How Student Organizations are Mobilizing Against Tuition Hikes at Concordia University in Montreal.

When the Quebec government announced that the tuition for out of province will rise from around $9000 to $17,000, student groups in Montreal universities began to work together, protest, and join forces to mobilize and put pressure on the provincial government. 

Julianna Smith, campaigns coordinator at the Concordia Student Union (CSU) said that the province’s announcement on tuition hikes came at a really bad time with no warning for student groups like CSU to prepare. “We're in the midst of a geopolitical crisis with the war that's going on in Israel and Palestine so this news came out just a week later.” 

“And as someone who is very tuned into social justice affairs you know this was just like another blow at the time like we also had like a bunch of anti-trans legislation that was going on throughout the country at the time too so it felt like just yet another attack on you know an overburdened activist community.” 

Yet, even with the short notice, the CSU and student groups and faculty members at McGill and Bishop University have come together to push back against the province. 

“We've been doing some Coalition building with different departmental and faculty associations within Concordia but also really trying to branch out to include departmental and faculty associations at McGill. We also have some collaborators within francophone institutions,”

“Because this is such a short timeline we've really been having to move as quickly as possible to like build our numbers and build our strength because we know that historically what happens is when our province and international students are targeted first with a tuition hike, they then shortly after, come for Quebec residents, so overall you know we know this is a fight that will impact all students regardless,” says Smith.