Higher Education in Newfoundland and Labrador - Funding

Funding

As with many Canadian public colleges and universities in the 1990s, those in Newfoundland experienced a huge drop in government funding and had to deal with budgeting challenges. Newfoundland’s provincial revenues dropped significantly during this decade, falling 30% from 1992 through 1998 alone, equaling $3,500 per student. Since 1999, after years of funding cuts, program closures and skyrocketing tuition fees, access to and quality of post-secondary education have greatly improved in Newfoundland and Labrador. Freezing and reducing tuition fees, improving student financial aid, and increasing funding to the province’s two post-secondary institutions have resulted in increased enrollment. Even in this environment, however, Memorial University and the College of the North Atlantic have turned increasingly to private funding in the form of corporate donations or short-term training contracts.

The Newfoundland and Labrador Government provided $3 million funding in 2006-07 to match, dollar-for-dollar, private sector contributions made to Memorial University and the College of the North Atlantic to support various infrastructure projects. In order to receive the funding, both institutions had to submit all eligible receipts to the Department of Education. This was year two of a three-year, $9 million initiative contained in the White Paper.