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Call for a complimentary evaluation Building Financial Independence Crosby Audl SUSAN MacDONALD 884â€"0392 Associate Broker PETER BENNINGER REALTY Broker An Independently Owned and Operated Member Broker of Coldwell Banker Affiliation of Canada Lunch and Learn Seminar Broker “g EdwardJones Serving Individual Investors ile university stuâ€" Wems across the country rallied against the soaring cost of education last week, local university officials said they were caught in the middle of a cash crunch Students protest soaring education costs Students across Canada took part in a day of action Wednesday to highlight conâ€" cerns about the lack of affordability and accessibiliâ€" ty in postâ€"secondary educaâ€" tion. John Wilkinson, a doctorâ€" ate student in philosophy at Member CIPF 200 Highland Rd. W. Kitchener, ON N2H 3C2 (519) 576â€"8790 In Kelsey‘s Plaza Member CIPF www .crosbyywaudi.com www.edward www.edwardjones.com 1175 Weber St. E., Kit. By Bos VRBANAC Chronicle Staff 894â€"9300 jones.com Wilfrid Laurier student Kristi Kemp puts another brick in the debt wall at a student protest last week at the Waterloo school. Wilfrid Laurier University, _ $25,000 in accumulated said that since the Mike debt. In 1990, the average Harris government dereguâ€" _ debt load was $10,000. lated tuition fees for all gradâ€" Studies have shown that uate and certain professionâ€" _ the added debt burden has al programs in 1998, stuâ€" â€" made postâ€"secondary eduâ€" dents have seen a 500â€"perâ€" _ cation less accessible to lowâ€" cent hike in tuition fees. . income students. Without a Ontario now has the second _ tuition _ freeze, _ middleâ€" highest tuition fees in the _ income students will also be country, and the lowest govâ€" _ affected, leaving universities ernment grants per student. _ the private reserve of only Fears of wider deregulaâ€" tion of tuition fees sparked sitâ€"ins at Queen‘s University in Kingston in January, and at the University of Guelph two weeks ago. Wilkinson said students are fearful more and more each day that there won‘t be a publicly funded, accessible postâ€"secâ€" ondary education system. "The trick going on in Ontario the last few years is to cut government grants and let universities raise tuitions, which they pretty much have to do at this point to cover costs," said the grad student swimming under his own mountain of debt. Maria Hatzipantelis, viceâ€" president of student affairs for WLU‘s Graduate Students Association, said with the doubling of tuition fees over the past 10 years most stuâ€" dents are graduating with &4 d 4 Studies have shown that the added debt burden has made postâ€"secondary eduâ€" cation less accessible to lowâ€" income students. Without a tuition _ freeze, _ middleâ€" income students will also be affected, leaving universities the private reserve of only those few students who can afford it. "We feel that education is a right, as it is under the United Nations declaration of human rights," said Hatzipantelis. "We really want to make sure that is being upheld in Ontario and Canada. "Other provinces have started to freeze their tuition fees, or actually started to decrease them. Here, in Ontario, we‘re seeing a conâ€" tinual rise in our fees that is starting to act as a barrier to postâ€"secondary education." While most of their critiâ€" cism is directed at the govâ€" ernment, protesters think university administrations have capitulated instead of fighting â€" the continuing increase. "Universities are being forced into a position where the only way to keep our institutions open is to either raise our tuition fees, or raise private _ funding," _ said Hatzipantelis. "We as the students are saying that‘s not what we want "We want our education system to remain a publiclyâ€" funded system." Dr. Bob Rosehart, presiâ€" dent of Wilfrid Laurier University, said he‘d also like to see postâ€"secondary eduâ€" cation _ remain â€" publicly funded. But the universities are caught in the middle of declining government grants due to inflation, with expanding enrolment presâ€" sures made more acute by the double cohort of two high school â€" graduating classes coming out in 2003. But keeping the costs of university education down can‘t come at the expense of quality. "Our preference would be to see more public fundâ€" ing, but having said that we always have to keep in the back of our mind the quality of what we‘re doing," said Rosehart. "I would see wider deregulation as sort of a less desirable approach to mainâ€" taining quality." But the battle between accessibility and quality will be further impugned by the double cohort. That flood of applicants has already startâ€" ed to wash up on the steps of local universities, with more students fastâ€"tracking to beat the crunch of the more than _ 90,000 _ university spaces needed by 2005. Figures released by the university application centre Friday show that applicaâ€" tions to Wilfrid Laurier have jumped by 17.7 per cent. while at the University of Waterloo the increase is 18.2 per cent. That‘s on top of the record _ 2,700 _ students accepted into Laurier last September, and the 4,518 firstâ€"year students accepted by UW, exceeding its initial cutoff. "What seems to be hapâ€" pening is that there are more students showing up than Continued on page 7