familiar with the article. It says, “Federal scholarships intended to support some of Canada’s most accomplished graduate students in science have become so devalued by inflation that those who receive them are effectively earning below the poverty line absent any additional means of income, a coalition of senior researchers has warned.” Obviously, they're looking to the government to increase these scholarships.
Dr. LaMontagne, as someone who's worked in both Canadian and American universities, can you talk a bit about how the low value of these scholarships and the fact that they haven't gone up in 19 years impact graduate students, and how things might differ between Canada and the United States?
7:15 p.m.
Associate Professor, DePaul University, As an Individual
Sure. I'll start with a bit of my experience.
When I started my Ph.D., back in 2001, I got a mortgage in Edmonton based on my salary as a graduate student. I don't think that's happening anymore. I'll say that to start.
The difference between Canada and the U.S. is that there are different opportunities for researchers to fund graduate students. For instance, in the United States, when I apply for a grant, I can put a graduate student on that grant and it would pay them a salary and would pay their tuition. I don't think those same opportunities exist in Canada, and that's a function of the difference in the granting system and the opportunity for individual researchers in the U.S. system to have many different grants to fund many different projects at the same time.
I don't want to say that everything is better in the U.S. with the money that graduate students are getting. In some universities, students are getting quite a lot, but there are still issues with students being at the poverty line.
7:15 p.m.
Skeena—Bulkley Valley, NDP
What percentage of graduate students would you say are able to live on the scholarship or grant money that they secure, versus having to work a second or third job?
I think Mr. Perreault touched on this and talked a bit about how working additional jobs takes away from their ability to focus on the reason they're at the university. Some may be waiting tables in the evening or may have to travel to a work site so they can earn enough money to put food on the table.
How many students would you say are in that position, relatively speaking?
7:15 p.m.
Associate Professor, DePaul University, As an Individual
I don't have specific numbers on that, but it's definitely an issue. In some schools and some systems, graduate students may get paid during the academic year but then not during the summer, and that's going to influence their ability to do research. When you're making money below the poverty line, you have to have another job in order to put food on the table and do everything you need to do.
I don't have numbers, but maybe someone else does.
7:15 p.m.
Skeena—Bulkley Valley, NDP
I wonder if Dr. MacLatchy might have a sense of that, as the president of Wilfrid Laurier University.
Do you have a sense of what proportion of graduate students are working additional jobs in order to make ends meet?
7:15 p.m.
President and Vice-Chancellor, Wilfrid Laurier University
I would venture to say that almost all of them are, and some of them are doing work that's very complementary to their studies. For example, they are teaching assistants in undergraduate labs, so they're enhancing their professional skill development and teaching skills. Those are great opportunities, but more and more students, even ones on the best federal scholarships, are also taking part-time jobs as servers in restaurants and other types of positions, because of costs.
I think the other critical thing to consider here is that not only are the students living below the poverty line, but they're also paying tuition to the institution, which, depending on the institution, is going to be $6,000, $7,000 or $10,000-plus that you have to take off the top of those scholarships. What is left is then what they have to pay for rent and food. One thing that most Canadian universities don't do is tuition remissions for graduate students, so I think that's also a really important concern.
Very often I have students ask me if they can take on an additional TA job or something like that. As their supervisor, I don't want to say no, even though I know it's going to take away from their research activities. I also understand that they need to pay their bills. As students get older and become post-docs, there's also a greater chance that they're thinking about starting families and doing other things that really have to be taken into consideration as well.
7:20 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Kirsty Duncan
Dr. MacLatchy, I'm sorry to interrupt.
Mr. Bachrach, once again, we're delighted you could join us.
We're now going to go to the second round of questions. This one is for five minutes, and we begin with Mr. Williams.
7:20 p.m.
Conservative
Ryan Williams Conservative Bay of Quinte, ON
Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and thank you very much to our witnesses.
Our chair knows too well that we have so many great questions and we only have a bit of time, but I'm happy for my colleagues who have asked some great questions.
Dr. Blit, I am going to start with you. That was a fantastic discussion. I think you had some great examples. You say we can keep students from STEM, but we're losing STEM students, so I'm going to talk about retention.
I know there's no silver bullet for fixing these innovation problems, as you've mentioned, so what is step one to keeping students specifically in STEM, as you've mentioned, in Canada?
7:20 p.m.
Associate Professor, University of Waterloo, As an Individual
If the question is how to keep STEM-educated students from leaving Canada, obviously one key is to have good-paying jobs in the STEM sector in Canada, and I think the government can control that only so much.
One change that has come with COVID-19 is that we've all learned to work remotely, and I think a lot of firms have now decided that you can have research teams that have people all over the world. What that means is that potentially a lot of our students who were moving, maybe, to Silicon Valley, Boston or anywhere else may end up staying in Canada and working remotely for these multinationals.
Of course, that's kind of a two-edged sword, because, if you think about our small firms that are trying to hire STEM-educated graduates, they're now competing with all these multinationals that are setting up these remote working situations. I think there has been a paradigm shift because of this shift to remote work.
Another thing has happened. I have friends who are CEOs of tech firms, and they are starting to hire. Their employees asked if they could start working remotely. They were all Canadian, and they said yes, and within six months they realized they were paying these guys three times what they would be paying someone in India, Brazil, Russia or wherever you want, so they're starting to hire from abroad now because everyone is working remotely. There has been a very strong paradigm shift here.
I'll just add one last thing. If we can keep students, graduates in STEM, in Canada for three or four years after they graduate, then I think they will probably stay long term, because, by that time, they've probably settled down and maybe they're starting to have kids. Really it's a matter of how we can keep them around for three or four years, and I think we could get creative. Right now tuition's very high. What if anyone who stays for four years gets a complete refund or a half refund of their tuition? You know, these are just crazy ideas, but....
7:20 p.m.
Conservative
Ryan Williams Conservative Bay of Quinte, ON
I love your idea about creating big ideas. Are you familiar with the U.S. Department of Energy's earthshots program? They're looking at big ideas. They're putting a lot of money behind solving those with specific targets that they want to hit. For all the U.S. energy, it's going to be geothermal and solar and wind.
We have different kinds of challenges here in Canada, and we talk about genomics and glycomics. There are a lot of different things that we're excelling on. Looking at your idea from Israel and Finland, are they doing some of that? Is that a direction you think we should be taking for more of that commercialization?