Calgary post-secondaries adjusting policies for international students

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As travel restrictions around the world persist due to COVID-19, post-secondary institutions in Calgary have been working quickly to adapt policies for international students.

Calgary’s five biggest post-secondary institutions — the University of Calgary, Mount Royal University, SAIT, Bow Valley College and St. Mary’s University — are all adjusting plans and programs for students from abroad to continue their studies if they have remained in the city or have chosen to return home.

Yet, despite the uncertainty, some institutions are seeing an increase in applications from those who want to study in Calgary.

“At MRU . . . our number of qualified applicants — number of people who have accepted an offer of admission and number of people who have deposited and registered — are all higher than they were previously in 2018-19,” said Phil Warsaba, Mount Royal’s associate vice-president of students.

There are currently about 500 international students studying at MRU, accounting for around 3.3 per cent of the university’s overall student enrolment. Of these, just over two dozen remain in on-campus residence.

“Our sincere hope is that we are able to guard against any decreases in those numbers both for international and domestic students, but some of the elements of this global health crisis are pretty hard to predict or forecast,” he said. “But the travel restriction piece for new students is one that we’re closely monitoring.”

Warsaba added that MRU, like many other post-secondaries, has relaxed the application process to allow international students to apply for the fall semester later in the spring, if their ability to access certain documents, such as transcripts, has been affected by COVID-19.

“We haven’t officially extended our deadlines but we’re continuing to admit international students on a daily basis, and we’ll be as flexible as we possibly can be.”

Leadership at the U of C — which has 4,588 international students, 720 of whom live in residence — also noted an increase in applications from abroad.

“As the deadline for applications preceded the COVID-19 outbreak, we did not see a decrease in international applications. In fact, international applications had actually increased,” the university said in an emailed statement. “We continue to track the acceptance of offers, and, to date, we have not seen any significant changes.”

The U of C has also extended the deadline to April 13 for prospective students to submit documentation. For students that have already been admitted, the final document deadline has been extended to the fall.

“It is too early to tell what the impact on the university will be. We receive many more applications than spaces available and we are considering multiple options to ensure our overall enrolment goals are achieved,” the statement read. “Our international students help enrich our campus by bringing a diversity of world views and perspectives, so we are doing all that we can to mitigate any potential impact.”

St. Mary’s University, which only has 16 international students out of around 1,000 students in total this term, has used the current situation as an opportunity to “think outside of the box,” said Dr. Pablo Ortiz, director of student affairs.

Ortiz said the university made a quick switch to online courses and it’s become a “great training ground” for what might happen in the fall and in 2021.

“There are going to be three scenarios for the fall semester — either we go face-to-face, completely online or in a blended format,” he said. “A blended format would mean half the students are on campus and half online, and switching to give students the chance to be on campus one day and online the other. But nothing is set in stone, we’re exploring all possibilities.”

International students who already have a study permit or have obtained approval through a post-secondary institution can now begin their classes online outside of Canada, and can complete up to 50 per cent of their studies from their country of origin if they cannot travel outside of the country soon.

That move is just one of the things Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) is doing to accommodate international students during the pandemic.

In an emailed statement, Shannon Kerr with the IRCC said they are also offering to extend study and work permits that were set to expire for students in Canada who cannot get home before their permit expires.

“Courses of study being delivered online on an exceptional basis due to COVID-19 will not affect Post-Graduation Work Permit (PGWP) program eligibility,” she said. “Time spent in distance learning due to the current situation created by the COVID-19 pandemic will be counted toward PGWP eligibility, as long as more than half of their program is completed within Canada.”

This includes students on study permits who’ve remained in Canada or who have returned home and continue to take classes online, new students already in Canada ahead of a study term whose course will initially be online, and applicants who have been approved for May and June studies who will begin their courses online from their country of origin.

At Bow Valley College (BVC), 2,400 international students and just over 15,000 other students moved to online courses within the first 10 days of the pandemic declaration. The college’s director of international education, Derek Lemieux, said one of the biggest focuses was offering other supports, specifically for international students.

“We made sure we reached out to them to provide advice on a number of different things, so we moved everything online, obviously, but we were offering counselling service to them, both mental-health and academic counselling,” Lemieux said. “We also provided them with access to a regulated Canadian immigration consultant if they had questions about their immigration status.”

So far, BVC hasn’t seen a “significant increase or decrease” in applications from abroad, but said the ability to allow students who can’t travel to Canada to start their studies online from home without affecting their study permits has been “a welcome support.”

“We’re also working with our students to potentially postpone or defer their study time with us in May if they decide they’d prefer to wait and study with us in September,” he said. “And reaching out to them to see what their preference is and working with them to move their start date if that’s something they want to do.”

SAIT spokesman Chris Gerritsen said school officials are also in talks with the provincial and federal governments to ensure minimal disruption to international students.

“SAIT values being a global leader in applied education and attracting students from around the world to Calgary,” he said in an emailed statement. “We are working closely with our government partners to ensure our international students are able to start their SAIT programs remotely for the May intake in their country of residence while the travel bans and other government restrictions are in place.”

ocondon@postmedia.com