Student affordability

2024 Initiatives

Consistent tuition increases and skyrocketing costs of housing and groceries are just some of the financial pressures students are facing, and your representatives at SAMU are hard at work advocating to the university and all levels of government for better supports for the students of MacEwan.

We would like to thank all those students who responded to our recent 2024 Student Affordability Survey. Your feedback on how you’re being impacted by the cost of living and education will ensure we have an accurate idea of what needs students are facing, how you’re coping with pressures, and where SAMU’s advocacy should be focused.

2022/2023 Initiatives

In October of 2022, SAMU kicked off the tuition and fees consultation process with MacEwan University, as mandated by the tuition and fees regulations put forward by the Government of Alberta through the Advanced Education Minister. In order to ensure SAMU’s position in these conversations was relevant to the current student experience, the organization conducted a series of consultations with the student body, including focus groups and social media engagement, as well as referencing the findings from SAMU’s 2022 annual survey of students.

Following extensive consultation with the students of MacEwan University, it was SAMU’s position that we are opposed to any increase to tuition or fees for students for the 2023/2024 academic year, for a variety of reasons. Most urgently, the present state of affordability for MacEwan students can only be characterized as dire. While the cost of living has increased almost universally, students find themselves exceptionally vulnerable to the ongoing affordability crisis, forced to choose between a meal and enough gas to drive to school.

As a part of the tuition and fees consultation, the university administration presented a plan to increase tuition for the next academic year by 5.5%, a proposal that SAMU spoke against on behalf of students. However, SAMU doesn’t have the power to veto the tuition increase proposal, and in the December meeting of MacEwan’s Board of Governors, the motion to increase tuition for the upcoming year passed–with student members of the Board voting against the increase.

SAMU has conducted a survey of students so you could help guide our next steps and tell us how we should respond to this decision.

Thank you to all those that took the time to respond!

If you have any questions about the proposed tuition increase or SAMU’s response, reach out to your elected representatives at SAMU through this link.

Watch this page for further updates, developments and announcements.