Conservative, Liberal and NDP stance on post-secondary education
Rahman Mohamed

The 2014 Ontario Provincial Election is in full swing.  And one of the central topics is education.

One of the first education candles to take the flame was the Green Party of Ontario’s controversial plan to merge the Catholic and Public school boards across the province if elected.  Post-secondary education is strong issue in this election too.

The “1,000,000 Jobs Plan” Election Platform of the Ontario Progressive Conservatives plans to rewrite the rules of Apprenticeship and eliminate the College of Trades.  He also plans to offer more high school-college dual credits to encourage college entrance.  For Universities he plans to place more emphasis on the “quality and quantity of teaching, and on the importance of critical thinking”, placing more emphasis on science, business, and math to increase economic growth and increase entrepreneurship.

Not only that Tim Hudak says he’ll make it easier for students to transfer from college to university AND transfer from university to college while keeping their credits.

According to the plan the Conservatives will “also make sure that no student is denied access because of a lack of money.” On May 14 CBC reported that their election platform will eliminate the 30% tuition grant.

On May 22, at University of Toronto, Andrea Horwath revealed the NDP election platform, saying that they would freeze tuition, make provincial loans interest free.  And because she knows students don’t want to live in their parents’ basement, create a tax incentive to encourage job creation.

On top of that the NDP platform includes removing the HST from Hydro and Auto Insurance because Ontarians are tiered of seeing an eroding lifestyle and want to see one that improves.

Kathleen Wynne and the Liberals haven’t announced any plans for changes to a post-secondary lifestyle.