Finance committee  Good evening. My name is Bilan Arte, and I am the national chairperson for the Canadian Federation of Students. The Canadian Federation of Students is Canada's largest and oldest national student organization, representing more than 650,000 students across the country. Our organ

Finance committee  Yes, absolutely. We know that in previous governments there were significant investments in what is called the SR and ED tax credit system. It is our recommendation that monies from that tax credit be redirected into the tri-council system for research, particularly targeting gra

Finance committee  If you look through pages 4 onward in the submission that we provided, there are costings for each of our recommendations.

Finance committee  Many of them are actually cost neutral. It's about reinvestment of existing funds that the federal government is spending in and around post-secondary education into policies and programs that we find would be more efficient actually increasing accessibility.

Finance committee  What we're saying is that current tax credits and various savings schemes—for example, tax credits that exist around tuition programs, textbook programs, or in addition to that the RESP program, as one that many might be familiar with as well—are oftentimes programs that benefit

Finance committee  I think we would see more and more Canadians being able to access post-secondary education. As a result, we would also see more and more young people being able to gain access to the skills and training they need in order to be successful in today's workforce. It's no secret tha

Status of Women committee  Thank you very much. Good afternoon, members of the committee and fellow witnesses. First and foremost, I'd like to thank you for inviting me. I'm on campus today, as you can tell. I'm joining you from St. John's, and I'm on campus at Memorial University, speaking to students ab

Status of Women committee  Absolutely.

Status of Women committee  Thank you for the question. I don't have any particular data around first-generation students, but I think some of the data from Statistics Canada tells us that marginalized communities, specifically students who come from racialized backgrounds, immigrant backgrounds, or some o

Status of Women committee  I'll try to keep it short so that Danika can also have some speaking time. When it comes to good examples, York University has developed a pretty comprehensive and, I think, exemplary program. The sexual violence support centres on campus are almost entirely run by students, so

Status of Women committee  Absolutely. I do share this concern. Being here in Newfoundland, I had the opportunity at a skills conference this weekend to meet students not only from Memorial University but from a lot of the satellite campuses that this institution has. They go as far up into the island as

Human Resources committee  Thank you very much. Good morning, members of the committee, and thank you for inviting me to speak before you. My name is Bilan Arte and I'm the national chairperson of the Canadian Federation of Students. The Canadian Federation of Students is Canada's oldest and largest nat

Human Resources committee  Absolutely, I will. Thank you for that. In 2013-14, 203,887 graduates couldn't make a single payment on their Canada student loan. This claim required reporting pre-tax incomes of less than $20,000 per year. Earlier this month, the Canada student loans program adjusted its mini

Human Resources committee  Thank you for that. I really want to appreciate the emphasis that this is the most indebted generation in Canadian history. I believe we are in a crisis when it comes to access to education; furthermore, when 70% of new jobs require some form of post-secondary education, studen

Human Resources committee  I'll be very quick, then. Removing the cap on the post-secondary student support program, which I would emphasize is a federal program for public funding of first nations' access to post-secondary education—a guaranteed treaty right, and something that is very much cited within